Ahmaud Arbery Holds Us Accountable

In this precise moment, the sky over coastal Georgia is as clear and as blue as I have ever seen it.  The wind is gentle across the marsh.  An osprey circles contentedly overhead.  The tide has turned. On February 23, 2020, three men took the life of Ahmaud Arbery.   Between that day and today, grey clouds have cast shadows over this place.  But today, the clouds have lifted.  From now on, the day before Thanksgiving will have a new significance here in coastal Georgia.  It will be remembered as the day that twelve of our neighbors re-affirmed the value of Ahmaud Arbery’s life and repudiated the notion that his killing was justified.

Ahmaud’s killers and their lawyers didn’t argue that the killing didn’t happen; rather they argued that it was justified.  They argued that Ahmaud’s repeated presence in their neighborhood justified the taking of his life.  They argued that Ahmaud’s refusal to explain his presence justified the taking of his life.  They argued that Ahmaud’s running and his swift, athletic pace – which they were unable to match on foot – justified them in chasing him in pick-ups and taking his life.  They argued that Ahmaud was to blame for his own death.  That he should not have defended himself.  They argued that any reasonable person would have killed Ahmaud, given the same chance.

In the past, I am ashamed to say that those same arguments have repeatedly won out in other courtrooms across our country and particularly here in the South. Thousands of instances of racial terror lynching have been documented in communities across our region, where white people were not held accountable for killing people of color and where such unpunished murders terrorized countless others into believing that their mere presence in the wrong place was a crime punishable by death.  Ahmaud’s killers said they didn’t witness him commit any crime, but they knew he must have done something wrong.  His killers’ lawyers invited, even begged, the jury to infer that Ahmaud had committed a crime to justify his killing.  But today the jury refused.  The jury said, No.  Not here.  Not anymore.  So, even as we have so many more rivers to cross and many more cloudy days ahead, today we rejoice.  And each year from here on out, on Thanksgiving Eve, we will  remember this day and rejoice and offer up thanks for Ahmaud and for his family and for the jury of ordinary citizens who re-affirmed his humanity.