Ahmaud Arbery Killer Fears for Life in State Prison

Travis McMichael, who along with his father, Greg McMichael, and neighbor, William “Roddie” Bryan, hunted down, shot and killed jogger Ahmaud Arbery in a small Georgia town is requesting to serve his sentence in Federal Prison because he fears he will be killed in State Prison.

The Associated Press reports

In Georgia, the McMichaels and Bryan were sentenced to life in prison after being convicted of Arbery’s murder in a state court last fall. They have remained in a county jail in custody of U.S. marshals since standing trial in February in federal court, where a jury convicted them of hate crimes. Each defendant now faces a potential second life sentence.

Once the men are sentenced Monday by U.S. District Court Judge Lisa Godbey Wood, protocol would be to turn them over the Georgia Department of Corrections to serve their prison terms for murder. That’s because they were first arrested and tried by state authorities.

For Travis McMichael, “his concern is that he will promptly be killed upon delivery to the state prison system for service of that sentence,” Copeland wrote in her sentencing request. “He has received numerous threats of death that are credible in light of all circumstances.”

Copeland said she has alerted Georgia’s corrections agency, “which has replied that these threats are unverified and that it can securely house McMichael in state custody.”

Greg McMichael, 66, has also asked the judge to put him in federal rather than state prison, citing safety concerns and health problems.

Arbery’s family family has insisted the McMichaels and Bryan should serve their sentences in a state prison, arguing a federal penitentiary wouldn’t be as tough. His parents objected forcefully before the federal trial when both McMichaels sought a plea deal that would have included a request to transfer them to federal prison. The judge ended up rejecting the plea agreement.

“Granting these men their preferred choice of confinement would defeat me,” Arbery’s mother, Wanda Cooper-Jones, told the judge at a hearing Jan. 31. “It gives them one last chance to spit in my face.”