Gregory McMichael will face trial on federal hate crime charges in Ahmaud Arbery killing after withdrawing plea agreement

By Travis Caldwell, CNN

Gregory McMichael is expected to face trial on federal hate crime charges for his role in the 2020 killing of Ahmaud Arbery after withdrawing a plea agreement.

Attorneys for Gregory McMichael informed the court that the prior plea agreement over hate crime charges is null and void, according to court documents filed Thursday in federal district court. Trial proceedings are slated to begin Monday. He has pleaded not guilty.

The federal charges include one count of interference with rights and one count of attempted kidnapping, according to an indictment.

Gregory McMichael was found guilty on state charges and sentenced last month to life in prison for his role in the 2020 killing of Ahmaud Arbery, a Black man who was chased and gunned down after jogging near Brunswick, Georgia.

Travis McMichael, Gregory’s son and the man who shot and killed Arbery, will make a court appearance Friday for a change of plea hearing, according to the court docket. His plea deal with prosecutors was rejected by a federal judge Monday.

Travis McMichael had agreed to plead guilty to a single hate crime charge — interference with rights — in exchange for prosecutors recommending he serve 30 years in federal prison.

After completing the federal sentence, he would’ve been returned to Georgia to finish his sentence of life in prison without parole. Five of those final years would have counted toward his supervised release from federal prison.

Witnesses who spoke at Monday’s plea hearing included an FBI special agent, who testified that authorities searched Travis McMichael’s cell phone and social media accounts and found “frequent use of racial slurs” in reference to Black people.

US District Judge Lisa Godbey Wood said she was not comfortable with the sentencing guidelines. Arbery’s family also opposed the deal.

The Department of Justice respected the court’s decision to not accept the plea and had “entered the plea agreement only after the victims’ attorneys informed me that the family was not opposed to it,” Kristen Clarke, assistant attorney general for the Civil Rights Division, said in a statement provided to CNN.

The judge had been expected to rule separately on the same plea deal for Gregory McMichael, but after the judge rejected Travis’ deal, attorneys for both McMichaels asked for more time to decide whether to change their pleas to guilty.

A third individual found responsible for Arbery’s murder, neighbor William “Roddie” Bryan, was sentenced to life with the possibility of parole and also faces federal hate crime charges.

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CNN’s Alta Spells, Raja Razek, Maria Cartaya, Elliot C. McLaughlin, Angela Barajas and Melissa Alonso contributed to this report.