Thread by @VoteBeebe

GA Law: "A private person may arrest an *offender* if the offense is committed in his presence or within his immediate knowledge" But the DA's sleight of hand says it was "perfectly legal" to "stop and hold this criminal *suspect*"

Can you spot the error? 1/ #AhmaudArbery

https://twitter.com/VoteBeebe/status/1258603050152923141

While the law governing citizens arrests is complex and varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, the essential requirement of GA law here is clear: the arresting "citizen" must have immediate knowledge of guilt. NOT SUSPICION.

The local DA needs to answer for this too. 2/

It isn't a "Citizen's Stop & Frisk" law, or a "Citizens Detain & Question" law — the "Citizen's Arrest" law is narrowly focused to empower a citizen who has direct knowledge —usually requires "committed in the arrester’s presence"— of a serious crime to immediately intervene. 3/

This isn't new or novel. Blackstone's Commentaries on the Common Law required the private person to be "present when any felony is committed" for an arrest to be legal (in those days it was also considered compulsory to do so if the felony was witnessed) 4/

But it gets worse: The DA spends more than half a page recounting how #AhmaudArbery was allegedly the aggressor, and posits the theory that HE could have pulled the trigger (a theory for an inventive defense attorney at trial, not one the DA should entertain as exculpatory) 5/

And it gets even worse: The DA suggests that #AhmedArbery's "mental health records & prior convictions help explain his apparent aggressive nature and his possible thought pattern to attack an armed man."
GTFO
THIS. IS. SHAMEFUL!!
6/

You'll note that in the subsequent paragraph he excuses the killers under the Georgia "Use of Force in Defense" statute, noting they are "allowed to use deadly force to defend themselves" and "had no duty to retreat" under a separate George statute. Are you kidding me?
7/

So according to Georgia's Waycross Judicial Circuit DA George E. Barnhill, the killers were justified in "defending themselves", but #AhmaudArbery had mental issues and prior convictions and he was "aggressive" when he defended *himself* from the obvious present danger?

8/

Georgia, you have a problem.

The death of #AhmaudArbery is tragic & shameful. The attempted *whitewashing* by local authorities is even more shameful: it's an attack on the very system of justice we NEED as a beacon of hope & shield of protection for ALL of us. 9/9