Courts

Murder Trial That Totally Isn't About Race Morphs Into A Tarantino Scene

Enough about the gun. When was the deceased's last pedicure?

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Many Americans believe that when it comes to the criminal justice system, you are innocent until proven guilty. But the Arbery trial is a reminder of a burden some of us have known for a while. Others are given the talk. And the talk is one of those ongoing conversations we weave in and out of at various checkpoints in life. Maybe at 12 we learn not to play with toy guns in public. Or how our fall from grace can be determined as early as 18. Or the dangers of loud music at 17. Because sometimes, the defendant’s presumed innocence is complemented by another assumption — that we deserved to die. Some of us know that you can die twice. The first is when you physically die. The second is when they kill your character.

In her closing argument, defense attorney Laura Hogue did what good defense attorneys do: she tried to recap the theory of the case in a way that aimed to have the jury see her clients in the best light. And this is part of the description she used to describe the man the three she defended were accused of murdering:

“Turning Ahmaud Arbery into a victim after the choices that he made does not reflect the reality of what brought Ahmaud Arbery to Satilla Shores in his khaki shorts with no socks to cover his long, dirty toenails”

Sometimes a good defense is a shameful thing. It is shameful that counsel thought that focusing on a dead man’s feet could play a role in convincing a jury that his blood was on his hands. It’s a shameful thing that she said this about somebody’s child in front of their own mother. Ahmaud’s mother, Wanda Cooper-Jones’s response to the defense’s closing description was that she “thought it was very, very rude to talk about his long, dirty toenails and to totally neglect that my son had a huge hole in his chest when he was shot with that shotgun” (emphasis added). It’s shameful if she had the visceral reaction to yell at counsel for saying something that disrespectful about her son that it would have likely been written off as another angry black woman’s tirade (which again, may have hurt her dead son’s credibility in the court room). What is most shameful is that the defense’s strategy of searching head to toe for a way to blame a man who got called a slur after being boxed in by two cars, three men, and a shotgun found nothing and decided the victim’s toes may actually be enough. What happened to zealous advocacy? They usually at least pull from more traditional BS sources like there being weed in their bloodstream or that time they got a suspension in 4th grade. That said, the defense attempted to get more “Bubbas” in the jury pool from the very beginning. Knowing this, it only makes sense that she would use language in her closing argument that, in the words of legal analyst and former prosecutor Charles Coleman Jr., positioned Mr. Arbery as a “runaway slave” — maybe they just assumed this would be enough from the beginning.

So, remember to update the list of old wisdom that we have to share with our kids when THE TALK flashes above the exit. And our teenagers. And our adults. Some of them that burn crosses are the same that join forces.  Be careful when you’re driving while black. Or sleeping. Or just trying to get some exercise in. And keep your nails trimmed — you don’t want to get killed and have it used against you when your family wants justice.

Defense Lawyer Prompts Outrage For Bringing Up Ahmaud Arbery’s Toenails In Closing Arguments [CNN]

Earlier: 15 of The 16 Potential Jurors In The Ahmaud Arbery Trial Are White. Problem?

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Chris Williams became a social media manager and assistant editor for Above the Law in June 2021. Prior to joining the staff, he moonlighted as a minor Memelord™ in the Facebook group Law School Memes for Edgy T14s. Before that, he wrote columns for an online magazine named The Muse Collaborative under the pen name Knehmo. He endured the great state of Missouri long enough to graduate from Washington University in St. Louis School of Law. He is a former boatbuilder who cannot swim, a published author on critical race theory, philosophy, and humor, and has a love for cycling that occasionally annoys his peers. You can reach him by email at cwilliams@abovethelaw.com and by tweet at @WritesForRent.

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