Attorneys are asking a U.S. appeals court to throw out the hate crime convictions of three White men who used pickup trucks to chase Ahmaud Arbery through the streets of a Georgia subdivision before one of them killed the running Black man with a shotgun.
A panel of judges from the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta was scheduled to hear oral arguments Wednesday in a case that followed a national outcry over Arbery’s death. The men’s lawyers argue that evidence of past racist comments they made didn’t prove a racist intent to harm.
Disagree on the lawyers. Their job is to zealously represent whoever the client might be, and anything less than that risks a mistrial due to ineffective representation. Borrowing former prosecutor Emily D. Baker’s words (from a Depp v. Heard livestream), not making such a motion is almost considered legal malpractice.
You wouldn’t want those three cunts to walk free because of a procedural mistake.
Everyone hates a defense lawyer until they need one
Except sovereign citizens, they’ll hate them all the more once they need one.
Just like freedom of speech, everyone loves the right to representation until someone they don’t like exercises it. If rights don’t apply to everyone then they effectively apply to no one.