(Trends Wide) — American justice faces a new moment of truth with the coming end of three trials and the closing of another case that was a long chapter.
A trial features white men accused of taking justice into their own hands to kill a black man.
Another features a white man who picked up a gun to patrol during a Black Lives Matter protest and ended up killing two people.
One more seeks to get organizers to pay after a Nazi rally turned deadly.
And finally, there is the long-sought clemency for a black man convicted of killing a white man in a carjacking where racial prejudice may have played a role in the conviction.
Each case is different, but they weave together the tense era of race and justice reckoning, something that is happening across the country and, this week, specifically in Wisconsin, Georgia, Virginia and Oklahoma.
Ahmaud Arbery: Can armed white men in a van claim an attempt at ‘citizen arrest’ to kill an unarmed jogging black man?
The basic narrative of the Georgia case, according to the Trends Wide report, is as follows:
Arbery’s family have said he was out for a run when he was shot and killed. Defense attorneys contend that their clients were attempting to make an Arbery legal citizen arrest, and Travis McMichael shot Arbery in self-defense while fighting for Travis’s shotgun.
Graphic video of the February 2020 shooting turned the case into a cause of cause during the summer of last year when the murder of George Floyd by police in Minneapolis sparked a nationwide protest movement.
Three white men are on trial: Gregory McMichael, his son Travis and William Bryan, who recorded the chase and the Arbery shooting.
Whether men can fear for their lives while grabbing guns and chasing another man in his truck is, perhaps, a legal matter.
But this case has grown in importance with its racial overtones. The selected jury is almost entirely white. How does that happen in a case like this?
Civil rights leaders and black pastors attended the trial, drawing criticism from the defense, prompting even more pastors to attend.
Kyle Rittenhouse: Is the teenager who joined a vigilante mob guilty of murder?
The teenager grabbed an AR-15-style rifle and joined the people who were tasked with patrolling the streets of Kenosha, Wisconsin, in August 2020. The Black Lives Matter protests had turned into riots and riots after the shooting of the police against Jacob Blake, a 29-year-old black man.
Rittenhouse was chased by protesters, one of whom threw a bag at him. Rittenhouse opened fire.
“I did nothing wrong. I defended myself,” he testified during an emotional testimony. The prosecution used drone video to argue that Rittenhouse provoked the confrontation with his weapon.
The judge has surprised with his peculiarities, such as saying that the dead cannot be called “victims” and his inappropriate comments about Asians.
Rittenhouse has become a hero to some gun rights activists. Florida Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz said he could give the 18-year-old an internship if he is acquitted.
Rittenhouse could be convicted on lesser charges rather than the more serious murder charges.
Kenosha is nervous. Five schools near the Kenosha County Courthouse have moved to virtual classrooms as jury deliberations progress.
Charlottesville: Are the organizers responsible for the deadly ‘Unite the Right’ rally?
Final arguments are ongoing in the civil lawsuit brought by residents and counter-protesters. They are seeking damages against 14 individuals and 10 white supremacist and nationalist organizations involved in a two-day rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017.
The rally was held to oppose the planned removal of a statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee. It resulted in violence and the death of Heather Heyer, 32, when James Fields, who was among the protesters from Unite the Right, rammed a car into a crowd of counter-protesters.
The events horrified many Americans. Then-President Donald Trump was convicted of defending what he called “very fine people” among white supremacist protesters.
Fields was convicted and sentenced to life in prison in state and federal courts in 2019. This civil lawsuit is to determine whether the protest organizers are responsible for the physical and emotional injuries suffered by townspeople and counter-protesters.
It could depend on whether the code language used by white supremacists was a joke or something sinister.
Julius Jones: A black man receives the death penalty pardon. There are doubts about your guilt
Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt waited until a few hours before Julius Jones was executed before granting him clemency for the 1999 murder of a white man, Paul Howell, during a carjacking. Jones has maintained his innocence. A parole board recommended commuting Jones’s sentence to life in prison with the possibility of parole. Stitt, a Republican, commuted the sentence to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Jones had high-profile sponsors like Kim Kardashian, a reality TV star and sentencing reform activist, and Baker Mayfield, the NFL quarterback who was a star at the University of Oklahoma.
In his clemency petition, Jones cited, among other things, racial bias on his jury.
Whats Next?
There is no “aha!” that links the four cases together. And there are others that could be included, including the exoneration Thursday of two men jailed for killing civil rights icon Malcolm X.
From Trends Wide’s story on the case: “‘The murder of Malcolm X was a landmark event that required scrupulous investigation and prosecution, but instead produced one of the most flagrant judicial errors I have ever seen,” said the attorney. Barry Scheck, co-founder of the Innocence Project.
Jurors in all three active trials have heard evidence about different people. There is already some justice for the murder in Charlottesville, but the ugly fact of white nationalism is a stain on the country.
And in Oklahoma, there is the simple issue of guilt overlaid with a system that treats people very differently because of their race.
The verdicts can all be different. The problems won’t go away anytime soon.
