ATLANTA—Attorneys for three white men who chased and killed Ahmaud Arbery in a Georgia subdivision asked a federal appeals court Wednesday to throw out their hate crime convictions, arguing that prosecutors relied on their history of racist comments without proving they targeted Arbery because he was black.
“At the end of the day, this issue isn’t about the racism of these defendants,” A.J. Balbo, representing Greg McMichael, told a three-judge panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta. “It’s about whether or not the government met its burden.”
