troublesome part about trying to separate race or racism from our system of jurisprudence in this country. i mean, look. my colleague just laid out all the facts that the prosecution laid out. but i think we would both agree that our stomachs in knots because we have seen the system fail black people before. we have seen this system fail people of color before. and what we saw in this prosecution, she laid it out perfectly. i mean, if you were to have a split screen between what the defense said and in talking about the color of or or his toenails, for example, or what he looked like or his appearance. versus, the prosecution s case where they simply said they played the 9-1-1 tape. and what s your emergency? you know, it s a black man running. i mean, so you look at these things in totally and you can t help but to, um, have some certain level of heartbreak for a system that doesn t benefit black people in this country. and i want to remind people that i have had this conversation
he argued his client took a video and turned it over to the police and without that there would be no justice and no trial. she went through all the charges against bryan and brought him back into those charges. ultimately, i think roddy will probably get acquitted or get, you know, be found guilty of some of the lessers. but she did a fantastic job and really sort of played a little bit more on the race card as well, you know, that long, dirty toenail comment that was just despicable about ahmaud arbery. she humanized him. she said look at him when he was alive and then look at him you know, showing the autopsy picture. that was very effective on her part in rebuttal. bernarda, i wanted your take on that. that is a choice by the prosecution, because all throughout closings really until these very final moments in reb rebuttal, the prosecution did not spend much time kind of
jury instructions are critical, complicated as we ve seen here and in other trials. and as sara is getting at, the defense team has gone to lengths to object over the definition op citizens arrest as presented in closings by the state. what is that about? so, absolutely. because the defense knows that their only hanging fate is in citizens arrest and that definition of citizens arrest is going to be the hinch pin in terms of whether they are found guilty or not guilty. that s why the defense was very strategic and objected at the exact times that the prosecution was defining citizens arrest. if you did not see ahmaud arbery commit a crime and it wasn t committed contemporaneously to the arrest, you are not able to avail yourself of citizens arrest. that s why the defense has to
rather, it is sufficient if you, the jury, should find beyond all reasonable doubt that the defendants committed the crime in at least one of the ways alleged. now, ladies and gentlemen, the defendants have raised a defense that even if nay committed the acts described in the indictment, there are circumstances that justify it. once this defense is raised, the state must disprove it beyond a reasonable doubt. the fact that a person s conduct is justified is a defense to prosecution for any crime based on that conduct. the defense of justification can be claimed, a, when the person s conduct is justified as the use of force in defense of self or when the person s conduct is
leaning into humanizing ahmaud arbery. her focus really remained on the facts and evidence that had been laid out in the case. sara is getting at the defense during closings went right at ahmaud arbery. i want to play the moment sara was talking about right there. turning ahmaud arbery into a victim after the choices 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. bernarda, what did you think that was about? what did you think of the prose prosecution s response today? so her comments, i fund it to be despicable. i found it to be infuriating for her to do victim blaming, and not just victim blaming but