Judge: Arbery’s mental health records can’t be used at trial

SAVANNAH, Ga. – Ahmaud Arbery’s intelligence wellness records can’t beryllium utilized arsenic proceedings grounds by the achromatic men who chased and killed the 25-year-old Black antheral arsenic helium was moving successful their neighborhood, a Georgia justice ruled Friday.

The determination by Superior Court Judge Timothy Walmsley further limits defence attorneys’ efforts to represent Arbery arsenic an assertive young antheral with a troubled past erstwhile the lawsuit goes to proceedings soon, with assemblage enactment scheduled to commencement Oct. 18.

The justice ruled that Arbery's aesculapian privacy, adjacent successful death, trumped the close of the men lasting proceedings to a robust defense. And helium concluded that a registered nurse's "highly questionable diagnosis” successful 2018 that Arbery suffered from intelligence unwellness could unfairly prejudice the jury.

Prosecutors accidental Arbery was simply jogging connected Feb. 23, 2020, erstwhile begetter and lad Gregory and Travis McMichael equipped themselves and chased Arbery successful a pickup truck. A neighbour who joined the chase, William “Roddie” Bryan, took cellphone video that showed Travis McMichael fatally shooting Arbery arsenic helium threw punches and grabbed for McMichael's shotgun.

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The McMichaels and Bryan were arrested and charged with execution aft the video was leaked online much than 2 months later, connected May 5. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation took implicit the lawsuit the adjacent time and swiftly arrested each 3 men.

Defense attorneys reason the McMichaels and Bryan committed nary crimes. They accidental the McMichaels suspected Arbery was a burglar aft helium was recorded by video cameras wrong a location nether construction. Travis McMichael’s lawyers accidental helium changeable Arbery successful self-defense.

A period ago, the justice dealt different setback to the defendants erstwhile helium ruled off-limits grounds of Arbery’s past run-ins with instrumentality enforcement, including 2 arrests. Defense attorneys hoped to usage that grounds to formed uncertainty connected prosecutors’ contention that Arbery was an guiltless jogger and to bolster their statement that the achromatic men reasonably suspected Arbery had committed a transgression erstwhile they chased him.

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