The shooting death of Ahmaud Arbery: A timeline of a case that has gripped the nation

S. Lee Merritt, one of the family's attorneys, said on Monday that a new prosecutor — Cobb County District Attorney Joyette Holmes — has been assigned to Arbery's case at the family's request, First Coast News reported.

On Twitter, Merritt alleged that Atlantic Judicial Circuit District Attorney Durden "sat on the case until video of Ahmaud's murder was leaked," so Holmes represents a "huge WIN" in the family's pursuit for answers. She is currently being vetted for conflicts of interest.

Georgia's Attorney General Chris Carr announced on Sunday that he had asked the Department of Justice to conduct a "complete and transparent review of how the Ahmaud Arbery case was handled from the outset," Reuters reported.

Of particular interest are the ways Johnson, Barnhill, and the Glynn County Police Department responded to the fatal shooting.

Two Glynn County commissioners — Allen Booker and Peter Murphy — accused District Attorney Jackie Johnson on May 8 of preventing police from arresting the McMichaels.

"The police at the scene went to her, saying they were ready to arrest both of them. These were the police at the scene who had done the investigation," Booker told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. "She shut them down to protect her friend [Gregory] McMichael."

Murphy added: "They were told not to make the arrest."

But Johnson denied the "baseless and false" claims, WJAX-TV reported. She flatly denied having conversations with police about the Arbery case, instead alleging that this was "an attempt to make excuses and ignore the problems at the Glynn County Police Department, for which they are ultimately responsible."

Support for Arbery and anger at his death sparked the #IRunWithMaud movement, with people running 2.23 miles — to mark the day he was killed — on his birthday.

"He was my baby boy that I actually had on Mother's Day of 1994," said his mother, Wanda Cooper-Jones. "He was the baby of the family. But that being said, Ahmaud was his sister and brother's keeper."

Cooper-Jones added: "His spirit was good ... He was the 'yes, ma'am' and 'no, ma'am' type of fellow."

At a news conference on May 8, the bureau's director, Vic Reynolds, said there was "sufficient probable cause to charge the McMichaels with felony murder and aggravated assault."

"I can tell you that if we didn't believe it, we wouldn't have arrested them," he said. "If we believe it, then we're going to put the bracelets on them, and that's exactly what we did yesterday evening."

He outlined that the GBI was brought in late on May 5 by Durden and, within 36 hours, felt confident in seeking arrest warrants for the McMichaels, before nabbing them.

Reynolds said that while the police in Glynn County had gotten the investigation "to a good point," the GBI pursued additional leads, recanvassed the neighborhood, and interviewed more people — some for the first time.

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Regarding the death of Ahmaud Arbery, the director of the GBI, Vic Reynolds, told reporters, 'There's sufficient probable cause to charge the McMichaels with felony murder and aggravated assault' https://t.co/HzTqypOaOZ pic.twitter.com/fkwyYcAYwY

Asked whether other arrests were pending, Reynolds said the investigation was "active" and "ongoing."

Reynolds described the video of Arbery's shooting as "a very important piece of evidence."

The bureau is "investigating everybody involved in the case, including the individual who shot the video," as well as how it was leaked, he said.

Around 7:45 p.m. Thursday, news broke that the GBI had taken Gregory and Travis McMichael into custody. Both men face felony murder and aggravated assault charges and were booked in the Glynn County jail.

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The Georgia Bureau of Investigation arrested Gregory McMichael & Travis McMichael for the death of Ahmaud Arbery. They were both charged with murder and aggravated assault. The McMichaels were taken into custody. #WeAreDoneDying #IrunwithMaud pic.twitter.com/GBAaCJTdDz

A statement issued by Durden on May 5 indicated that he was assigned Arbery's case "on or about April 13," according to the Coastal Courier.

He went on to write: "Having neither previous knowledge of the incident nor any relationship with any investigators or witnesses, I accepted the appointment to review the case and take the action that I thought was appropriate."

Barnhill was the second district attorney to step aside, telling Glynn County Police Capt. Tom Jump, in a letter obtained by The New York Times that Arbery's mother, Wanda Cooper-Jones, did not want him in charge of the case since his son worked for Johnson.

"She sees a conflict in that my son works in the Brunswick District Attorney' s Office where Greg McMichael retired some time ago," he wrote. "She believes there are kinships between the parties [there are not] and has made other unfounded allegations of bias [es]. As such, I believe it is better for my office to step out and am going to recuse myself and the Assistants working for me from handling the case."

After reviewing autopsy reports on April 1, Barnhill told Jump that there were "no grounds for an arrest."

The McMichaels were "following, in 'hot pursuit,' a burglary suspect, with solid first-hand probable cause, in their neighborhood, and asking/telling him to stop," he wrote. "It appears their intent was to stop and hold this criminal suspect until law enforcement arrived. Under Georgia Law, this is perfectly legal."

Barnhill's letter also said that Georgia's open-carry law allowed them to be armed since neither is a convicted felon. They were also in a car registered to Travis McMichael.

He detailed the altercation between Arbery and Travis McMichael, saying, "Given the fact Arbery initiated the fight, at the point Arbery grabbed the shotgun, under Georgia Law, McMichael was allowed to use deadly force to protect himself."

According to Barnhill, there's also a question about who fired the fatal shot.

"While we know McMichael had his finger on the trigger, we do not know who caused the firings," he wrote.

Barnhill's letter named a witness William Bryan as the person who filmed the video of Arbery's killing and also refers to a conversation that he had with Glynn County police on February 24.

Jackie Johnson told the Brunswick News that she emailed State Attorney General Chris Carr on Feb. 25, recusing herself from the Arbery case due to a conflict of interest.

Gregory McMichael worked as an investigator for her office until his retirement in May 2019, a spokesman for the office told Insider.

Johnson asked Carr to transfer the case to another prosecutor. George Barnhill, the district attorney for the neighboring Waycross Judicial Circuit, was tapped on Feb. 27, according to the Brunswick News.

"The information I had was that there was a shooting involving Greg McMichael and his son," Johnson told the local outlet. "There seemed to be a self-defense issue, and they didn't know whether they could make an arrest."

However, a timeline by Glynn County's Public Information Officer Matthew Kent relays events differently and says Johnson's office learned of the investigation around 3:30 p.m. on Feb. 23, per WJAX-TV.

"The DA's office advised that there needed to be further follow up and the detectives would be contacted the following day by the DA from the Waycross Judicial Circuit. The McMichaels were deemed not to be flight risks, and officers were advised by the DA's office that no arrests were necessary at the time," Kent wrote, adding that Glynn County police detectives were in touch with Barnhill from Feb. 24.

The controversy has prompted calls for Johnson's removal from office.

Gregory McMichael told the responding officer, J. Brandeberry, that he first noticed Arbery because he resembled a man accused of a string of residential break-ins in the area, according to a Glynn County police report. But The Brunswick News found that only one burglary had been reported in the area from the start of 2020 to the day Arbery died. The sole item stolen was a gun from Travis McMichael's unlocked pickup truck.

That didn't stop the men from grabbing their guns — a .357 Magnum and a shotgun — and following Arbery just after 1 p.m. After they intercepted him, Arbery got into a scuffle with Travis McMichael.

"The two men then started fighting over the shotgun at which point Travis fired a shot and then a second later there was a second shot," the report said.

This altercation was filmed by a witness, later identified as William Bryan.

Three shots were heard in the footage, with the last one fired point-blank before Arbery stumbled and fell facedown.

Gregory McMichael, a former police officer and investigator with the Glynn County District Attorney's office, told police he rolled the body over to check for a weapon.

Arbery was unarmed, but Brandeberry made a note of the blood on the senior McMichael's hands.