Georgia bill would allow voters to disband police department at center of Ahmaud Arbery case

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Georgia NAACP Holds Protest For Shooting Death Of Jogger Ahmaud Arbery — A demonstrators protests the shooting death of Ahmaud Arbery at the Glynn County Courthouse on May 8, 2020 in Brunswick, Georgia. (Photo by Sean Rayford/Getty Images)

The police department at the center of the Ahmaud Arbery murder case has been the target of blistering critiques over the last few weeks, due to what many believe was a gross mishandling of a modern-day lynching. Now it appears a Georgia bill could make that department obsolete.

Next month, state lawmakers will be voting on a measure that would allow Georgia voters to completely dismantle the Glynn county police department, which has a long history of tampering with crime scenes and using retaliation tactics against those they believe to be whistleblowers.

Senate Bill 504 calls for a November ballot referendum that would allow state residents to vote on whether county leaders should disband the department and merge resources with the county sheriff’s office.

Ligon Sen. Bill Ligon who introduced the bill earlier this year told WJCL-TV that it was based around a scandal in the department that included allegations of witness tampering and that police were sleeping with drug informants. Several Glynn county officers were indicted in that case in March, including Chief John Powell. Ligon will not seek reelection this year after a decade in office.

And this isn’t the first stain on Glynn County PD’s history. (McMichael’s former employer/the PD that neglected to make arrests of Ahmaud’s murderers)The corruption runs deep. GA Senate passed a bill earlier this year to allow voters to decide to abolish the dept altogether.

— gaaAaAAÂÄbby (@harvestpoon) May 8, 2020

The original bill, introduced in January, had its legality challenged because it would have impacted county police departments across Georgia. But Senate Bill 504 has now been amended to narrow its scope and only focus on the notorious Glynn County PD.

#AhmaudArbery murder raises long-standing issues with #GlynnCounty DA’s handling of cases“. My reaction was simply, ‘Here we go again,’” said attorney Bill Atkins, who represented the family of Caroline Small, an unarmed woman killed by 2 Glynn County cops https://t.co/PJJYhZxQG9

— Maxx Microstopper (@MMicrostopper) May 9, 2020

Arbery was killed on February 23, but it took media attention and a public outcry before Gregory and Travis McMicheals were arrested on May 7th. Gregory, Travis’ father was a police officer for the Glynn county police department and an investigator for the Brunswick, Georgia district attorney’s office before his retirement in 2019.

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