There was another “awkward” moment in the trial of the three defendants in the death of Ahmaud Arbery yesterday, and that’s putting it mildly. During a recess in the proceedings, Al Sharpton showed up outside the courthouse to give a press conference and lead a prayer vigil for Arbery’s family. After that, he accompanied the family into the courtroom to observe the testimony. After the defense was made aware of his presence, Kevin Gough, the attorney for Roddie Bryan, addressed the judge and told him that he doesn’t want “any more Black pastors” in the courtroom. The motion was not supported by the prosecution or even the other defense attorneys and the judge wound up rejecting it. But while we don’t have audio of the actual exchange, you can almost hear defense attorneys around the world banging their heads onto their desks. What was this guy thinking? (Associated Press)

An attorney for one of the white men standing trial in the death of Ahmaud Arbery told the judge Thursday he doesn’t want “any more Black pastors” in the courtroom after the Rev. Al Sharpton sat with the slain man’s family.

Kevin Gough represents William “Roddie” Bryan, who along with father and son Greg and Travis McMichael is charged with murder and other crimes in Arbery’s Feb. 23, 2020, killing…

Gough told Superior Court Judge Timothy Walmsley that he was concerned Sharpton’s presence in court Wednesday was an attempt to intimidate the disproportionately white jury hearing the case. The jury was not in the courtroom when he made the remarks.

To be fair to Kevin Gough, he’s probably familiar with Al Sharpton and it’s not unreasonable to have concerns about seeing him show up in town. Sharpton is infamous for inserting himself into any situation with even the slightest possibility of being open to racial bias criticism and inflaming the tension levels. If the jury lets these guys off, you can expect Sharpton to be playing a role in the ensuing mayhem (and keeping his face in front of the cameras).

But even knowing that, this was a really poor move on Gough’s part. He’s practically inviting a challenge to the results or at least subsequent civil suits even if his client manages to be acquitted. And the press will continue to have a field day with it, particularly since the court wound up with eleven white people on the jury.

The attorney made matters worse with the way he worded his criticism in front of the judge. You can tell that Gough probably knew he was already in trouble when he said, “if their pastor’s Al Sharpton right now that’s fine, but then that’s it. We don’t want any more Black pastors coming in here … sitting with the victim’s family, trying to influence the jurors in this case.”

If his concern was over Sharpton specifically, that’s one thing. But simply saying he doesn’t want “any more Black pastors” is ridiculous. There are no limits to who may be in the gallery to observe a trial based on either the occupation or race of the attendees. Then, to sink his own case even further, he admitted to the judge that he hadn’t even been aware that Sharpton was in the back of the room until someone pointed it out to him later.

Gough said he didn’t realize Sharpton had been there until after court had adjourned for the day.

“You weren’t even aware of it until later?” the judge said. “I’m not sure what we’re doing.”

None of this has changed my previous view of how this will all play out, however. I could wind up being wrong, but I still think there is almost zero percent chance that the prosecutors will get a unanimous vote to convict any of those three men, at least on the most serious charges of malice murder, felony murder, and aggravated assault. The prosecution may manage to land one or more convictions for false imprisonment and criminal attempt to commit false imprisonment. There is also an element of “brandishing” in terms of using a deadly weapon (a shotgun) in the commission of a crime. If they get off on the murder charges, that would take the death penalty and life without parole off the table. But the other charges can carry up to ten or twenty years each, so they could still wind up doing quite a stretch behind bars. And of course, there are still federal hate crime charges pending, which could lead to yet another trial.