The air in Satilla Shores that Sunday afternoon held the damp, metallic chill of a Georgia February. Ahmaud Arbery, 25, wore a white t-shirt and shorts for his run. His route took him past a house under construction on Satilla Drive, a common sight for him. The bare plywood subfloor, the smell of sawdust and fresh-cut pine. He paused, looked inside, and ran on.
From a house down the street, Gregory McMichael saw him. He told his son, Travis, that it was the man from the surveillance videos. They grabbed a .357 Magnum and a shotgun, got in a pickup truck, and gave chase. A neighbor, William “Roddie” Bryan, joined in his own truck, cell phone in hand. For several minutes, the quiet streets of the subdivision became a hunting ground. The roar of truck engines, the squeal of tires on asphalt.
They cornered him on Satilla Drive. Travis McMichael stepped out with the shotgun. There was a struggle. Three shots. Arbery fell in the middle of the road, his blood stark against the gray pavement. The men stood over him. They told police they were making a citizen’s arrest. For 74 days, no charges were filed. The video Bryan took—the chase, the shots, the collapse—would not leak to the public for another two months. In those intervening days, the only witnesses were the men who killed him, the silent houses, and the unfinished home he had glanced into, its empty windows seeing nothing at all.