Georgia Deputy Headed to Unemployment Over Ahmaud Arbery Comments

A funny thing always seems to happen on the rare occasion when justice is served on behalf of unarmed Black folk who get slaughtered. Resentment abounds, usually from the same loud, dark corners that bleat out “law and order” rhetoric any other time.

When folks march for police accountability, some cops set up Facebook pages demonizing and threatening peaceful protesters. When new laws get passed requiring transparency for police departments, the departments go to court for permission to destroy possible evidence of their wrongdoing.

So when three white men with law enforcement ties were sentenced to life for hunting down and killing Black jogger Ahmaud Arbery, it’s no shock that the response from one Georgia sheriff’s deputy was to express his outrage by insulting the dead man.

At least this time, he’ll probably get canned for it.

From the Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Houston County Deputy Paul Urhahn, a 20-year veteran of the department, faces termination after reportedly calling Arbery a criminal who got the death penalty.

The since-deleted comment was made on Macon television station WGXA-TV’s Facebook post about Arbery’s killers being sentenced to life in prison Friday afternoon in the high-profile case.

“That criminal Arbery still got the death penalty though,” Urhahn wrote, according to the news station. The backlash to the comment was swift, with scores of people online calling for the deputy’s firing.

They’ll get what they wanted, the soon-to-be-former deputy got a letter from his boss, Houston County Sheriff Cullen Taulton on Monday telling him he’s suspended without pay, with his firing pending. Urhahn has until Jan. 20 to file an appeal; after that his shitcanning is final. Luckily for him, but definitely not the rest of us, cops who get fired for awful things tend to get their jobs back or get hired by another department.