– Thursday, March 28, 2024 –
Good morning. Today, we’re covering how Savannah responded to election integrity questions regarding a mayoral candidate, new court arguments made by the men found guilty of killing Ahmaud Arbery and a potential link between lead exposure in children and crime rates.
Questions, comments or story ideas? You can reach me at jake.shore@thecurrentga.org. Let’s dig in.
Savannah: Election issues ‘unfounded’
In mid-January, the City of Savannah sent a letter to state elections officials defending its handling of the 2023 municipal election, following reporting that found Clerk of Council Mark Massey approved a candidate to run for mayor who was not registered to vote in Georgia and did not appear to live in Savannah. Both circumstances violate Georgia election law.
The Current broke these stories late last year, after we visited longshot mayoral candidate Tyrisha Davis’ listed home address, only to find a vacant, for-rent house. We later reviewed voter registration documents which showed her unregistered status during qualifying. But none of this evidence found its way into the city’s Jan. 18 letter to the Secretary of State’s office and Georgia State Election Board (the body tasked with investigating complaints about elections).
“We have received inquiries from local media regarding the legitimacy of Savannah’s electoral process, which we believe are unfounded,” Deputy City Attorney Jennifer Herman wrote.
Without citing any of the evidence brought forth, the attorney asked if the state was “aware of any irregularities or issues with the conduct of the City’s 2023 municipal elections.”
A paralegal for the State Elections Board responded in a March 12 email that it did receive “a small number of complaints” related to Savannah’s 2023 elections but that none amounted to “a violation of Georgia Election Code nor SEB Rules, so an investigation was not opened.”
It’s not clear if any of the complaints were related to Davis, whom Mayor Van Johnson himself suggested was paid to run against him to split votes.
With the narrowly-tailored question answered and no evidence discussed, the state’s paralegal concluded the issue: “We appreciate your proactivity in this matter.“
Appeal efforts in Arbery case underway
Lawyers for the three Brunswick men convicted of murdering Ahmaud Arbery in February 2020 argued before a panel of federal appeals court judges on Wednesday, seeking to overturn the hate crimes convictions against the men.
A Glynn County jury found that Travis McMichael, Gregory McMichael and William Bryan killed Arbery, a Black man, who they believed was out committing a crime, when he was actually out for a jog. A federal jury later determined that race was the primary motivating factor and the killing constituted a hate crime. A.J. Balbo, Greg McMichael’s attorney, argued in his appeal that the government didn’t prove its case to the jury that race was the main reason.
“If this person had been a 60-year-old Black man, Greg McMichael would not have engaged him. The race was a non-contributing role in this matter,” Balbo said.
Brant Lavine, an attorney representing the Justice Department’s civil rights division, said this interpretation misses the context of the entire encounter.
“Had the McMichaels driven up to him and said, ‘Excuse me, can we talk to you about what you were doing in that house?’ we wouldn’t be here today,” Lavine said.
“We’re here today because when they went up to Ahmaud, they pulled out their guns, they yelled at him to get on the ground, they threatened to blow his head off,” Lavine continued, “And they chased him. Roddie Bryan blocks his exit from the neighborhoods so he couldn’t leave until in Greg Michael’s words, ‘they trapped him like a rat.'”
The panel of judges said they would take the arguments under advisement. They did not provide a timetable for release of their opinion.
Environmental factors and crime
Can reducing lead in communities cause crime to decrease? That’s a question a housing reporter at MLK50: Justice Through Journalism tried to answer in his home of Memphis.
Homes built before the 1978, when the residential use of lead paint was banned nationally, are the primary culprits for lead poisoning of children, whose developing brains are particularly impacted by lead. Lead poisoning affects children’s frontal lobes, which regulates self-control. Studies of large groups of children indicate a link between the toxin and their behavior — like controlling one’s anger or acting impulsively; behaviors often present during crimes, according to the news outlet.
One 2021 study in Cincinnati found a 5-6% increase in arrests for property and violent crimes associated with childhood increase in lead levels in blood. Another study from the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University found concentrations of lead among Pittsburgh youth convicted in juvenile court four times higher than their peers in high school, according to MLK 50.
Importantly, this is a trend that predominantly affects Black and poor neighborhoods, where housing tends to be older and poorly maintained.
It’s an interesting investigation and one relevant to Georgia, which recently passed a law to expand the criteria for lead poisoning in order to properly measure the problem and go after bad actor landlords. In 2023, nearly 109,00 children below the age of six in Georgia were screened for lead. Of those children, 4,339 had levels higher than 3.5 micrograms per deciliter of lead (the benchmark for investigating and reducing exposure).
Combatting this trend — and setting children up for success rather than futures in taxpayer-funded jails, courts and mental health institutions — requires more screening of children, abatements of homes and structures contaminated with lead, and awareness of the issue. Here’s the Georgia Department of Public Health website with more information.
Programming note: Sunday Solutions newsletter will take Easter Sunday off, and we’ll return Monday with your public meetings calendar, followed by a legislative wrap on Tuesday in Soundings.
General Assembly sets new elections for PSC members
The 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals overturned a lower-court decision last fall and upheld the system of statewide elections. However, an injunction the lower federal court issued remains in place.
Savannah mayoral candidate not a registered voter when she filed to run
Tyrisha Davis, a candidate for Savannah mayor, was not registered to vote when she filed to run for office, Chatham County officials said. It’s the second apparent violation of requirements to run for mayor, according to state law.
Arbery killers appeal federal hate crimes convictions
Gregory McMichael, Travis McMichael, William Bryan file appeals to throw out hate crimes convictions, arguing race didn’t factor into chase and killing of Ahmaud Arbery in Brunswick in Februrary 2020.
Lawmakers take up proposal to honor Clarence Thomas in state Capitol
Georgia lawmakers consider a proposal to honor U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas in the state Capitol.
Okefenokee bill clears Georgia House
Legislation declaring a three-year moratorium on the type of mining being planned near the Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge sailed through the Georgia House Tuesday.
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