Georgia lawmakers took another step Monday to repeal a citizen’s arrest law predating the Civil War, acting little more than a year after the fatal shooting of Ahmaud Arbery, a Black man pursued by armed white men.
The Senate voted 52-1 for House Bill 479, which would end the right of people in Georgia to make an arrest if a crime is committed in the person’s presence “or within their immediate knowledge.”
Sen. Bill Cowsert, an Athens Republican, gave an explanation that focused on what police officers, business owners and individual citizens could still do to detain. But he said the measure made one key change.
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