The statehouse in Georgia passed a bill Friday to dissolve the Glynn County Police Department in response to its mishandling of the investigation of the Ahmaud Arbery killing, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
The bill that would allow Georgia residents to vote on whether to close their county police departments passed by a landslide 152-3 vote.
Multiple counties throughout Georgia have county police departments, which enforce state or local laws, and the sheriff office controls the jail.
Arbery was shot and killed near Brunswick, Georgia, while he was jogging, by three white men, Travis and Gregory McMichael and William "Roddie" Bryan. While the three men were eventually charged with felony murder for the death, many believe police dragged their feet on the investigation as it took two months and a viral video of the shooting before they arrested the men.
"There have been too many missteps over there," said Democratic state Rep. Al Williams, told the AJC. "It's time to be going in a different direction."
The case of Arbery – as well as the deaths of George Floyd in Minnesota, Breonna Taylor in Kentucky, and Rashard Brooks in Atlanta as a result of police violence – ignited demonstrations through the United States with protesters calling for police brutality and systemic racism in the country to end.
"They should have arrested the McMichaels at the scene, and they did not," Republican state Rep. Don Hogan said.
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