Sheriff's Deputy Posts Comment About 'Criminal' Ahmaud Arbery, Could Lose Job in 7 Days

A Georgia police officer is suspended without pay "pending termination" after writing a Facebook comment calling Ahmaud Arbery a criminal.

Arbery was a 25-year-old Black man gunned down nearly two years ago by three white men when he was jogging in his neighborhood. The killing caught national attention when video of the incident circulated on social media. His killers were convicted of murder in November and recently sentenced to life in prison.

When WGXA-TV, a local Macon, Georgia, news station, posted the results of the sentencing to its Facebook page, one commenter wrote, "That criminal Arbery still got the death penalty though."

The comment, which has since been deleted, came from the Facebook profile of Paul Urhahn, a deputy with the Houston County Sheriff's Office, reported Macon's WMAZ-TV.

Houston County, Georgia, Sheriff Cullen Talton posted a letter to Urhahn on the sheriff's office's Facebook page. According to the letter, the deputy is "suspended without pay pending termination."

In the letter, Talton told Urhahn he has until 5 p.m. on January 20 to appeal the termination decision, or he will lose his job.

The letter also specified that Urhahn was being terminated for being in violation of a handful of standard operating procedures involving his alleged conduct.

"An officer must at all times, on and off duty, conduct him/herself in a manner which does not bring discredit to the department or county," it said, continuing, "Conduct unbecoming of an officer shall include that conduct…which has a tendency to destroy public respect for employees and confidence in the department."

The sheriff's office launched an investigation after screenshots of Urhahn's deleted comment made their rounds on social media, being shared with the sheriff's office and the WGXA-TV newsroom, which reported on the matter.

According to WMAZ-TV, Urhahn has been working at the sheriff's office for 20 years. Chief Deputy Billy Rape told the local news outlet the deputy had been disciplined before for other issues. However, the chief deputy said the termination was based solely on the most recent comment, which he said caused a "destruction of public respect for himself and our department through all of the social media outrage."

In 2020, Urhahn was accused of using a derogatory term against a Black woman, but Rape said the department could not substantiate that claim despite a doorbell camera allegedly capturing footage of the incident, WMAZ added.

Eli Porter, an activist with the Poor And Minority Justice Association, told WGXA the comment was "disgusting."

"That deputy represents that entire department, and for him to say something like that—I'm just…it got under my skin," he told the news outlet.

Porter also expressed optimism at the sheriff's quick response to the comment, saying it makes sure "that everybody knows that the sheriff's office does not stand with what Paul said."

Urhahn has since deleted his Facebook page and no other contact information was immediately available to request a comment from him.