BRUNSWICK, Ga. — The parents of Ahmaud Arbery, a man killed in a shooting that unfolded in the Satilla Shores neighborhood in Brunswick, spoke during a video news conference Wednesday.
Also in attendance were National civil rights attorneys Ben Crump and Lee Merritt, who are both are representing Arbery's family.
The news conference comes after a video surfaced Tuesday, months after the shooting incident unfolded in Georgia, depicting the moments leading up to the 25-year-old's death.
Merritt stated they received the video from one of Ahmaud Arbery's coaches and that it contradicts everything originally reported in the police report.
According to the police report, Arbery is referred to as a "suspect" in a home break-in that needed to be stopped and so Gregory McMichael and his son Travis McMichael grabbed their firearms pursued Arbery in their truck.
WATCH THE FULL VIDEO NEWS CONFERENCE BELOW:
In the video that was leaked Tuesday, Arbery can be seen jogging up a road with the McMichaels stopped ahead apparently waiting for him, each of them armed.
Arbery is seen swerving out of their way to avoid them, as he runs in a yard around their truck, but Travis follows him to the front of the truck with his shotgun and a fight over the gun ensues leading to several shots fired.
“These men were not performing any police function or any duty as citizens of Georgia...these men were vigilantes, they were a posse they were performing a lynching in the middle of the day," said Merritt.
Ahmaud Arbery's mother, Wanda Jones, said she hasn't seen the video and does not plan on it. She said she remembers seeing her son come into this world, and doesn't think she can handle seeing him leave it.
"He was my baby boy that I had on Mother's Day of 1994," she explained. "He was his sister and brother's keeper... his spirit was good. He was a yes ma'am and no ma'am type of fellow."
Jones said that she was initially told by police that her son was shot by a homeowner during the commission of a home burglary.
She says it wasn't until after she left the funeral home, after seeing her dead son for the first time, that she read an article that said that her son wasn't shot in a home or yard of a home but that he was gunned down in the street.
She says this prompted her to begin digging into the circumstances surrounding her son's death, which quickly became suspicious to her.
“It was a hate crime," said father Marcus Arbery. "My young son wasn’t doing nothing -- minding his own business, running and working out. And that’s a crime? To work out and run and he aint breaking no law? No. Time out.”
Merritt says the reason this case is in the spotlight in the first place is because of the loyal friends and family of Ahmaud Arbery who "have fought tooth and nail" for their loved one.
He says it was specifically Jones's diligence in looking into this case and doing background research that may have saved this case form being thrown out.
Merrit said there are number of authorities that have the authority to make arrests in this case and fully expects one to happen soon, if not as early as today.
Family members tell First Coast News that Arbery would have turned 26 years old this weekend.
"It's not fair, it's not equal justice," said Crump. "It's so sad that these beautiful parents will have to celebrate their son's birthday ... without him being on Earth."