Among the questions: Did shooting suspect Travis McMichael and his father, Gregory, both white, get special treatment because the elder McMichael had been a longtime investigator at the Brunswick Circuit District Attorney’s office?

The father and son were questioned, and police called the district attorney’s office, where Gregory McMichael had worked for more than two decades, for legal advice.

Just days after Arbery’s killing, Glynn County Police Chief John Powell and three former high-ranking officers were indicted in what investigators described as a cover-up of an officer’s sexual relationship with an informant.

J. Tom Morgan, a former metro Atlanta district attorney who is now a criminal defense lawyer, said it would be a “big misstep” for the DA to advise against arrests if officers decided there was probable cause that a crime had occurred.

Bowling Green State University criminologist Philip Stinson said there is also a tendency to treat a crime scene differently if a current or former law enforcement officer is involved, as was the case with Gregory McMichael.