Supporters of Harrison Floyd, one of two Black defendants in the Georgia election interference case, have raised more than a quarter of a million dollars to help pay for his legal expenses after he wasn’t granted a bond agreement and had to spend nearly a week in jail.
Floyd finally received that bond deal on Tuesday after being the only person out of 19 defendants in the case who didn’t initially receive one upon arrest.
After his release, Floyd thanked Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis for a “negro wake-up call” and announced that he is “exploring running for a congressional seat.”
“She reminded me that our country and the state of Georgia will not be able to be a righteous nation if we stand on pillars of corruption, racism, lying and cheating,” Floyd said Wednesday. “And when we are governed by men and women who are concerned about things in the world rather than serving the citizens they’re sworn to protect, we end up going into more and deeper darkness. So the only thing we can do is follow God and lead by example.”
Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee signed a bond order directing Floyd to pay $100,000 five days after he surrendered to Fulton County authorities and was booked into a county jail.
While Floyd was sitting in jail, one of his attorneys in an unrelated case started a fundraiser, which received nearly $280,000 in donations. The crowdfunding site where the fundraiser was posted states that Floyd is “innocent” and claims that he doesn’t have enough resources to hire an attorney for this case.
Confusion and questions have emerged over the absence of a pre-arranged bond in Floyd’s arrest.
Some people pointed to a fairly recent run-in Floyd had with the law back in May as one possible rationale for why he wasn’t granted a bond order. During that encounter, Floyd allegedly assaulted a federal officer after two FBI agents served him a grand jury summons in Maryland.
It was also reported that because he didn’t have a lawyer at the time of his arrest, he had no one working on his behalf to work out a deal.
However, some new details shed light on the situation.
According to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Virginia-based attorney Chris Kachouroff filed paperwork on Monday to represent Floyd in Georgia. Kachouroff claimed that the office of Fulton County District Attorney Willis contacted him Tuesday to arrange a bond only because Willis “didn’t like the optics” of Floyd’s jailing.
“She was just letting him rot in there,” he said. “I told Harrison, ‘This is ridiculous. She should have jumped in there and done the right thing.’”
Willis’ spokesman, Jeff DiSantis, vehemently rejected the claim.
“Mr. Floyd has had the opportunity to work out a consent bond in the same manner as the other defendants named in the indictment but chose not to do so until today,” DiSantis said.
Willis’ office also gave The AJC a recording of a call that was made on the day of Floyd’s arrest between Willis and Carlos Salvado, Floyd’s attorney in a federal case in Maryland. Willis explained to Salvado that she sent a representative to meet with Floyd at the jail who offered him a consent bond, but he refused it at the time.
“He said he didn’t want to talk to anyone without a lawyer, so they ended the conversation and walked out of the jail. So, your client’s going be sitting in jail with no bond,” she said, according to the recording reviewed by the AJC.
Floyd was released from jail on Wednesday after he was able to satisfy the bail requirements.
The former leader of the Black Voices of Trump group was indicted alongside former president Donald Trump and 17 other people for his alleged role in attempting to overturn the 2020 presidential election results in Georgia.
Floyd is accused of working alongside co-conspirators Trevian Kutti, the former publicist for Kanye West, and Stephen Lee, a pastor, to pressure Fulton County election worker Ruby Freeman into falsely admitting that she stole votes and committed election fraud.
He will formally hear his charges and enter a plea at his arraignment on Sept. 6. The other 18 defendants will also be arraigned that day. Willis has also filed a motion to request Oct. 23 as the trial date for this case. She has said that she plans to try all the defendants at the same time.
