A key witness said in a recorded deposition Thursday that he never authorized the trio of white men accused of murdering Ahmaud Arbery to confront anyone on his property, which the 25-year-old Black man had been captured visiting on surveillance footage prior to his death.

A recording of Larry English was played to the jury on Thursday, and in the deposition, he said that after footage showed several people on his property several times, he asked a neighbor to check in on his unfinished house and even called 911. “At any point in time, did you ever authorize the McMichaels to... confront anybody on your site?” prosecutor Paul Camarillo said during the deposition. “No,” English replied.

The defense, however, has suggested word of people breaking into the English construction site is what spurred the trio to chase Arbery in trucks before Travis McMichael fatally shot him in a gruesome incident caught on camera.