Greetings:
This week is about the numbers Georgia keeps but never lines up — and what those numbers show once you do. The parole board granted release to 93 of 2,046 lifers in FY2024, a rate of 4.5 percent, down from 30.1 percent in FY2003. The collapse was never announced, never explained, and never published as a rate. In 1994, 81 percent of Georgia voters gave the board constitutional authority to parole anyone 62 or older; thirty-two years later there is no rule, no process, and no record of it ever being used.
The same gap runs through the deaths. A man was killed thirty days from release because, the security chief said, every segregation bed was full. Another was cornered at a gate the state built and locked. In each case the record exists — the state’s own investigators wrote it down.
We compiled all 24 of the board’s annual reports and filed 44 open-records requests to find what the state won’t compile itself. We don’t ask anyone to take our word for it. We put the receipts in front of the people who can act on them.
| 5 articles · 50 stories to legislators · 872 emails · 15 new advocates |
New from GPS
Georgia’s law, published in full and free on gps.press
GPS published the entire body of Georgia law it answers questions from: the Official Code of Georgia Annotated — all 29,000-plus sections, current through the 2026 session — plus the Georgia and United States Constitutions, the Uniform Superior Court Rules, the Code of Judicial Conduct, and the Rules of Professional Conduct. Every statute and rule now has its own page with the full text, free and without a login, plus machine-readable editions for researchers. Georgia’s statutes were previously reachable online mainly through commercial services that block or paywall readers — the people most governed by these texts are the least able to reach them. A quarterly check now watches all of it for amendments. Read more
Site-wide search: ask gps.press a question in plain English
GPS built and launched a search that understands questions, not just keywords. Ask “how many people are in GDC custody” or “what happens if I miss the habeas deadline” and it returns the pages that answer it — pointing to the exact section of the page, not just the top. It reads across everything GPS has published: articles, facility profiles, the statistics portal, the research library, the policy library, and the advocacy tools. Free, no login, and available in English and Spanish. Try it
Significant work this period
Testified to the Blue-Ribbon Committee: repeal Georgia’s four-year habeas deadline
GPS gave testimony at the first road meeting of the Georgia House Blue-Ribbon Study Committee on Criminal Post-Conviction Litigation, held 21 August in Ellijay. A formerly incarcerated Georgian spoke for GPS and asked the committee to repeal the four-year deadline for filing a habeas corpus petition, added by the legislature in 2004. Georgia had no filing deadline for the previous 141 years, from the Code of 1863 onward, and eleven states still impose none at all. Committee members spoke with him afterward and said they rarely hear from people who have recently been inside. GPS was asked to return for the committee’s next meeting, on 18 September in Milledgeville, which is open to the public. This built on a three-part written recommendation GPS submitted to the committee earlier in the period, every statement backed by a verified quotation from Georgia statute or case law.
The Parole Board’s own lifer decision series, 2001 to 2025
GPS obtained and indexed all 24 annual reports the State Board of Pardons and Paroles publishes online — fiscal years 2001 through 2025 — and assembled the life-sentence parole figures into a single continuous series, the first time these numbers have existed in one place. Every figure is cited to the exact report and page it came from. The record shows the grant rate for life-sentenced people falling from 30.1 percent in FY2003 to 4.5 percent in FY2024, while annual denials rose from 577 to 2,154. The whole dataset is published as an open, machine-readable resource, and the GPS statistics portal now carries a Parole Board section built from it — releases to parole, supervision population, completion rates, revocations, and life-sentence decisions, year by year, with reporting changes footnoted. Read more
Records requests filed on an in-custody homicide the state never explained
GPS filed two formal open-records requests on the 2023 killing of a man at a Georgia prison thirty days before his release date — a death the county medical examiner certified as a homicide, and which drew no news coverage at the time. The first asks the district attorney whether anyone was ever charged, what the disposition was, and what physical evidence, if any, was ever transmitted to prosecutors. The second asks the state crime lab whether the tissue slides taken at the time of death still exist, for the working notes behind a microscopic examination that disposed of ten organs in a single sentence, and whether the retained blood specimen and clothing remain in custody. The Open Records Act gives three business days.
Open-records push on parole and prison records
GPS pressed four further open-records fronts: paying the Parole Board to produce its unpublished 1989–2000 annual reports, challenging the Board’s refusal to release aggregate parole data it says it does not have to compile, chasing two overdue cost estimates from the Department of Corrections, and re-filing a state-level request for prison water-testing records after a district office said its systems could not reach them.
Help us grow the Advocacy Network — forward this email
The Advocacy Network writes to each advocate’s own state legislators on their behalf, every week, and copies the advocate on every letter. It works on one principle: legislators answer to the people who can vote for them, so a letter from inside a district carries weight a petition signature never will. That means the network’s reach is simply the number of districts we can speak into — and there are 236 seats under the Gold Dome. We need many more people than we have. If you are already an advocate, forward this email to one friend or family member in Georgia and ask them to sign up. It takes two minutes and no prior knowledge. If you are not signed up yet, this is the ask. Become an advocate
Upcoming events
Blue-Ribbon Committee on Criminal Post-Conviction Litigation — public meeting
Friday, 18 September 2026, 9:00 a.m., Old Capitol Building, Milledgeville. The Georgia House Blue-Ribbon Study Committee on Criminal Post-Conviction Litigation meets in Milledgeville, and the public may attend. The committee is examining how people convicted in Georgia can challenge a conviction after trial, and it is taking testimony from the public as it goes. GPS spoke at its August meeting in Ellijay, where members said they rarely hear from people who have recently been inside, and GPS was asked to return in September. The committee’s notice asks anyone who wants to give testimony to contact the committee office in advance. If you or someone in your family has been through Georgia’s post-conviction process, this is a room where that experience is being asked for.
Featured story
The Board That Stopped Saying Yes: Georgia’s Lifer Parole Collapse, in Its Own Numbers
Georgia’s parole board granted release to just 93 of 2,046 lifers in FY2024 — 4.5 percent. GPS compiled all 24 of the Board’s own annual reports: a generation ago it granted one in five. The collapse was never announced, never explained, and never published as a rate — until now.
Every story we publish starts with someone who lived it. If you have an account of what happens inside Georgia’s prisons, share it through Tell My Story — and if you have a loved one inside, you can refer them there too.
Articles published
5 articles published this period, and 5 Spanish editions.
The Board That Stopped Saying Yes: Georgia’s Lifer Parole Collapse, in Its Own Numbers — 19 Aug 2026
Georgia’s parole board granted release to just 93 of 2,046 lifers in FY2024 — 4.5%. GPS compiled all 24 of the Board’s own annual reports; a generation ago it granted one in five.
Nowhere to Put Him: How Georgia’s Bed Math Killed a Man Thirty Days From Home — 16 Aug 2026
A man was killed at Phillips State Prison thirty days from release. The Chief of Security says every segregation bed was full, so there was nowhere to put a man who needed protecting. The medical examiner certified homicide.
Georgia Parole Board Rejects Constitution — 15 Aug 2026
In 1994, 81% of Georgia voters gave the parole board constitutional authority to parole anyone 62 or older. Thirty-two years later, the Board has no rule, no process, and no record of ever using it once.
Death at a Locked Gate: Georgia Fences Men In, Then Locks the Only Way Out — 15 Aug 2026
A man with twenty months left on his sentence was chased across the Hancock State Prison yard and cornered at a locked gate. Georgia built the gate, locked it, and left no one watching the corridor between.
Five Hours in a Shower Stall — 9 Aug 2026
Georgia’s own death investigators recorded what happened to four men at Washington State Prison. In each case the response to a medical crisis was a placement, not treatment.
Postal Mailings this period
1 advocacy letter (sent certified).
We put 50 firsthand stories from inside directly into Georgia legislators’ hands this period — real accounts mailed as Tell My Story postcards, each carrying a pull-quote and a QR code to the full story. Have a story that belongs in a legislator’s hands? Share it at gps.press/tellmystory.
Emails sent on your behalf
872 emails sent this period — 831 Legislative, 26 Media, 15 Advocacy.
Open records requests
44 open records requests were made this period, to 9 different agencies or offices.
New advocates
15 new advocates joined this period.
Explore GPS
Two corners of GPS worth a look:
Search gps.press
Ask a question in plain English — “how many people are in GDC custody”, “what is the habeas deadline” — and get the exact page and section that answers it, across everything GPS has published. Free, no login, English and Spanish.
Facility Intelligence Profiles
Deep-dive profiles of each GDC facility: conditions, deaths in custody, leadership, and documented incidents, drawn from GPS’s records.
— The GPS Team — accountability@gps.press