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In-depth reporting on Georgia’s prison crisis — data-driven investigations, policy analysis, and the stories that need to be told.
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Forgetting Is Not Murder
A Florida nanny forgot a sleeping baby in her car, and the State called it murder until an appeals court said no. Georgia charges grieving parents the same way. One Lawrenceville mother sat in jail for six weeks after losing her son. Forgetting is a tragedy, not a murder...
Who Builds the File Five Members Vote On? Georgia’s Parole Guidelines and the One Unit That Checks Them
Five Board members vote on Georgia parole cases, but staff compute the crime severity level, the risk score and the case summary. One internal unit audits that work and publishes no results. Here is the design, in the Board's own words...
“He’s on Tier”: What Georgia’s Prison Segregation System Is and How It Works
"He's on Tier" means a loved one is in Georgia's prison segregation system. Here's how Tier I, Tier II, the Special Management Unit and the STEP step-down work under GDC's own policies, how people get in and out, and the bed counts GDC gave GPS in October 2026...
“I Am Telling You What I Saw”: A Letter From Georgia’s Women’s Prisons
Rachelle Terry spent more than two years in Georgia's women's prisons. This September she wrote to lawmakers and the Department of Corrections about what she saw. Her letter is published here in full, alongside what the state's own records show for the two prisons that held her...
Three to a Cell: Georgia’s Commissioner Says Single Cells Cut the Violence. Four Prisons Do the Opposite.
Georgia's corrections commissioner told senators single cells cut prison violence. At Calhoun, Dooly, Washington and Wilcox, GDC is packing more Close security men into single-man cells that hold three, at prisons built for 500 and holding up to 1,800, and the homicide rate shows it...
Five Questions for Georgia’s Next Attorney General
On August 25 we sent the same five questions to both nominees for Georgia Attorney General, on the Justice Department's prison findings, deaths in custody, open records, oversight and habeas. Sen. Brian Strickland answered. No answers were received from Rep. Tanya Miller. His answers are here in full...
The Warden Shall Notify: Who Georgia’s Prisons Keep in the Dark, and the Law That Lets Them
A 1984 rule says the warden shall notify a prisoner's family when he is badly hurt. Family after family since December 2024 found out instead from an intern, a contraband phone, other prisoners or Facebook. The Department told the men at Autry there was no outbreak. And the statute that makes every inmate file a state secret is missing the one sentence the Parole Board's has...
Direct Selection: The Two-Page Note Behind Georgia’s $85,585,244 Prison Purchase
Georgia paid $85,585,244 for 524 modular prison beds. Asked how the vendor was chosen, GDC, DOAS and GSFIC each said the record wasn't theirs. Then GSFIC sent two undated pages: it read GDC's information request and "made a direct selection."...
Nobody Told Them: Georgia Convicted People on Science the FBI Disowned, Then Shut the Courthouse Door
The FBI has disowned three kinds of forensic testimony and sent letters each time. Georgia's crime lab read the 2015 hair admission, measured its own error rate at one in twenty, and told no one. The one court door that opened last year is one-shot. The other is closed by the four-year habeas deadline...
“Contained to One Dorm”: The Squad Left Wilcox at Noon. The Coroner Was Called at Two.
A tactical squad spent five hours turning out F2 dorm at Wilcox State Prison, then left at noon. The men were let out to shower. By two the coroner was called. GDC's own policies have four pages on the squad and no page for the hour after...
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