GPS Is Asking District Attorneys to Find Out What Prison Staff Knew
GPS asks Georgia DAs to review every prison homicide for staff who were warned of the danger, and puts wardens on notice that warnings will go to prosecutors.
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When a man is killed in a Georgia prison, staff face no questions. GPS is asking district attorneys to review every prison homicide and ask: was staff warned, and what did they do? https://gps.press/gps-asks-district-attorneys-what-prison-staff-knew/
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Georgia charges the man with the stabbing. It rarely asks what the staff knew. At Dooly State Prison, the Commissioner had a written warning about the dorm before Zeary Davis was killed. The deputy warden and a captain got phone calls the day before he died. The man now charged with the murder had broken another man's jaw in that dorm weeks earlier and admitted it to the warden. He stayed in the dorm.
Georgia law already covers reckless conduct, involuntary manslaughter, and violating an oath of office. Prosecutors have charged staff who opened a door for an attacker. GPS hasn't found a case where staff were warned and did nothing. What's missing is a prosecutor willing to ask. What should your district attorney do when a man is killed in a prison in their circuit?
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GPS records at least 268 homicides among at least 1,928 deaths in GDC custody since 2020. When a man is killed inside a Georgia prison, someone usually gets charged with the stabbing. Almost nobody asks what the staff knew. GPS is asking district attorneys to review every prison homicide in their circuit and ask one more question: was anyone on staff warned, and what did they do?
#GAPrisons #PrisonReform #GeorgiaPrisonerSpeak #Accountability #InvestigativeJournalism
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The U.S. Department of Justice found in October 2024 that gangs have "unacceptable levels of control over large sections of Georgia's prison system," and GDC's own staff told DOJ that wardens bear responsibility for managing them. Since 2020, GPS's death registry records at least 268 homicides among at least 1,928 deaths in GDC custody. Georgia law already provides the tools: reckless conduct, involuntary manslaughter, and violation of oath by a public officer. Prosecutors have charged staff who opened a door for an attacker, but GPS has not found a case where staff were warned and did nothing.
GPS is asking district attorneys to review every homicide in a state prison in their circuit and ask whether anyone on staff was warned, and what they did. A homicide inside a state prison is a homicide in that circuit. Read the full editorial and the legal analysis behind it.