Georgia attorney general says gang prosecution unit has secured more than 140 convictions in four years

The Georgia Attorney General’s Office says its Gang Prosecution Unit is marking four years of operation after securing more than 140 convictions statewide since July 1, 2022.

According to the press release, the majority of the unit’s cases involve fatal and non-fatal shootings, and one victim in those cases was as young as 3 years old.

The office says Attorney General Chris Carr created Georgia’s first statewide Gang Prosecution Unit in 2022. It began with Chief Prosecutor Cara Convery and one main office in Atlanta, and has since expanded to satellite offices in Albany, Augusta, Columbus, Macon, Southeast Georgia and Savannah.

The release says the unit has investigated and prosecuted cases in multiple counties, including Athens-Clarke, Barrow, Bibb, Bryan, Chatham, Clayton, Cobb, Coffee, DeKalb, Dougherty, Fulton, Gwinnett, Laurens, Lowndes, Muscogee, Richmond, Spalding, Thomas, Upson and Washington.

Among the case examples cited, the office highlighted the convictions of 15 members of the Outcast Motorcycle Gang in Bryan County, the convictions of 16 members of the 1-8 Trey Gangster Bloods, a Spalding County murder case in which Kionta Parks was sentenced to life in prison plus five years, an 11-person indictment in Macon-Bibb County, and the convictions of three PDE members in DeKalb County.

The press release also lists county-level results, including 20 convictions in Athens, nearly 20 convictions in Dougherty County, 13 convictions in Laurens County, five murder convictions and eight gang convictions in Columbus, and more than 45 defendants prosecuted in Richmond County.

In Athens, the office also said total shootings were down by more than 50% last year compared with 2022.