Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms and her police chief Rodney Bryant claim they are focused on public safety and that the police department is reprioritizing its efforts. But until the criminal gang crisis is effectively combatted, nothing much will change. That also goes for the police and sheriff’s departments in other major Georgia cities– especially Augusta, Savannah and Macon.
For public safety’s sake, gang member arrests and prosecutions under O.C.G.A § 16-15-4 must increase, and law enforcement experts stress that anyone not saying this is a gang crime-denier.
No major politician has mentioned raising O.C.G.A § 16-15-4 arrests and prosecutions. Experts at the Georgia Gang Investigators Association (GGIA) went to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation and checked GCIC records. It was to determine how many people were arrested under O.C.G.A § 16-15-4, the charging provision of the Street Gang Act, for every jurisdiction in Georgia. What GGIA found was the old saw playing out again: In the past three years gang arrests went down— and gang crime went up! Additionally, the GGIA found that gang member arrests have been abysmally low for years. And this was statewide.
That said, the Atlanta Police Department’s numbers are particularly emblematic.
Here are the numbers for the APD:
· 2018:
· # people arrested for 16-15-4(a) violations:
· APD-32
· 2019
· # people arrested for 16-15-4(a) violations:
· APD-23
· 2020
· # people arrested for 16-15-4(a) violations:
· APD-14
That begs the question: APD could not find 75 gang members to arrest in and charge in three entire years?
So, did the Atlanta chief’s new plans include an intention to increase these arrests under this law? No. Yet at the same time the head of GBI’s gang task force, Ken Howard, is explicitly stating that 70-90 percent of Georgia’s violent crime is has to do with gangs.
By the way, which among Atlanta’s mayoral aspirants is stating that police must be arresting gang members under O.C.G.A § 16-15-4 and that they must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of this RICO-style law? So far, none.
