Following DOJ Investigation, Sens. Ossoff, Rev. Warnock Urge State of Georgia to Swiftly Address “Unconstitutional” Conditions in State Prisons

Washington, D.C. — Following the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ)’s investigation into Georgia’s state prisons, U.S. Senators Reverend Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff today urged the State to swiftly improve conditions in Georgia prisons, which the DOJ found were “unconstitutional.”

Sens. Ossoff and Rev. Warnock urged Georgia Department of Corrections (GDC) Commissioner Tyrone Oliver to promptly address the deeply concerning findings in the DOJ’s report last month on Georgia’s state prison system, which found conditions in Georgia’s prisons “violate the Eighth Amendment to the Constitution.”

The DOJ’s investigation of Georgia’s state-operated prisons found that “the State of Georgia engages in a pattern or practice of violating incarcerated persons’ constitutional rights.”

“We write to urge the State of Georgia and the Georgia Department of Corrections (GDC) to promptly address the deeply concerning findings contained in the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) October 2024 report on its investigation of Georgia prisons,” the Senators wrote to GDC Commissioner Tyrone Olver.

“On October 1, 2024, DOJ’s Civil Rights Division published the findings from its investigation of Georgia prisons. Among its findings are that there is reason to believe the State of Georgia and GDC (1) fail to protect incarcerated people from violence and harm by other incarcerated people in violation of the Eighth Amendment, and (2) fail to protect incarcerated people from harm caused by sexual violence in violation of the Eighth Amendment. DOJ further found that the State and GDC are ‘deliberately indifferent' to unsafe conditions in state prisons,” the Senators wrote. “In light of DOJ’s alarming findings, we urge GDC to give DOJ’s findings due consideration and act swiftly to remedy the troubling state of Georgia state prisons.”  

According to the DOJ’s 93-page report, from January 2022 through April 2023, there were more than 1,400 reported incidents of violence, including fights, assaults, hostage incidents, and homicides, across 24 of Georgia’s prisons, including all close-security prisons and most of the medium-security prisons. The DOJ also found that in 2022, there were 456 documented allegations of sexual abuse between incarcerated individuals, 35 of which were found to be substantiated.

Earlier this year, Sen. Ossoff, alongside Senator Reverend Warnock and Congresswoman Nikema Williams (GA-05), urged the DOJ to prioritize its investigation into the Fulton County Jail.

In June, Sens. Ossoff and Reverend Warnock launched an inquiry with Attorney General Merrick Garland urging the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) to strengthen policies aimed at tracking and collecting data about deaths in Federal, state, and local custody in order to better understand and mitigate risks inmates face while incarcerated.

In September 2023, Sen. Ossoff urged Attorney General Merrick Garland to open a civil rights investigation into the Clayton County Jail, pointing to extensive local reporting alleging serious human rights violations and dangerous conditions inside the facility.

In 2022, Sen. Ossoff led a 10-month bipartisan investigation that uncovered the DOJ failed to count nearly 1,000 deaths in state and local custody in 2021 alone.