Georgia Prisoners' Speak

08/25/2026

𝗚𝗲𝗼𝗿𝗴𝗶𝗮 𝘀𝗽𝗲𝗻𝘁 $𝟴𝟲 𝗺𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗼𝗻 𝟱𝟮𝟰 𝗽𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗼𝗻 𝗯𝗲𝗱𝘀.

There is no contract. Not a sealed one, not a redacted one — none.

We searched the entire state procurement registry. Every agency, 2014 through 2026. What exists is a single eight-day "request for information" from March 2025, with no award, no named vendor, and not one document the public can open.

The state's own vendor payment records show nothing paid to the company in any published year.

The company is ModCorr. Texas records list its owners as three brothers — John, Todd and William Sullivan — at 6702 Broadway in Galveston. That is the same address, and the same registered agent, as SLSCO, one of the largest contractors on the U.S.-Mexico border wall.

GDC says ModCorr was founded in 2023. Texas registered it in September 2022.

The legislature funded these buildings as temporary "swing space" — somewhere to put people while crumbling prisons got repaired. Thirteen months later GDC called them 524 permanent beds. Georgia now budgets $1.76 million a year to operate them.

Meanwhile 2,500 people who have already been convicted and sentenced are sitting in county jails, waiting for a bed to open.

Read the full investigation 👇

GDC added 524 modular beds at five prisons. The builder is owned by border-wall contractor SLSCO — and no contract appears in Georgia's procurement registry.

08/24/2026

𝗩𝗶𝗻𝗰𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗗𝘆𝗲𝗿 𝗯𝗹𝗲𝗱 𝘁𝗼 𝗱𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗵 𝗶𝗻 𝗮 𝗹𝗮𝘂𝗻𝗱𝗿𝘆 𝗯𝗶𝗻 𝘄𝗵𝗶𝗹𝗲 𝗼𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗿 𝗽𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗼𝗻𝗲𝗿𝘀 𝗽𝘂𝘀𝗵𝗲𝗱 𝗵𝗶𝗺 𝗽𝗮𝘀𝘁 𝗼𝗳𝗳𝗶𝗰𝗲𝗿𝘀 𝘄𝗵𝗼 𝗻𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿 𝗺𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗱.

𝘏𝘦 𝘩𝘢𝘥 𝘵𝘰𝘭𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘮, 𝘪𝘯 𝘸𝘳𝘪𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨, 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘩𝘦 𝘸𝘢𝘴 𝘨𝘰𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘰 𝘣𝘦 𝘬𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘦𝘥.

He was 50 years old. Stabbed in the chest, abdomen, shoulder, forearm and hand at Baldwin State Prison on August 21, 2024. A federal complaint says the attack ran at least fifteen minutes with no staff in the dorm, and that no officer responded during it or after — so men lifted him into a laundry bin and wheeled him toward medical themselves, pleading for help as they went. His heart stopped before EMS arrived.

The day before, he had asked to be moved for his own safety. Then he put the request in writing.

A Baldwin County jury has already convicted the man who stabbed him. The harder question — who let it happen — is now in federal court in Macon. Last week a judge opened discovery, which means the logbooks, the housing records, and the incident files get read by lawyers who don't work for the state.

The four officers named deny the allegations and have demanded a jury trial. Nothing is proven yet. But the claims are specific and dated, and they're about to be tested against GDC's own paperwork instead of its press releases.

At least 63 people have died at Baldwin since 2020 in our mortality registry. For 42 of them, Georgia has never made a cause of death public.

A sentence is the punishment. Bleeding out in a laundry bin is not.

𝗦𝗵𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀. 𝗜𝘁'𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗼𝗻𝗹𝘆 𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘀𝗼𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝘀𝗲 𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲𝘀 𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗰𝗵 𝗮𝗻𝘆𝗼𝗻𝗲 𝗼𝘂𝘁𝘀𝗶𝗱𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗳𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲. Full story in the first comment.

08/24/2026

𝗬𝗼𝘂 𝘄𝗿𝗼𝘁𝗲 𝗶𝘁 𝗱𝗼𝘄𝗻. 𝗪𝗲 𝗽𝘂𝘁 𝗶𝘁 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗶𝗿 𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗱𝘀.

Every story published on Tell My Story gets printed on a card and mailed — to Georgia legislators, to newsrooms, to the people whose job it is to be paying attention.

Help educate your state legislators.

840 cards mailed so far.

𝘐𝘵 𝘥𝘪𝘥 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘴𝘵𝘰𝘱 𝘢𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘴𝘶𝘣𝘮𝘪𝘵 𝘣𝘶𝘵𝘵𝘰𝘯.

If you've submitted a story, log back into your account. You can see exactly who your story was sent to — name by name — and when it was delivered.

https://tellmystory.gps.press

Haven't told yours yet? It's free, it's your account, and you decide what goes on the page. Families can write on behalf of someone inside, or tell their story as someone who lives with everything a loved one on the outside lives through; fears, expenses, missed phone calls, long travel times for a 2-hour visit.

Share this so it reaches someone who's been waiting to be heard.

Real stories from inside Georgia's prisons.

08/21/2026

The second of three meetings of the House Blue-Ribbon Study Committee on Criminal Post-Conviction Litigation happened today, August 21, 2026, at the Gilmer County Courthouse in Ellijay. The full recording is available now.

The committee is charged with examining Georgia's post-conviction framework to protect constitutional rights, reduce delays, and improve efficiency. Earlier this year, Georgia Supreme Court Chief Justice Nels Peterson described the state's post-conviction process as broken in an opinion.

If you care about how wrongly convicted or badly represented Georgians get back into court, watch it yourself. Then call your state representative and senator and tell them what you saw.

For context, read our coverage of the first meeting: https://gps.press/georgias-post-conviction-committee-the-first-meeting/

https://www.youtube.com/live/Kpy621pFxl0

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08/21/2026

On Tuesday, 284 letters went out to Georgia legislators.

Not a petition. Not a form email. 284 individual letters, each written as a constituent in that legislator's own district.

This week's ask was specific: create an accountability board outside the Department of Corrections — one with real power to inspect prisons, compel records and testimony, and report its findings directly to the legislature. Not a review panel inside GDC reporting to GDC. Independent oversight, with teeth.

It is not a request for more money. Corrections already draws close to two billion dollars a year. It is a request for someone whose job is to ask why, and who can require an answer.

Those letters reached 139 different legislators. Georgia's General Assembly has 236 members — in a single day, more than half of them heard from a constituent about this.

And then something happened that doesn't usually happen. They wrote back.

Here is the part that should stop you: all of it came from 144 people. That is the entire GPS Advocacy Network.

144 people reached more than half the legislature in a day. The 2027 session starts in January. Imagine 500. Imagine 1,000.

Signing up takes two minutes. Name, email, address — we find your House and Senate representatives automatically. Every week you get an Action Alert explaining exactly what is going out on your behalf, plus a copy of every letter. Opt out any time.

We do the hard part. You just have to say yes.

Your loved one needs a voice in the Georgia legislature. We make it easy — sign up once and we'll advocate on your behalf every single week.

08/20/2026

𝗢𝗻𝗲 𝗶𝗻 𝗳𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝗯𝗲𝗰𝗮𝗺𝗲 𝗼𝗻𝗲 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝘄𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘆. 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗕𝗼𝗮𝗿𝗱 𝗻𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿 𝗮𝗻𝗻𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗰𝗲𝗱 𝗶𝘁.

𝘕𝘰 𝘭𝘢𝘸 𝘤𝘩𝘢𝘯𝘨𝘦𝘥. 𝘕𝘰 𝘦𝘹𝘱𝘭𝘢𝘯𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯 𝘸𝘢𝘴 𝘨𝘪𝘷𝘦𝘯. 𝘑𝘶𝘴𝘵 𝘢 𝘥𝘰𝘰𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘲𝘶𝘪𝘦𝘵𝘭𝘺 𝘤𝘭𝘰𝘴𝘦𝘥.

In fiscal 2024, 2,046 people serving life sentences came before Georgia's State Board of Pardons and Paroles. It said yes to 93 — fewer than eight a month, a grant rate of 4.5 percent. From 2001 through 2014, the same board granted parole in more than one of every five life cases.

GPS compiled all 24 annual reports the Board has published online, fiscal 2001 through 2025, and pulled the life-sentence numbers from each one, page by page. When we asked the Board under the Open Records Act for the aggregate data behind its decisions, it told us it had no responsive documents. So we built the record from the Board's own publications.

Those same publications show that parole works: more than 70 percent of Georgia parolees have completed supervision successfully every year for the past decade. The Board is releasing fewer lifers than at any point in its own published history anyway.

Every number, every citation, published for anyone to check:

The Board's own reports show lifer parole grants fell from 1 in 5 to 1 in 20 since 2001. GPS compiled all 24 annual reports — every number page-cited.

08/16/2026

𝗧𝘄𝗼 𝗱𝗮𝘆𝘀 𝗯𝗲𝗳𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝗔𝗿𝘁𝗵𝘂𝗿 𝗪𝗶𝗺𝗯𝘂𝘀𝗵 𝘄𝗮𝘀 𝗸𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗲𝗱, 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗺𝗮𝗻 𝘄𝗵𝗼 𝗿𝗮𝗻 𝘀𝗲𝗰𝘂𝗿𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗮𝘁 𝗣𝗵𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗽𝘀 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝗣𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗼𝗻 𝘁𝗿𝗶𝗲𝗱 𝘁𝗼 𝗺𝗼𝘃𝗲 𝗵𝗶𝗺 𝘀𝗼𝗺𝗲𝘄𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝘀𝗮𝗳𝗲. 𝗘𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘆 𝘀𝗲𝗴𝗿𝗲𝗴𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗯𝗲𝗱 𝘄𝗮𝘀 𝗳𝘂𝗹𝗹.

𝘛𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘸𝘢𝘴 𝘯𝘰 𝘣𝘦𝘥.

𝘚𝘰 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘯𝘦𝘹𝘵 𝘮𝘰𝘳𝘯𝘪𝘯𝘨, 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘴𝘦𝘯𝘵 𝘩𝘪𝘮 𝘣𝘢𝘤𝘬 𝘵𝘰 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘥𝘰𝘳𝘮 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘩𝘢𝘥 𝘱𝘶𝘭𝘭𝘦𝘥 𝘩𝘪𝘮 𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘰𝘧.

Arthur James Wimbush, Jr. walked into his cell at 10:55 on a Sunday morning. At 11:30, incarcerated men — not officers — flagged down staff. He was already dead. The Gwinnett County Medical Examiner certified it a homicide: blunt-force trauma, a fractured thyroid cartilage. The reported weapon was a padlock wrapped in a sock.

He was 46. He had about thirty days left to serve.

GPS found no charge, no indictment, no prosecution — and no news coverage of his death at all. We've filed an open-records request with the Gwinnett County District Attorney, and we'll publish the answer either way.

He was killed because Georgia lacked a bed, and the staff to move him to one.

Every segregation bed at Phillips State Prison was full. Arthur Wimbush was returned to the dorm he was pulled from, and killed there 30 days from home.

08/16/2026

The people of Georgia made a constitutional amendment to allow release of elderly prisoners. The parole board has ignored this part of the constitution for 32 years.

In 1994, more than a million Georgians — 81% of everyone voting — wrote it into the state constitution: the Parole Board may release anyone 62 or older.

The Board has used it exactly zero times.

No rule. No application form. No mention in 930 pages of its own reports to the legislature. Not one person, ever — while more than 4,100 Georgians aged 62 and older grow old, sicken, and die behind razor wire at taxpayer expense.

The people spoke. The Board has spent 32 years ignoring the people’s wishes.

The people created the Constitution to set the rules of government, when the government ignores those rules the people must hold the government accountable!!

Read the full investigation:

Georgia voters gave the parole board constitutional power to release anyone 62 or older in 1994. In 32 years, the Board has never used it once. GPS investigates.

08/15/2026

𝗛𝗲 𝗱𝗶𝗲𝗱 𝗮𝘁 𝗮 𝗹𝗼𝗰𝗸𝗲𝗱 𝗴𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝗚𝗲𝗼𝗿𝗴𝗶𝗮 𝗯𝘂𝗶𝗹𝘁.
𝗖𝗼𝗿𝗲𝘆 𝗝𝘂𝗹𝘆 𝗵𝗮𝗱 𝘁𝘄𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘆 𝗺𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗵𝘀 𝗹𝗲𝗳𝘁.

He was 34. Eight days from his 35th birthday. Serving a Floyd County sentence for shoplifting, with a February 2027 release date.

On June 17, 2025, in the yard at Hancock State Prison, another man came at him with a homemade knife.

Chased. Cornered. Killed.

Prosecutors say surveillance video showed Corey July ran until a locked gate stopped him. Georgia moves prisoners between buildings through chain-link corridors closed at both ends. There was no way out because there was never supposed to be one.

Georgia does not have a death penalty for shoplifting. He got one anyway.

His killer was convicted of malice murder and will now die in prison. That is justice. It is not safety.

Corey July was cornered at a locked gate and killed at Hancock State Prison. His killer got life without parole. Georgia built the trap.

08/12/2026

𝗔 𝗚𝗲𝗼𝗿𝗴𝗶𝗮 𝗛𝗼𝘂𝘀𝗲 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗺𝗶𝘁𝘁𝗲𝗲 𝗶𝘀 𝗱𝗲𝗰𝗶𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘄𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗵𝗮𝗽𝗽𝗲𝗻𝘀 𝘁𝗼 𝗽𝗲𝗼𝗽𝗹𝗲 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗹 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘀𝘁𝗶𝘁𝘂𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝗮𝗹 𝗰𝗹𝗮𝗶𝗺𝘀.

𝘛𝘸𝘦𝘭𝘷𝘦 𝘭𝘦𝘨𝘪𝘴𝘭𝘢𝘵𝘰𝘳𝘴. 𝘖𝘯𝘦 2027 𝘴𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘰𝘯. 𝘗𝘶𝘣𝘭𝘪𝘤 𝘪𝘯𝘱𝘶𝘵 𝘰𝘱𝘦𝘯 𝘳𝘪𝘨𝘩𝘵 𝘯𝘰𝘸.

The House Blue-Ribbon Study Committee on Criminal Post-Conviction Litigation was created this year by House Resolution 1703 and is chaired by Rep. Stan Gunter, a former district attorney. It is examining how Georgia handles challenges to convictions after trial, and it will recommend legislation for the 2027 session.

It has said it will hear from the public. Most people never get told that, and the window closes quietly.

So we built a page that makes it simple. Start from our letter or write your own, add one sentence about who you are, and the page opens your own email app with everything filled in. You press send. Nothing goes through GPS. Nothing you type is stored.

What we're asking the committee to recommend: repeal Georgia's four-year habeas filing deadline — O.C.G.A. § 9-14-42(c) — retroactively. Habeas doesn't retry guilt or innocence. It tests whether a conviction was obtained legally. For 141 years, from 1863 until 2004, Georgia had no filing deadline at all.

You're welcome to make that ask, your own version of it, or a different point entirely. It's your letter.

Two minutes. Your words. A committee that says it's listening.

A Georgia House committee is deciding what to fix in the state's post-conviction system — and it is taking public input. Send yours in two minutes, from your own email.