Ga. lawmakers seek answers to deaths, violence plaguing the state’s prisons [Video]

By Charlotte KramonAssociated Press/Report for America

ATLANTA — Georgia prisons remain understaffed and overwhelmed by violence and deaths, according to statistics presented to state lawmakers Wednesday.

Legislators are seeking solutions to a wide range of problems plaguing prisons that have sparked a federal investigation. Among them: a sharp increase in prisoner deaths; high rates of employee turnover and arrests for criminal activity; and a persistent problem with contraband cellphones and drugs.

A total of 981 people have died in Georgia prisons since 2021, including 207 this year alone, according to numbers that Department of Corrections Commissioner Tyrone Oliver presented to a legislative committee holding its second meeting on the issue. The cause of 98 of those deaths is unknown. Officials are investigating 36 as homicides, Oliver said, a number that is nearly as high as the total number of homicides in the system in all of 2023. There were more prison deaths in the first six months of 2024than there …