Crime Wave

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Mayor pledges action on violent crime as DA warns of case backlog

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By Collin Kelley and Bob Pepalis

An Anti-Violence Advisory Council created by Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms delivered its recommendations in July for immediate and long-term actions to address the current violent crime wave happening across Atlanta. The recommendations include creating a Mayor’s Office of Violence Reduction, expanding APD’s repeat offender unit, increasing resources to APD’s license and permit team to handle nuisance properties, focus on hiring 250 officers in fiscal year 2022, increase the number of surveillance cameras and license plate readers, and add 10,000 new street lights.

The investment to implement the council’s recommendation is $70 million, $50 million of which would come from public funding and $20 million from philanthropic and nonprofit contributions, Bottoms said during a June 16 news conference.

Bottoms described the uptick in crime in Atlanta and across the nation as a “public epidemic.”

Meanwhile, Fulton County District Attorney Fani T. Willis told the Fulton County Board of Commissioners at the end of their July 14 meeting that her office needed $7.66 million for 2021 and more than $54 million in 2022 to handle the case backlog and rise in crime.

“Crime is [at] an all-time high. We’re getting ready to be in a position where we may have to release murderers. This is not a third world country. This is Fulton County,” Willis said.

Willis said that the rise in crime, mismanagement from 2016 to 2019, and the COVID-19 pandemic had created the backlog of cases. More than 6,000 unindicted cases are from 2016 to 2019. Another 7,805 unindicted cases from March 2020 to June 2021 make up the COVID backlog. And with the 86% increase in rapes and 25% increase in murders in the past year, the numbers keep rising.

Her request came during the same meeting in which the commissioners were told by Alton Adams, the county’s deputy chief operating officer for public safety, that the county needed to spend $75 million over two years to hire 300 personnel and prepare 75 additional courtrooms to handle the case backlog. Additional staff for the district attorney’s office is included in that plan.