SAVANNAH, Ga. (WSAV) – The Chatham County District Attorney is back in the hot seat after WSAV’s Investigative Unit has learned that her office’s investigations into four different officer-involved shootings are now over. As first reported by Drew Favakeh at Savannah Morning News, the news is controversial because District Attorney Shalena Jones never publicly announced her findings or decisions in any of those cases. News 3 had to find out from the Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI). We’ve also learned that she didn’t recently close these cases — she did it back in March.
Three of those cases were part of a string of five officer-involved shootings in early 2022. One dates as far back as December 2020. The GBI tells News 3 that all of them were closed with “no judicial action by the Chatham County DA’s office.”
Not only did District Attorney Jones close the cases without informing the public, we learned that Mayor Van Johnson’s office wasn’t informed either.
“Because it’s so much attention on when the incident happened, I think that those officers deserve that public vindication as well,” Johnson said about the closed cases during his weekly press briefing.
We have reached out to the district attorney and her spokesperson for comment, but have yet to hear back from them. We have also put in an open records request for all documents connected to these cases, and her decisions on them.
This news comes as we’re still waiting on a decision from the Chatham County District Attorney on another officer-involved shooting. June 24 will mark one year since former Savannah Police Officer Ernest Ferguson shot and killed 31-year-old Saudi Lee in the Carver Heights Neighborhood. The GBI gave the DA’s office their report on that shooting in August of last year. She has yet to make a decision on whether to charge Ferguson.