Gwinnett DA Patsy Austin-Gatson works to ‘put a friendlier face on the legal system’

“I’m trying to build bridges, to put a friendlier, human face on the legal system while at the same time showing young people that there are consequences for actions,” she says. “I’m trying to get to them early, before they’re even in the system, to head off trouble before it even has a chance to start. I want to end that school-to-prison pipeline and give them an alternative to guns, gangs and drugs.”

Think of this outreach as a kinder, gentler ― and cooler ― “Scared Straight.” Austin-Gatson has instituted several programs to aid young people, including a Junior District Attorney and Investigator Mentorship Program, which has doubled in size each year, and Rehabilitation Enables Dreams (RED), a one-year program for 18- to 28-year-olds who are first-offenders.

“We also go to a lot of career days and host homeschool students to show them what we do,” she says. “Basically, we love on ‘em. We teach them accountability and emotional maturity.”

Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez

Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez

Criminal justice runs in the family

Austin-Gatson, 66, is a public servant with an informal, easygoing manner. She is married to lawman Travis Gatson, one of the first African Americans hired by the sheriff’s department and the first Black police chief in Gwinnett, who retired as a captain from the Gwinnett County Sheriff’s Department.

Criminal justice is the family business. “Like the show ‘Blue Bloods,’ but with a tan,” they joke.

She grew up in Rockaway, Queens, the baby in a family of six, brought up by a single mother in and out of public housing.

There was plenty of character-building adversity in her childhood, she says. She suffered from scoliosis and had to wear an uncomfortable back brace. At one point, her mother took in four cousins and Austin-Gatson had to relinquish her bed to sleep on a table. Perhaps worst of all, she stuttered.

“Sometimes things were just hard,” she says. “I was very quiet. I didn’t volunteer to talk. I took up with the people my mother called ‘holy rollers’ at school and discovered God. My faith got me through.”

She dodged junkies nodding on the corner and skirted around the racially tense atmosphere of Howard Beach. “We knew not to stop for pizza there,” she says.

Feeling stifled in the city and yearning for an escape, she enrolled at Syracuse University and studied human development. A neighborhood attorney took an interest in her academic progress and sent her money for books.

“His name was Mr. Goldstein, and he was the first lawyer I ever knew,” she says. “That made me think law might be a way to make a difference. I met Shirley Chisholm (the first Black woman elected to Congress) at school, and she inspired me. And Barbara Jordan (the first African American elected to the Texas Senate since Reconstruction) was my role model.”

After graduating, she took six years off from school, relocating to Atlanta to work in the business office of Time Magazine. The law beckoned, though, and she enrolled at Emory University, becoming one of eight Black students in a class of 225. Austin-Gatson interned in the Brooklyn DA’s office ― a “rat-infested learning experience” ― and graduated in 1989.

For the next 30 years, she explored different aspects of the legal system.

“I enjoy the variety in the law,” she says. She argued a case before the Superior Court of Georgia and for a while hung out her shingle as Austin and Associates. More recently she worked in Gwinnett County’s solicitor’s office and began climbing the ladder, setting her sights ever higher.

Austin-Gatson says she was moved by current events to throw her hat in the ring for DA.

“The deaths of George Floyd and Ahmaud Arbery really got to me,” she says. “Gwinnett County is one of the most diverse places in the country, and soon enough the rest of the country will look like Gwinnett. I decided we needed a more inclusive DA’s office that embraces our rich diversity and gives people a second chance to become contributing members of society.”

Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez

Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez

A changing of the guard

Austin-Gatson’s spirit of advocacy and engagement marked a dramatic shift in the DA’s office. A Democrat, she is the first woman and the first African American to hold the position. In the blue wave of 2020, she unseated Republican Danny Porter, a 30-year incumbent. When he first took power, gridlocked, multiethnic Lawrenceville still had cow pastures. He was known for resisting bail reform, routinely seeking the death penalty and sentencing young offenders to adult prisons.

“I’m not saying that the previous DA was not out in the community, but he certainly wasn’t out in my community,” says State House Rep. Dewey McClain, who endorsed Austin-Gatson. “I first encountered Patsy years ago doing work in the community before she ever got political. I saw her compassion in action. She impressed me then and has lived up to her promises. She helps people, especially young people, turn their lives around and succeed, even if they have fallen down.”

“When I took office, there was this huge shift from Republican to Democrat, man to woman, white to Black,” she says. “Some people in the office resisted that, and I got what I called ‘nasty-grams’ in interoffice email. So, I decided to sweeten things up with plenty of doughnuts and juice and conversation about what was happening. I said, ‘Let’s meet and talk and figure all this out.’ It was a challenge, but it was worth it, and now we’re attracting top-notch people who want to work with us.”

John Williams, deputy chief assistant district attorney, previously worked as a prosecutor in Fulton and DeKalb counties before coming to Gwinnett. “Madam DA is the best boss I’ve ever had and ever will have,” he says. “It cannot be overstated how strong her wisdom and her patience are. In this line of work, there are land mines around every corner, and she maneuvers them with great leadership instincts. She is consistently deliberative and fair, and she’s always the last to leave the office at the end of the day.”

Just don’t mistake her kindness for weakness, colleagues warn.

“She’s a fighter,” says defense attorney Chris Adams, who frequently squares off against her in the courtroom. “She won’t back down. You learn to be scrappy if you come from a family of six. Foremost in her mind always is what is best for the victims and what is best for the citizens of Gwinnett. She also has those great mom instincts, which show in her passion for children.”

Austin-Gatson’s conviction rate is 94%, with a 100% rate for homicide. She has organized victims’ vigils and produced a resource guide to help them with social services, and she formed both a cold case unit and a conviction integrity unit, racking up awards from the Georgia Criminal Justice Coordinating Council. She also had to confront a backlog of pandemic cases.

“The office was in shambles, but we prosecuted cases as far back as 2014, finally bringing justice and closure to some victims.”

Another land mine: the fentanyl epidemic. Her office became the first in Georgia to prosecute dealers for murder in deaths by overdose.

“It took the statutes a while to catch up on that issue, but we tried to get out ahead of it,” she says. “Two inmates recently died in the jail from it, and I prosecuted their dealer.”

Last year during the Democratic primary, Austin-Gatson fended off challenges from her former No. 2 and No. 3 employees in the DA’s office. She won the primary with more than 50% of the vote, avoiding a runoff. The next election is in 2028.

Not long ago, Madam DA received a panicked phone call from her daughter, Keke. She had been pulled over for speeding. “She said, ‘Mom, what do I do?’ I told her to be respectful and apologize to the officer. He has a hard job, after all. I also told her not to even think about dropping my name to get out of it. It all worked out. It’s all about taking responsibility, which is something we all need to do. That, and second chances.”