Former high-ranking state investigator Josh Waites has hauled Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr into court, claiming the state’s top lawyer and two of his prosecutors maliciously went after him and then got in the way when he tried to rebuild his career. In a new lawsuit, Waites says the attorney general’s office pushed a criminal case that a grand jury later slapped down, and that the failed prosecutions scared off would-be employers and cost him multiple job offers.
The complaint, reviewed by WSB‑TV, names Carr, senior prosecutor John Fowler and former prosecutor Blair McGowan as defendants. Filed by attorney David Cooke on Waites’s behalf, it alleges that in July 2024 Fowler "falsely represented" to the Spalding County Sheriff’s Office that Waites remained under active investigation, and that the attorney general’s office has blocked at least four job opportunities since Waites was fired by the Department of Revenue in 2020. The lawsuit also points out that Waites once led investigations that helped secure fraud convictions in high-profile cases.
Cooke says he expects to knock down allegations that Waites altered an email and misrepresented information on a job application, calling those claims provably wrong. The attorney general’s office, for its part, told WSB‑TV, "We completely dispute these allegations and very much look forward to vigorously defending our office in Court."
Grand Jury’s Rare Rebuke
The criminal case that sparked all of this ended with a highly unusual flourish from a DeKalb County grand jury in 2022. Jurors declined to return indictments and, in an unusually pointed move, stamped the charging document "NO" and wrote "Malicious Prosecution/Unanimous Verdict" across it, a public rebuke that legal experts described as extraordinary.
As reported by WSB‑TV, that written slam is more than courtroom drama for Waites. It matters in his civil case because it is likely to be treated as a favorable termination of the underlying prosecution, a key hurdle for any malicious-prosecution claim.
Fired Amid Forfeiture Probe
The bad blood traces back to March 2020 reporting by The Atlanta Journal‑Constitution that spotlighted how the Department of Revenue’s Office of Special Investigations had spent millions in seized forfeiture funds. That coverage also noted that Waites had misstated his education on a state form. The department fired him amid the fallout from that probe.
Records and reporting showed the investigations unit controlled millions of dollars in seized assets. The controversy prompted the state Inspector General to turn over files to the attorney general’s office, setting the stage for the later criminal case that grand jurors rejected.
What’s at Stake
Waites’s lawsuit now has to run the gauntlet of Georgia’s strict rules for malicious-prosecution claims. Courts in the state require a plaintiff to show that the earlier case ended in his favor, that there was no probable cause, that the prosecution was driven by malice and that he suffered concrete damages along the way.
As Justia notes in summarizing Georgia appellate decisions, those elements are tough to meet, and one of the biggest questions will be how much immunity prosecutors enjoy for decisions they made on the job. The attorney general’s office has already signaled it will fight the case hard, while Waites’s lawyer says he is just as determined to press every claim in court.
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