In the Supreme Court of Georgia

Decided: October 11, 2023

S23A0702. THE STATE v. COOK.

S23A0703. THE STATE v. ROACHE.

S23A0704. THE STATE v. DELA CRUZ.

S23A0705. THE STATE v. JACKSON.

S23A0706. THE STATE v. STROWDER.

S23A0707. THE STATE v. WHITAKER.

 BETHEL, Justice.

Antonio May died from injuries he sustained inside the Fulton 

County Jail while in the custody of the Fulton County Sheriff. The 

defendants, Aaron Cook, Jason Roache, Guito Dela Cruz, Omar 

Jackson, Kenesia Strowder, and William Whitaker, were employed 

as jailers by the Fulton County Sheriff and were on duty at the 

Fulton County Jail when May died. The State alleges through

indictments of the defendants for felony murder and other crimes 

that the defendants beat, pepper sprayed, and repeatedly shocked 

May with an electronic taser, thereby causing his death. Claiming 
2

entitlement to the pre-indictment protections afforded to “peace 

officers” under OCGA § 17-7-52, the defendants sought to quash 

their indictments on the basis that they did not receive preindictment notice and an opportunity to be heard.

The trial court held an evidentiary hearing on the matter and 

thereafter entered an order quashing the indictments. The trial 

court’s analysis turned on whether the defendants were “peace 

officers,” as that term is used in OCGA § 17-7-52. After considering 

definitions of “peace officer” found elsewhere in our Code, the trial 

court determined that OCGA § 16-1-3 (11), which defines “peace 

officer” as “any person who by virtue of his office or public 

employment is vested by law with a duty to maintain public order 

or to make arrests for offenses,” was “most applicable.” Applying 

that definition, the trial court found that, while none of the 

defendants were empowered to make arrests, they were 

nevertheless charged with maintaining the public peace. To that 

end, the trial court reasoned that “within the community of over 

3,000 inmates in the Fulton County Jail (which is accessible to the 
3

public in various controlled ways), detention officers are the

maintainers of public order” in the event that “there is a fight in the 

mess hall over bad beans or a brawl in the common space over which 

channel the TV should be on[.]” (Emphasis in original.) Following its 

finding that the defendants were charged with the control and 

supervision of inmates at the jail, the trial court determined that the 

defendants were “vested with a duty to maintain public order, i.e., 

keep the peace,” and, as such, were peace officers entitled to the 

protections of OCGA § 17-7-52. On that basis, the trial court 

quashed the indictments. The State appeals. See OCGA § 5-7-1 (a) 

(1) (allowing the State to appeal in criminal cases from, among other 

things, “an order, decision, or judgment setting aside or dismissing 

any indictment”).

This appeal presents two issues for our consideration. We must 

determine, first, whether the trial court properly defined “peace 

officer” for purposes of OCGA § 17-7-52 and, second, whether the 

trial court erred by finding that the defendants here fall within that 

definition. As to the first issue, we reach the same general definition 
4

of “peace officer” as the trial court — that is, a “peace officer” is an 

officer vested by law with a duty to maintain the public peace — but 

for different reasons and without importing the statutory definition 

found in OCGA § 16-1-3 (11). As to the second issue, we conclude 

that the trial court erred by finding that the defendants’ duty to 

control and supervise inmates within the jail constitutes a duty to 

maintain the public peace. Accordingly, we reverse.

1. We first address what is meant by “peace officer” in OCGA § 

17-7-52. And because we must consider the statute’s proper 

construction, our review is de novo. See Hankla v. Postell, 293 Ga. 

692, 693 (749 SE2d 726) (2013). 

To begin, we recall the well-settled principles that guide our

inquiry. As in all cases of statutory construction, we remain mindful 

that “we must give the text its plain and ordinary meaning, view it 

in the context in which it appears, and read it in its most natural 

and reasonable way.” State v. Coleman, 306 Ga. 529, 530 (832 SE2d 

389) (2019). Of course, while “[t]he common and customary usages 

of the words are important, . . . so is their context.” (Citation and 
5

punctuation omitted.) Langley v. State, 313 Ga. 141, 143 (2) (868 

SE2d 759) (2022). See also May v. State, 295 Ga. 388, 391 (761 SE2d 

38) (2014) (“In our search for the meaning of a particular statutory 

provision, we look not only to the words of that provision, but we 

consider its legal context as well.”). “For context, we may look to 

other provisions of the same statute, the structure and history of the

whole statute, and the other law — constitutional, statutory, and 

common law alike — that forms the legal background of the 

statutory provision in question.” (Citation and punctuation omitted.) 

Langley, 313 Ga. at 143 (2). “Thus, we construe statutes in 

connection and in harmony with the existing law, and as part of a 

general and uniform system of jurisprudence.” (Citation and 

punctuation omitted.) Id. Guided by these principles, we turn to the 

statutory text at issue.

OCGA § 17-7-52 (a) provides:

Before a bill of indictment or special presentment against 

a present or former peace officer charging the officer with 

a crime which is alleged to have occurred while he or she 

was in the performance of his or her duties is presented 

to a grand jury, the officer shall be given a copy of the 
6

proposed bill of indictment or special presentment and 

notified in writing of the contemplated action by the 

prosecuting attorney.

OCGA § 17-7-52 does not define “peace officer,” and it is not 

otherwise defined within Title 17. The term is, however, defined 

elsewhere in our Code. The parties’ arguments on appeal, as well as 

the trial court’s ruling, focus on determining which of these 

statutory definitions of “peace officer” may be applicable to OCGA § 

17-7-52. Specifically, the State contends that we should apply the 

definition of “peace officer” in OCGA § 35-8-2 (8),1 while the 

defendants maintain that the trial court properly applied the 

definition in OCGA § 16-1-3 (11).2 But the statutory text contradicts 

the parties’ arguments and precludes the mechanical importation of 

1 OCGA § 35-8-2 (8), which is part of the Georgia Peace Officer Standards 

and Trainings Act, identifies five categories of “peace officer” and sets out a 

separate definition for each category by reference to the person’s employer, 

duties, and powers. As the State notes, several definitions require a person to 

have “the power of arrest” in order to be deemed a “peace officer” under that 

statute. But the State does not identify which of the five definitions should be 

applied in the context of OCGA § 17-7-52; instead, it simply asserts that the 

defendants do not meet any of those definitions.

2 OCGA § 16-1-3 (11) says, “[A]ny person who by virtue of his office or 

public employment is vested by law with a duty to maintain public order or to 

make arrests for offenses, whether that duty extends to all crimes or is limited 

to specific offenses.”
7

these independent definitions into OCGA § 17-7-52. Indeed, the 

definitions in both OCGA §§ 16-1-3 and 35-8-2 are limited in 

application by their express language,3 and OCGA § 17-7-52 does not 

incorporate by reference any independent statutory definition of 

“peace officer.”4 This is not to say that these statutory definitions are 

without significance; they can — and do — provide important 

context to our ordinary-meaning analysis. See Seals v. State, 311 Ga. 

739, 740 (1) (860 SE2d 419) (2021) (“The primary determinant of a 

text’s meaning is its context, which includes the structure and 

history of the text and the broader context in which that text was 

enacted, including statutory and decisional law that forms the 

background of the written text.” (punctuation omitted)). They simply 

do not play the outsized role the parties ascribe to them. Instead, in 

3 OCGA § 16-1-3 applies only within Title 16, while the application of

OCGA § 35-8-2 is limited to Chapter 8 of Title 35.

4 In other sections of our Code, including elsewhere in Title 17, where 

the statute at issue is found, the General Assembly has incorporated by 

reference the statutory definitions proposed by the parties. See, e.g., OCGA §§ 

17-4-20 (b) (incorporating OCGA § 35-8-2 (8)); 42-8-60 (j) (9) (B) (i) 

(incorporating OCGA § 35-8-2 (8)); 35-2-36 (c) (incorporating OCGA § 16-1-3 

(11)); 16-10-34 (incorporating OCGA § 35-8-2 (8)); 49-4A-8 (i) (2) (incorporating 

OCGA § 35-8-2 (8)).
8

the absence of an applicable statutory definition of “peace officer,” 

we must look first to the term’s “ordinary, natural, and most basic 

meaning[.]” Nuckles v. State, 310 Ga. 624, 629 (2) (853 SE2d 81) 

(2020). And, of course, “[t]he ordinary public meaning of statutory 

text that matters is the meaning the statutory text had at the time 

it was enacted.” Seals, 311 Ga. at 740 (1).

The statutory provision at issue here was enacted in 1975.5 An 

examination of the relevant sources of ordinary meaning reveals 

some accord on the basic definition of a peace officer. See State v. 

Sass Group, LLC, 315 Ga. 893, 898-899 (2) (a) (885 SE2d 761) (2023) 

(“[C]ontemporaneous dictionaries from around the time when the 

text was adopted . . . offer a useful reference for [an ordinarymeaning] analysis.”). As a general matter, those sources broadly 

define a peace officer as an officer vested by law with the duty to 

maintain the public peace. See The American Heritage Dictionary of 

the English Language 963 (1973) (defining “peace officer” as “[a] law 

5 See Ga. L. 1975, p. 607, § 1. OCGA § 17-7-52 has been amended several 

times since 1975, and each version has used the term “peace officer.” See Ga. 

L. 1997, p. 879, § 1; Ga. L. 2001, p. 487, § 5; Ga. L. 2016, p. 186, § 6. 
9

officer, such as a sheriff, responsible for maintaining civil peace”); 

Webster’s New Twentieth Century Dictionary of the English 

Language 1317 (1968) (defining “peace officer” as “any officer of the 

law charged with the preservation of the public peace, as a sheriff, 

constable, or policeman”). And these definitions comport with the 

definition of “peace officer” in Black’s Law Dictionary, which, around 

the time of the statute’s enactment, defined the term as “generally 

[including] sheriffs and their deputies, constables, marshals, 

members of the police force of cities, and other officers whose duty is 

to enforce and preserve the public peace.” Black’s Law Dictionary 

1287 (4th ed. 1968). 

This understanding of “peace officer,” a term with deep roots in 

Georgia law, finds support in a broader context. The term “peace 

officer” has been used in Georgia statutory law since at least 17936

6 See, e.g., Robert Watkins, et al., Digest of the Laws of Georgia, p. 532 

(1799) (Act No. 499, Dec. 19, 1793) (“[I]t shall be the duty of the justices of this 

State . . . on issuing a warrant, to apprehend any person or persons charged 

with any criminal offence, to direct the peace officer executing the same, to 

make diligent enquiry as to the property, of which any person charged as 

aforesaid, may be possessed at the time he or she was apprehended . . . and if 
10

and has also appeared with some regularity in our decisional law, 

beginning with the early opinions of this Court. But the term 

predates even those sources and in fact derived from the common 

law. As Blackstone explained,7 the common law “had a special care 

and regard for the conservation of the peace,” which was considered 

“the very end and foundation of civil society.” See 1 William 

Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England 349 (8th Ed. 

1778). In this regard, officers known as “conservators of the peace”

were, at first, elected by the people and, after about 1351, appointed 

by the king “for the maintenance of the public peace.” Id. at 349-351.

At common law, these conservators of the peace had powers “in 

suppressing riots and affrays, in taking securities for the peace, and 

in apprehending and committing felons and other inferior 

criminals.” Id. at 354. Sheriffs, constables, and coroners, among 

any justice or peace officer shall fail to perform the duties hereby required, he 

shall himself be subject to the payment of the cost with which such criminal 

may be chargeable. . . .”).

7 “[W]e have long accepted [Blackstone] as the leading authority on the 

common law[.]” Sons of Confederate Veterans v. Henry County Bd. of Comm’rs, 

315 Ga. 39, 48 (2) (a) (880 SE2d 168) (2022).
11

others, were styled conservators of the peace — a term that became 

interchangeable with peace officers8 — by virtue of their duty to 

maintain the peace. Id. at 350. And to aid the execution of that duty, 

peace officers were vested with the concomitant power to apprehend 

or restrain those who violated the peace within their jurisdictions. 

Id. at 350. See also 4 Blackstone 290-293 (discussing arrest powers

and defining an arrest as “the apprehending or restraining of one’s 

person, in order to be forthcoming to answer to an alleged or 

suspected crime”). 

This common-law understanding that peace-officer status 

flowed from the duties and powers vested in an officer is also 

reflected in Georgia statutory and decisional law. Our case law has 

frequently spoken of peace officers in terms of their duty to maintain 

the public peace. See, e.g., Parker v. Travelers’ Ins. Co., 174 Ga. 525, 

527 (163 SE 159) (1932) (“[A] policeman is a peace officer, whose 

8 See Vandiver v. Endicott, 215 Ga. 250, 251 (109 SE2d 775) (1959) (the 

term “conservator of the peace” is “synonymous with the term ‘peace officer’”); 

Black’s Law Dictionary (11th ed. 2019) (identifying “conservator of the peace” 

as an alternative term for “peace officer”).
12

duties are connected with the public peace[.]”); Ramsey v. State, 92 

Ga. 53, 62 (17 SE 613) (1893) (“[T]he defendant was engaged in a 

violation of the public peace amounting to an offence against the 

laws of the State[;] and it was the duty of the deceased, as a peaceofficer, to arrest him.”). These judicial decisions painted with broad 

strokes and portrayed a peace officer’s duty to maintain the public 

peace as generally pertaining to the enforcement of criminal laws.9

See, e.g., Ramsey, 92 Ga. at 62; Elder v. Camp, 193 Ga. 320, 322-323 

(18 SE2d 622) (5) (1942) (“In exercising [his] duties and powers and 

9 Both the Georgia Code and Georgia appellate decisions have employed 

“peace officer” as a collective term to encompass what are now generally 

considered to be law enforcement officers, such as sheriffs, police officers, and 

marshals. See, e.g., Penal Code 1910, § 338 (“Any person who shall, without 

authority, exercise or attempt to exercise the functions of, or hold himself out 

to anyone as, a deputy-sheriff, marshal, policeman, constable, or other peaceofficer or detective shall be guilty of a misdemeanor.”); Penal Code 1895, § 332 

(“No sheriff, mayor, or other person authorized by law to appoint special 

deputy-sheriffs, constables, marshals, policemen, or other peace-officers, or 

detectives, to preserve the public peace or detect crime, shall appoint . . . any

person who is not a citizen of this State[.]”); McDuffie v. Perkerson, 178 Ga. 

230, 236 (173 SE 151) (1933) (noting that “[m]any persons perform duties of a 

public nature who are not officers,” including “persons assisting sheriffs and 

other peace officers”); Porter v. State, 124 Ga. 297, 302 (52 SE 283) (1905) 

(recognizing that Penal Code section “was applicable to municipal peace 

officers, such as a policeman or town marshal”); Columbus v. Ogletree, 96 Ga. 

177, 179-180 (22 SE 709) (1895) (“In the absence of any ordinance or statutory 

provision specially defining the powers and duties of policemen, they are 

presumptively, as at common law, mere peace officers.”).
13

acting as a conservator of the peace within his county, a sheriff has 

the right and duty to enforce the laws enacted for the protection of 

the lives, persons, property, health, and morals of the people.” 

(punctuation omitted)); Cook v. Mayor & Council of the City of 

Macon, 54 Ga. 468, 469 (1875) (concluding that, for purposes of 

municipal liability, a police officer appointed by a city was a “peace 

officer” because his duties were “connected with the public peace in 

which the state is interested, and in a very wide sense he is a state 

officer; many of his duties are duties connected with the prevention 

and punishment of crime”). 

And our case law recognized that peace officers are vested with 

the powers necessary to fulfill that duty, most notably the power of 

arrest. See Mitchell v. State, 71 Ga. 128, 138 (1883) (criticizing peace 

officer’s failure to grant request to issue peace warrant and 

emphasizing that a peace officer “is invested with power to command 

and restrain” and “should not desist from the performance of his 

duty . . . when he is bound by every obligation and is fully armed 

with power to secure peace”); McCrackin v. State, 150 Ga. 718, 722
14

(105 SE 487) (1920) (“[S]ome latitude is allowed to peace officers in 

making arrests of persons who have violated penal statutes, because 

it is essential to protection of person and property. . . . [P]eace 

officers . . . are charged by law with th[e] duty [to make arrests] and 

are subjected to penalties for failure thereof.”); Porter v. State, 124 

Ga. 297, 307-308 (52 SE 283) (1905) (Lumpkin, J., concurring 

specially) (“A policeman performs the duty of arresting both for 

offenses against the State and those against municipal ordinances. 

He partakes both of the nature of a constable, and a watchman at 

common law, with such added powers as may result from 

legislation.”).

10

10 See also Graham v. State, 143 Ga. 440, 443 (85 SE 328) (1915) (“At 

common law, certain officers, as conservators of the peace, were entrusted with 

power to make arrests without a warrant in certain cases. . . . As to [arrests for 

misdemeanors] . . . the officer could arrest without a warrant any person who 

committed a breach of the peace in his presence or within his view.”); Williford 

v. State, 121 Ga. 173, 177 (48 SE 962) (1904) (If an escaped convict is not 

“legally at liberty,” “then any peace officer may arrest him without a warrant 

and restore him to the imprisonment to which the court has sentenced him. It 

is the duty of the officer to take prompt action in effecting the capture of the 

escape[e], and to then turn him over to his lawful custodians within a 

reasonable time.”); Cobb v. Bailey, 35 Ga. App. 302, 304-305 (133 SE 42) (1926) 

(“A peace officer has the right to make an arrest without a warrant, for the 

purpose of preventing the commission of a felony . . . [and] may make an arrest 
15

When OCGA § 17-7-52 was enacted in 1975, the common-law

connection between peace officers and the duty to maintain public 

peace was reflected in codified definitions of “peace officer,” as well.

The first codified definition of the term defined “peace officer” in the 

context of designating the class of public employees eligible to 

participate in the Peace Officers’ Annuity and Benefit Fund, as 

persons “required by the term of their employment . . . to give their 

full time to the preservation of public order, or the protection of life 

and property, or the detection of crime.” Ga. L. 1950, p. 50, § 8 

(predecessor to current OCGA § 47-17-1 (5)). The predecessor to 

current OCGA § 16-1-3 (11) defined a “peace officer” as “any person 

who by virtue of his office or public employment is vested by law 

with a duty to maintain public order or to make arrests for offenses, 

whether that duty extends to all crimes or is limited to specific 

offenses.” Ga. L. 1968, p. 1249, § 1. And under the predecessor to 

current OCGA § 35-8-2 (8) (A), a “peace officer” was “any officer or 

without a warrant for the purpose of preventing an imminent breach of the 

peace.” (punctuation omitted)).
16

member of a law enforcement unit . . . who has the power of arrest, 

and who is responsible for the enforcing of criminal laws of this State 

or its political subdivisions.” Ga. L. 1970, p. 208, § 2. The common 

thread between these statutory definitions and the decisional law 

discussed above is the peace officer’s duty to maintain the public 

peace, generally by enforcing criminal laws through the power of 

arrest. Because these statutory definitions invariably incorporate 

the duty to maintain the public peace, they also reflect, whether 

explicitly or implicitly, the common law’s consistent recognition that

the arrest power is integral to the performance of that duty.

Having reviewed the background upon which OCGA § 17-7-52

was enacted, what do we make of it all? There can be no question 

that a peace officer is, at bottom, an officer vested by law with the 

duty to maintain the public peace. The term’s ordinary meaning and 

its related context readily support that understanding. But, 

emphasizing OCGA § 16-1-3 (11)’s explicit reference to arrest powers 

in its definition of the term, the State argues that a person is not a 

peace officer unless he has both a duty to maintain the public peace 
17

and the power to effect arrests. As we have seen, the presence of 

arrest powers is most often a distinguishing feature of a peace 

officer. And we agree that the presence of arrest powers has 

significant relevance to determining whether a person is a peace 

officer.

11 However, we need not resolve, at least at this juncture, the 

extent to which the presence of arrest powers might control that 

analysis because the trial court found that the defendants here do 

not have arrest powers12 and because, as we will discuss, the 

11 For example, we have deemed the presence of statutory arrest powers 

pertinent, but not dispositive in the context of determining whether a duty to 

maintain the public peace is owed for purposes of eligibility in the Peace 

Officers’ Annuity and Benefit Fund Act. See Vandiver v. Manning, 215 Ga. 874, 

879-880 (114 SE2d 121) (1960) (discussing probation officer’s arrest powers); 

Vandiver, 215 Ga. at 251-252 (rejecting fire department officer’s claim that he 

was charged with maintaining public peace and was thus a peace officer, 

despite fact that he was “invested with the powers of police officers and [was] 

authorized to make arrests within the city” of Atlanta); Clay, 214 Ga. at 72 

(noting that “nothing in the law” authorized motor-carrier inspectors for 

Georgia Public Service commission to make any arrests).

12 On appeal, the defendants briefly argue that their authority to control 

and supervise inmates within the jail is akin to arrest powers. In support of 

that claim, they point only to legal authority holding that a person is under 

arrest for purposes of the Fourth Amendment whenever his liberty is 

restrained, assert that they have authority to restrain the liberty of inmates 

confined to the jail, and then summarily conclude that they have arrest powers. 

But the defendants point to no controlling authority — and we are aware of 

none — holding that the authority they maintain over jail inmates establishes 

that they have arrest powers for purposes of OCGA § 17-7-52. 
18

defendants do not have a duty to maintain the public peace. 

2. Having determined the basic meaning of “peace officer” for 

purposes of OCGA § 17-7-52, we turn next to consider whether the 

trial court erred by finding that the defendants, who maintained

order within the jail, meet that definition.13 We begin and end our 

inquiry with the duty to maintain public peace.14

We have not previously identified what considerations may be 

relevant to whether a person asserting peace-officer status under 

OCGA § 17-7-52 is charged with maintaining the public peace. But 

a few guideposts exist in this area. To start, we have explained that 

“‘[p]ublic order’ means the tranquility and security which every 

13 As we noted at the outset, in defining “peace officer” as the term is 

used in OCGA § 17-7-52, the trial court traversed the wrong analytical path 

but nevertheless reached the right definitional destination. Thus, in resolving 

the factual issue of whether the defendants are “peace officers,” the trial court 

applied the correct legal standard, asking whether the defendants are officers 

vested by law with a duty to preserve the public peace. Accordingly, remand is 

unnecessary. Cf. Smith v. Northside Hospital, 302 Ga. 517, 531 (3) (807 SE2d 

909) (2017). 

14 Because it is clear that the defendants here are not charged with a 

duty to maintain the public peace, we need not — and, thus, do not — address

the remaining determinations underlying the trial court’s conclusion that the 

defendants were peace officers, namely that they were officers and that their 

duties were vested by law.
19

person feels under the protection of the law” and that “[t]o preserve 

the public peace means to secure that quiet and freedom from 

disturbance which is guaranteed by law.” Bd. of Commrs. v. Clay, 

214 Ga. 70, 72 (1) (102 SE2d 575) (1958). Accord Black’s Law 

Dictionary 1287, 1393 (4th Ed. 1968) (defining “public peace” as 

“[t]he peace or tranquility of the community in general”). We have 

also associated a duty to maintain the public peace with a duty to

enforce criminal laws. See Ramsey, 92 Ga. at 62; Cook, 54 Ga. at 469. 

When determining, in the context of other statutes, whether an 

individual was duty-bound to preserve the public order, we have

employed a fact-specific analysis, looking to the person’s primary 

duties and assessing whether those duties included maintaining

public order, or whether the person’s performance of his private

duties merely facilitated, or tangentially benefitted, the 

preservation of the peace. See Clay, 214 Ga. at 73-74; Fleming v. 

Maddox, 225 Ga. 737, 740-741 (171 SE2d 276) (1969). For instance, 

a person who, “incidental to the primary duties of [his] employment, 

occasionally perform[ed] some of the services of a police officer” did 
20

not have a duty to maintain public order. Vandiver v. Endicott, 215 

Ga. 250, 252 (109 SE2d 775) (1959). See also Clay, 214 Ga. at 74 (2) 

(appellees did not enjoy peace-officer status where their duties 

“relate[d] only to the enforcement of the laws and the rules of the 

Public Service Commission” and they were not authorized “to act as 

‘peace officers’ in the general sense, either in the preservation of 

public order, or in the protection of life and property, or in the 

detection of crime”). Finally, we have inquired into the scope of the 

duties imposed upon a person seeking peace-officer status,

comparing those duties to the ones imposed upon a law enforcement 

officer, the prototypical peace officer. See Vandiver v. Manning, 215 

Ga. 874, 878-879 (114 SE2d 121) (1960) (comparing duties, 

authorities, and jurisdiction of probation officer to those of police 

officers). With these general considerations in mind, we return to 

the case at hand.

Here, the trial court rested its conclusion that the defendants 

were charged with preserving the public peace on the sole fact that 

the defendants were responsible for maintaining order among the 
21

inmates confined to the Fulton County Jail.15 While it is true that

the defendants’ work may have benefitted the public peace, a 

tangential benefit to the public peace is not synonymous with a duty 

to maintain the peace within the community as a whole.

16 See 

Fleming, 225 Ga. at 740-741; Clay, 214 Ga. at 73-74; Endicott, 215 

Ga at 252. The trial court even acknowledged as much, indicating 

that the defendants do not maintain “the public order traditionally 

conceived of.” Indeed, any authority the defendants may exercise is 

constrained to a limited population of inmates and, perhaps, to 

certain members of the general public who voluntarily enter the 

jail’s boundaries via its controlled access points. And unlike “[l]aw 

enforcement officers [who] have a general duty to enforce the law 

and maintain the peace [that] exists 24 hours a day,” Woodard v. 

15 The defendants do not argue that the trial court’s factual findings are 

incomplete or that the trial court otherwise overlooked facts that might 

establish their duty to maintain public order. Instead, the defendants argue 

that, by maintaining order within the jail, they “provide[d] a benefit” to “the 

surrounding community.”

16 The defendants themselves acknowledge that inmates in the Fulton 

County Jail are not members of the general community, “should not be out in 

the community,” and have in fact been removed from the general community 

by virtue of legal process. 
22

State, 296 Ga. 803, 807 (3) (771 SE2d 362) (2015), there is no 

indication that the defendants’ duty extends beyond the timeframe 

of their work shifts or the bounds of the Fulton County Jail.

17 The 

defendants’ duties instead are primarily related to maintaining 

order at the Fulton County Jail and to supervising the inmates and, 

therefore, were simply insufficient to establish that the defendants

owed a general duty to maintain the public peace within the 

community at large. 

Thus, because the defendants’ primary duty of supervising and 

controlling a defined population of inmates was markedly limited in 

comparison to a traditional peace officer’s and because they had no 

duty to maintain the public peace in a general sense, we conclude 

that the trial court erred by deeming them peace officers under

OCGA § 17-7-52. We therefore reverse the trial court’s quashal of 

the indictments. 

Judgment reversed. All the Justices concur.

17 Of course, nothing we say should be understood to undermine the 

peace-officer-status of law enforcement officers with a narrow geographic 

jurisdiction merely because their physical jurisdiction is relatively small.