Source: Office of United States Attorneys
MACON, Ga. – U.S. Attorney Peter D. Leary will resign as the top-ranking law enforcement official for the Middle District of Georgia, effective January 11, 2025, and will join an Atlanta-based law firm. Leary began his federal career in 2007 working on complex civil litigation and with the Intelligence Community before joining the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Georgia as a federal prosecutor in 2012 and ultimately becoming the 17th presidentially appointed U.S. Attorney for the 70-county Middle District of Georgia.
“I am honored to have served as the U.S. Attorney for the community that raised me, alongside some of the finest public servants in the country,” said U.S. Attorney Peter D. Leary. “Every day the men and women of this office stand shoulder to shoulder with federal, state and local law enforcement partners to advance safety and promote justice.”
Under U.S. Attorney Leary’s leadership, the office deepened its complex criminal prosecutorial team to focus on the most significant and far-reaching safety concerns in the District. These efforts resulted in noteworthy convictions involving transnational criminal organizations and armed fentanyl traffickers while also preventing the distribution of illegal rapid-fire weapons and prioritizing child sexual abuse material (CSAM) and child exploitation investigations to track down predators and hold them accountable.
U.S. Attorney Leary guided the Middle District of Georgia through high-profile investigations such as the office’s first-ever Violent Crime in Aid of Racketeering (VICAR) prosecution involving the murders of three Athens, Georgia, residents (click for link to press release); charging dozens of defendants allegedly tied to a Columbus, Georgia, criminal street gang distributing millions of dollars of drugs and guns (click for link to press release); protecting the religious rights of Macon, Georgia, citizens threatened with violence (click for link to press release); removing fentanyl and guns from the Albany, Georgia, region (click for link to press release); actively working with law enforcement in Valdosta, Georgia, to get violent re-offenders with firearms off the streets (click for link to press release); and working with law enforcement to use crime gun intelligence to obtain justice for the victim in an Oconee County, Georgia, homicide cold case (click for link to press release).
Understanding that reducing violent crime and strengthening communities ultimately requires collaboration beyond policing and prosecuting, U.S. Attorney Leary was committed to building relationships and partnerships with law enforcement agencies and community stakeholders within the District. One such notable example was the office’s support of Macon Violence Prevention (MVP), a grassroots initiative seeded from the Mayor’s office which contributed to a 46% decrease in homicides in Macon, Georgia, between 2022 to 2023, with the number of homicides in 2023 marking the lowest number since 2019.
Since U.S. Attorney Leary took command, additional resources have been directed towards the office’s growing Civil Division, which currently is at its largest size in the office’s history. This growth—including employing a healthcare fraud investigator and a specialized Affirmative Civil Enforcement (ACE) auditor—has resulted in the office being better able to affirmatively pursue recovery on behalf of the United States, from seeking COVID fraud relief to recouping the highest civil healthcare fraud amounts since 2005.
Importantly, U.S. Attorney Leary also secured a full-time Civil Division Civil Rights investigator—the first position of its kind in any U.S. Attorney’s office in the country. With the help of this dedicated investigator, the office was able to engage in a multi-year investigation of the Georgia Department of Corrections, which recently concluded that the constitutional rights of prisoners are being violated by failing to protect them from widespread physical violence and harm. In short, the Civil Division is accomplishing groundbreaking and meaningful work regarding all types of civil rights matters including housing, disability and voting rights because of the people in the Division as well as the resources directed to the practice area by U.S. Attorney Leary.
“Providing the necessary resources so talented prosecutors, investigators and support staff can pursue justice – in both a civil and criminal context – is paramount as we work alongside our agency and law enforcement partners to make Georgia safer and obtain justice for all,” said U.S. Attorney Leary.
U.S. Attorney Leary contributed his cybercrime prosecutorial expertise at the national level as a member of the Cyber and Intellectual Property Subcommittee of the Attorney General’s Advisory Committee (AGAC). U.S. Attorney Leary was also a member of the AGAC’s Violent and Organized Crime Subcommittee, Terrorism and National Security Subcommittee and Environmental Justice and Environmental Issues Subcommittee and has previously served as the office’s Anti-Terrorism Advisory Council (ATAC) Coordinator, Computer Hacking and Intellectual Property (CHIP) prosecutor and National Security Cyber Specialist (NSCS).
“Combating the cybercrime targeting our country is a constantly evolving challenge, and I am proud to have contributed to these efforts to protect the economic and national security of all Americans,” said U.S. Attorney Leary.
During his tenure, U.S. Attorney Leary elevated seasoned trial attorneys to leadership positions in the office—marking many historic firsts for the Middle District of Georgia—including the first black woman and first female to hold the highest non-appointed position in the office; the first openly LGBTQ+ person to command a leadership role in the District; and the greatest number of women attorneys to hold leadership positions.
“It is crucial to assemble a team of top-tier and diverse attorneys to pursue justice,” said U.S. Attorney Peter D. Leary. “Alongside the many dedicated and skilled attorneys and staff in the office, these dynamic leaders have helped to ensure a strong future of equal justice for all in the Middle District of Georgia.”
Raised in Watkinsville, Georgia, and a graduate of Athens Academy, Mr. Leary received his B.A. and J.D. from the University of Virginia, where he was a Jefferson Scholar. After law school, Mr. Leary clerked for U.S. District Judge Hugh Lawson of the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Georgia. Following his clerkship, Mr. Leary joined the Federal Programs Branch of the DOJ through its Honors Program, where he worked extensively with the Intelligence Community.
In 2021, along with other members of the U.S. Attorney’s Office, he received an Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys (EOUSA) Director’s Award for Superior Performance in Prevention and Reentry Activities for work on a campaign aimed at educating youth about gun possession: www.armedwithknowledge.com. In 2019, he received the Anti-Defamation League’s SHIELD award with FBI and Department of Justice partners, and he shared the 2018 International Association of Chiefs of Police/Thomson Reuters Award for Excellence in Criminal Investigation with the FBI and GBI.
“Serving our country for my entire legal career has been everything I hoped it would be; that is largely because I got to work alongside men and women who share the same vision of seeking justice,” said U.S. Attorney Leary. “I am beyond grateful that I was entrusted to serve the citizens of the Middle District of Georgia. I have been incredibly blessed.”
First Assistant U.S. Attorney Shanelle Booker will succeed U.S. Attorney Leary as the Acting U.S. Attorney for the Middle District of Georgia.
The U.S. Attorney is the top-ranking federal law enforcement official in the Middle District of Georgia, which covers 70 of Georgia’s 159 counties, includes Albany, Athens, Columbus, Macon and Valdosta, and has a population of approximately 2,045,000 people. The office is responsible for prosecuting federal crimes in the District, including crimes related to terrorism, public corruption, child exploitation, fraud, firearms, illegal gangs and narcotics. The office also defends the United States in civil cases and collects debts owed to the United States.