New Cobb District Attorney Joyette Holmes has named veteran prosecutor John Pursley as chief assistant DA.

It's a pick that puts an emphasis on the criminal justice movement that has swept the state since Gov. Nathan Deal was elected in 2010 and launched reforms that spread regionally and nationally.

Pursley led the accountability court efforts under former DA Vic Reynolds. He represented the DA's office on every one of the many courts designed to give nonviolent offenders a second chance to avoid jail time by meeting goals for counseling, working, paying restitution and working to recover from addictions to drugs and alcohol.

Reynolds left in February to lead the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. (After succeeding Deal in January, Gov. Brian Kemp named Reynolds GBI executive director). Kemp named Holmes, then chief judge of the Cobb County Magistrate Court, to replace Reynolds as Cobb DA. She started the new job in July.

Holmes signaled her views about the job in a news release Friday morning.

"The comment to the American Bar Association's Rule 3.8, Special Responsibilities of a Prosecutor, reads: 'A prosecutor has the responsibility of a minister of justice and not simply that of an advocate. This responsibility carries with it specific obligations to see that the defendant is accorded procedural justice, that guilt is decided upon the basis of sufficient evidence, and that special precautions are taken to prevent and to rectify the conviction of innocent persons,'" Holmes said. "John Pursley is the epitome of what that rule stands for, and the Cobb Judicial Circuit and I are fortunate to have him."

Holmes noted Pursley has more than 18 years of experience as a prosecutor, including the last 10 years in the Cobb DA's office. He is a member of the Recovery Roundtable Leadership Council, a group of community leaders dedicated to fighting the opioid epidemic. He participates with Restoring Lives Alliance, a nonprofit organization that supports the work of the accountability courts in Cobb.

The chief assistant handles supervisory and administrative duties for the office, as delegated by Holmes. The office has 45 prosecutors and an annual budget of about $8 million. In 2018, the office took in more than 6,000 new felony cases, Holmes said.

"I am honored to have been chosen by District Attorney Joyette Holmes," Pursley said. "I look forward to assisting her in achieving her vision for this office and Cobb County. I am eager to get to work."

Pursley is what lawyers in Cobb like to call a "double dog." He earned undergraduate and J.D. degrees at the University of Georgia. He and his wife have three children.

A couple of years ago, Reynolds interviewed Pursley for a half-hour program called "Gavel to Gavel" on Cobb's government access television channel. In it, Pursley talked about his work in the "nonadversarial" accountability courts. He explained the history of the movement. And he said his own involvement was inspired by his concerns about arrests of people with mental health crises. "The criminal justice system never handled mental health issues particularly well," he said.

Now Cobb has an accountability court devoted to mental health issues, as do many other Georgia counties. As Pursley noted, under Deal, accountability courts spread from just a handful to one in every county of the state.

Pursley said in the interview with Reynolds that, when he started as a prosecutor in Athens and Clarke County in the 1990s, judges had limited options for sentencing. "It was basically prison," he said. "Now, judges have a number options. Accountability courts have a big part of that."

Reynolds asked Pursley how the accountability court movement has changed the role of a prosecutor. He said the only question used to be, "Can we punish this person?" But punishment wasn't working to keep people from returning to crime once their time was served.

"These accountability courts can really affect the recidivism rates," Pursley said. "People who complete one of these programs are much less likely to offend and come back again."

The interview is still available on You Tube.