Atlanta Man Convicted in Decades-Old Sexual Assault Cold Cases

DECATUR, Ga.—A DeKalb County jury has found an Atlanta man guilty of a series of sexual assaults that occurred nearly 40 years ago, thanks to DNA evidence from a new cold case initiative.

On Friday, September 19, jurors convicted Jeffrey Briney, 61, of Rape, Kidnapping, Aggravated Assault, and other charges related to two separate incidents in 1986.

According to the investigation, on March 28, 1986, four men forced their way into a Brookhaven apartment, held five college students at gunpoint, and raped two of the young women. On October 27, 1986, two men with handguns broke into another apartment on Buford Highway, raped the two women who lived there, and stole their valuables.

The cases remained unsolved until 2023 when the Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI) sent the original rape kits to a private lab for testing as part of the Georgia Sexual Assault Kit Initiative (GASAKI). DNA from one of the victims was matched to Jeffrey Briney, and also connected him to the second assault. DNA from a second victim matched Briney’s brother, David, who was also connected to seven other cases. A trial date for David Briney has not yet been set.

Jeffrey Briney was found guilty of a combined 19 counts, including four counts of Rape, seven counts of Kidnapping, and seven counts of Aggravated Assault. A sentencing hearing will be scheduled in the coming weeks.

The GASAKI Task Force, established in 2018, is a collaborative effort between law enforcement agencies and prosecutors to solve cold case sexual assault crimes using previously untested sexual assault kits. The initiative secured a federal grant that allowed the GBI to send 2,500 kits to private labs for processing in 2023.