Inside Georgia's private backchannel with local police

Welcome to the third edition of FOIAball. If you have something you think we should look into, reach out to [email protected].

In this issue, we’re covering:

• Why did Georgia sit a star player during its 2021 national title run?

• Years of police reports local cops sent to the Bulldogs

• Bodycam footage passed through private social channels

• And tips and tricks to make the biggest sandwich of your life

Years of police messages to Georgia’s top fixer, revealed

Georgia kicked off the 2021 national title-winning season riding its defense to a slim victory. 

The Bulldogs' line, which featured four future first-round picks, smothered Clemson, holding them to two total rushing yards in a 10-3 win.  

Three of those stars, Travon Walker, Jalen Carter, and Jordan Davis, all took the field the next week against UAB. A fourth, Devonte Wyatt, didn’t play a snap. 

At his weekly Monday presser, a reporter asked head coach Kirby Smart about Wyatt and a few other injured players. Smart responded that "all those guys are working through different things." 

Several minutes later, another reporter followed up on the non-answer, directly asking if Wyatt was hurt. 

At the question, Smart’s face twitches before the coach delivers a curt, "No, he's not dealing with an injury."

So why sit a top performer just one week into the season?

The likely answer, like so many questions about player conduct that have swirled around Georgia during the program’s revival under Smart, lies in a police report sent to Bryant Gantt’s inbox. 

As Smart’s teams racked up accolades and arrests, Gantt’s role with the program faced increased scrutiny. His title, Director of Player Support and Operations, is nebulous. Less charitably, he’s been dubbed a “fixer,” arriving at the scenes of crimes and smoothing things over between cops and players. 

It’s a characterization Georgia disputes.

To further examine Gantt’s role, FOIAball obtained years of communication between the Athens-Clarke County Police Department's top deputies and Gantt.

The emails show Gantt was sent dozens of police reports almost immediately after incidents happened, often at the behest of the department’s top deputies. They show the police department used private, personal social media channels to share bodycam footage of player arrests. They reveal even more unreported driving citations involving Georgia players. And they raise more questions about when the team was truly aware of violent incidents by players. 

Gantt's time with the Bulldogs predates Smart's. He played for the team in the late 1980s and joined the program as a staff member in 2011. 

Smart promoted Gantt and gave him a massive raise. According to his bio, Gantt has a background in legal investigations and provides “advice and counsel to student-athletes in areas related to life skills, personal accountability, and personal development.”

But as Smart’s teams won back-to-back championships, its players—stars and second-stringers alike—often ran afoul of the law. 

And Gantt's presence became a story itself.

An Atlanta Journal-Constitution investigation into the crash after Georgia’s second title, which killed a player and a team staffer, revealed that ACCPD Police Chief Jerry Saulters told a dispatcher that Gantt would be arriving on the scene, adding he’d already spoken to him. 

Saulters was certainly familiar with Gantt. 

Emails obtained by FOIAball show that in 2021 alone, Saulters, then a deputy with the department, forwarded numerous police reports involving players to Gantt. 

One delivered to Gantt’s work email detailed an interview an officer conducted the morning of Friday, Sept. 10, just a day before Georgia played UAB. 

The cop met with a woman who said “her and her boyfriend had an argument the previous day. She stated that he shoved her and that he took her phone and busted it." 

The field report added that she believed her boyfriend also stole her keys.

The officer went to speak with the boyfriend, but noted “he did not answer the door or was not home.” 

The suspect in the incident was Devonte Wyatt. 

Saulters didn’t officially pass along the report to Gantt until Wednesday, Sept. 15. 

If that was the first time Georgia knew about the matter, it meant the team allowed a player under suspicion of violence to play three days later in a bigger game against South Carolina. 

But if that was the case, it wouldn’t explain why Wyatt didn’t see a snap the day after cops started looking for him. 

Wyatt, who had a February 2020 battery charge dismissed later that year, does not appear to have been arrested or charged in the incident. 

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When exactly Georgia has been formally aware of incidents regarding its players is a question that’s been difficult to nail down. 

Later that year, on Oct. 30, 2021, the Dawgs thwacked Florida, avenging a jarring loss from a year before. The team was riding high, winning its eighth straight. 

Two days later, shortly after noon, head coach Kirby Smart hosted his weekly Monday press conference. 

About eight minutes in, a reporter asked Smart about linebacker Adam Anderson, who played the game with a heavily taped hand. 

“He has a UCL, finger sprain deal that is bothering him … We felt that he would be more effective in a club than a cast,” Smart said. Discussing the drawbacks of it, he added, “It makes it a little less effective in terms of grabbing, clawing, and wrapping up.”

Smart didn’t add anything further, a curt answer about a top defensive player who had a career-high seven tackles that game. 

Four miles down the road, a records clerk with the Athens police emailed Saulters.

“Here is the Report you requested. Please let me know if you need anything else. Thanks!” The email was sent at 12:22 p.m., just minutes after Smart finished talking.

Saulters turned around and forwarded it to Gantt. 

Three days later, ESPN broke the news that Anderson was suspended from the team, accused of committing a rape before playing against the Gators. 

According to initial reporting by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Georgia officials said they were first informed of the claim on Monday, when the university’s Equal Opportunity Office passed along the police report. 

That means one of three things: Saulters sent the report unprompted to Gantt and the school first learned the news that way; Gantt knew about the case and requested a copy, the awareness coincidentally occurring around the end of Smart’s main weekly media availability. 

Or the EOO report came in earlier in the day, before Smart gave his brief, auspicious answer.

Anderson never played another snap and eventually pled guilty.

Whether Gantt is being informed of arrests by players and requesting reports or the department is passing them along is an open question. 

In the documents obtained by FOIABall, almost no email communications from Gantt to the ACCPD were provided. Phone logs and texts between Gantt and police were not part of the files, meaning conversations could have played out on other channels.

In only one email did a deputy send a report where it’s clear Gantt had requested it, when Saulters emailed him about a vandalism incident, writing, “Report you requested.” 

In numerous others, records officers are seen replying to requests for copies from Athens deputies, which were then forwarded to Gantt.

One thing is for certain: cops in Athens are typically fast and forthcoming.  

Inside local cops’ emails to Georgia

The time between incidents and emails to Gantt is often mere hours, which contrasts with the reports involving violent incidents that were sent days later. 

On March 19, 2025, Georgia wide receiver Nitro Tuggle was arrested for reckless driving, another in a long line of speeding concerns that plagued the program. 

Tuggle was arrested at 10:18 p.m. that night. Eleven hours later, an ACCPD deputy sent a copy of the report to Gantt. 

When wide receiver Sacovie White was arrested for reckless driving at two a.m. on May 18, 2024, the report was sent to Gantt just six hours later. 

And after cornerback Daniel Harris was arrested, also for reckless driving, at ten p.m. on Sept. 12, 2024, the report was sent to Gantt first thing in the morning as well. 

The report wasn’t the only email police sent to Gantt about that arrest.  

Cops don’t usually readily hand over bodycam footage. When FOIAball called the ACCPD directly to ask about obtaining bodycam footage, they pointed us in the direction of the records department and told us to make a formal inquiry. 

But eight hours after sending the report, the same deputy passed along a private link to his personal Vimeo page that hosted footage of Harris’ arrest.

The department previously used an official Vimeo account to share videos, but that page has been defunct for some time. 

The deputy does host some departmental material on his personal channel, such as a webinar for staff. But only two public videos have been posted since 2021.

The bodycam footage was uploaded at 4:44 p.m. and mailed to Gantt eight minutes later. The hour-long video shows Harris being pulled over and arrested for driving 106 miles an hour.

The cop realizes Harris is a football player, repeatedly mentioning the fatal 2023 crash. 

"Why, man, why after everything?” the officer asks. “It just keeps happening, I just don't understand.”

FOIAball obtained two other emails showing bodycam footage was sent from ACCPD to Gantt through private links to the deputy’s Vimeo page.

One, which has the player's last name as a subject line, shows the unreported detainment of a wide receiver on the team in 2024. It includes a helpful timestamp. 

“Please see attached link – 2:00,” the email says, showing video of a cop putting the player in a headlock.

It was sent two days after the incident—it appears no charges were ever filed. 

Another, of a student assistant arrested while out on the town on a Thursday night, was sent to Gantt on Monday morning along with the arrest report. 

The emails don’t just show close contact; they also reveal other unreported crashes, which are notable given Georgia’s history with speeding arrests. 

In 2021, Javon Bullard, who was later arrested for DUI, was involved in an unreported crash, hitting another car. Bullard was given a ticket for making an illegal turn. 

A 2024 incident featured a player crashing into a pillar at a vape shop, cited for leaving the scene. 

Even when Georgia players aren’t at fault, Gantt is kept in the loop. In December 2022 and January 2023, he received reports from ACCPD after a linebacker and an offensive lineman both got rear-ended. 

But he isn’t just sent reports for athletes. 

Gantt has received reports on two separate crashes involving an athletics department graduate staffer, a utility worker in the athletics department who was arrested for marijuana possession, and a linebackers coach hit with a reckless driving charge.

Gantt also appears to be a liaison for other sports, sent a police report of a man who stalked a volleyball player and of a softball player arrested for using a fake ID.  

ACCPD also sent Gantt reports pertaining to individuals FOIAball could not ascertain had any ties to the University of Georgia whatsoever, including local residents accused of shoplifting and elderly individuals involved in a car crash.

But if you thought it couldn’t get just a bit more cozy, it does. In 2023, Gantt was sent a release form for a ride-along with ACCPD.

How to win every party with the biggest sandwich of your life

Over the next five months, from now until the Super Bowl, provided you are a well-adjusted individual, you will receive numerous invites to watch major games at other people’s homes. 

And if you, like me, are a well-adjusted individual, you are going to want to saunter in carrying a dish so spectacular it sends your host, who has been slavishly stirring a stew for hours, into a shame spiral.

To do that, you need a gigantic party sub. Which is surprisingly easy to make. Just follow this very simple guide.

Bread: If you want a giant sandwich, it needs to be structurally sound. Nothing is as easy and reliable as a giant focaccia. It’s soft and squishy, dense but airy, with a crisp but not too crunchy crust. 

Yes, the above image is not of a focaccia, and the pictures below are from several different sandwiches. I always forget to take photos. Bear with me.

I swear by this Bon Appétit recipe, which you need to start the night before, but has never let me down. The only advice that isn’t included is to make a lot more indents in the bread than you think. Press every unsquished space of dough, almost down to the bottom of the tray. So many dimples a golf ball would find it indecent.

Go easy on the salt on top, since we’re adding other things. And rotate your sheet pan halfway through cooking.

When that comes out of the oven, let it cool and embrace the joy of slicing the entire thing in half, straight through the middle, using a big, serrated knife.

Mayo: Homemade is crucial. Uttering the phrase “basil garlic aioli” as friends take their first bite leaves them agog, unchewed bits of sandwich falling down their shirt.

Use an egg yolk and an equal-sized dollop of mustard. Ignore all the daunting directives about slow drizzles and a towel under your bowl. Just furiously scramble those two blobs with a whisk. Add about a half tablespoon of oil, neutral, and whisk for twenty seconds, even harder. Don’t worry what it looks like. Stop, take a breath, rest. Add another cavalierly eyeballed half tablespoon. More vigorous whisking.

Around the third go, the mixture should seem to take slightly longer to settle than before. You’ll question if it’s working. It is. Repeat once more and you’ll start to see globby streaks. You made it. Whisk til they feel more solid.

From there, add oil in recklessly bigger pours until you have the amount you want. A full cup, at least. 

FOIAball doctors with lemon, microplaned garlic, salt, and apple cider vinegar, but go crazy. A Caesar riff, a big dollop of Calabrian chili paste. Pesto, but call it basil garlic. More words = fancier.

Meat: For a whole loaf of focaccia, you don’t need that much deli meat. Around a pound total should satiate everyone. I buy a quarter-pound each of Genoa, Mortadella, hot Sopressatta, and Prosciutto. But you can make an absurdly delicious one with any two of those, so long as you follow a crucial step: Don’t place the meat flat on the bread. Fold it over and shingle it.  

Draping adds to the aesthetic when viewed from the side, an insanely crucial element for obtaining likes and DMs. It also adds volume, preventing a gummy meat wad when people bite down.

If you aren’t feeling Italian (rude!), try anything, but combine two different types. Turkey and pastrami, ham and corned beef. Mixing meats means you aren’t making a sandwich, you’re crafting an experience. 

Cheese: Don’t think hard, here. Provolone. If going the non-Italian route (again, rude!), cheddar. The cheese can be placed flat on top. Sometimes, we’ll do two cheeses, but come on, let your host escape with some dignity. 

Accoutrements: Express yourself. Odds are, it will be good. We’ve doctored with fried eggplant and made our own tapenade from roasted red pepper and kalamata olives. Pickles or pickled jalapenos. Bacon and avocado if doing non-cured meats. Attempt to perplex and astound with what could be lurking inside the loaf.

Vegetables: One essential rule here: thin as possible. Take iceberg lettuce leaves and roll them together, then chiffonade like basil. Think you’ve cut it thin enough? You have not.

Cut thin, it can be stacked a mile high, a brisk and pleasing contrast of crunch. Red onions should be shaved even thinner. Load those up. If it isn’t cascading down the sides, you’ve done it wrong.  

Revel in your triumph: That’s it. Slather the rest of the aioli on the other side and gingerly place the focaccia top atop your creation. Photograph from sixteen different angles. Post before you go to the party so everyone is salivating. 

Wrap thoroughly in plastic wrap and, as you lift it up, marvel at its heft. Envisioning the crushing disappointment on your best friend's face as they force a smile and ask, “Does anyone want more of my chili? I made a lot.” 

You may think doing something like this means you will never be invited back.

You will always be invited back.

If you make a big as heck sandwich, please follow and tag FOIAball. We’d love to see what creations you come up with!

And if you enjoyed this, please give it a share. Your support is what helps us grow.

Kirby Smart image via Georgia Bulldogs Athletics/YouTube