The Georgia Bureau of Investigation issued a statement about their investigation of a fatal shooting by officers of the Cobb County Police Department.

The man who was shot was suspected of opening fire on Cobb County police officers near Cumberland Mall on Sunday.

Here is the statement issued by the GBI:

The GBI is investigating an officer involved shooting in Cobb County, GA. The Cobb County Police Department asked the GBI to conduct an independent investigation on April 6, 2022. One man died in the incident. No officers were injured.

Preliminary information indicates that at around 5:00 p.m., numerous officers from the Cobb County Police Department conducted a traffic stop on a SUV on the Chastain Road bridge over Interstate 75. During the traffic stop, a male passenger in the SUV, identified as Demarco Mauge, age 20, of Duluth, displayed a firearm. Multiple Cobb County P.D. officers fired their guns, hitting Mauge . Mauge, holding a gun in his hand, was pronounced deceased on scene. The Cobb County Medical Examiner’s Office will conduct an autopsy.

The GBI investigation is active and ongoing. Once the investigation is completed, the case file will be given to the Cobb County District Attorney’s Office for review.

This is the 36^th officer involved shooting the GBI has been requested to investigate in 2022.

The GBI’s role in officer-involved shootings

The Georgia Bureau of Investigation routinely investigates the shooting of individuals by police officers, as well as any time an officer discharges a firearm while on duty, at the request of the police agency involved in the shooting.

Natalie Ammons, the Deputy Director of the GBI’s Office of Public Affairs explained to us how the system works.

Police agencies are not required to request outside investigation of officer involved shootings, and there is no formal agreement between the GBI and local police departments.

But police agencies make the request so that an independent agency does the investigation in an incident involving their own officers.

The investigations are carried out by Special Agents in a regional office within the area where the police agency is located. Cobb County, and much of the rest of metro Atlanta, is in the GBI’s Region 10, based in Conyers.

In Region 10, officer involved shootings and corruption investigations are the primary investigations Special Agents do, while in more rural areas with fewer police resources the agents handle a wider range of criminal investigations.

There is no special unit or division that conducts the investigation of officer involved shootings.

The announcements of the investigations can be found at the GBI’s press release web page.