ATLANTA — Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr announced that after a multi-agency operation, a 16-year-old girl was saved from an alleged human sex trafficker.
A Fulton County grand jury indicted Eric Gordon, 36, of Decatur, on Monday on a charge of trafficking a 16-year-old girl for sexual servitude, Carr announced.
Gordon was arrested on Aug. 4 with assistance from the U.S. Marshals Service following an investigation by the Attorney General’s Human Trafficking Prosecution Unit.
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The 16-year-old victim was recovered during Operation Global Chain, an international law enforcement operation conducted from June 8 to June 12, 2026.
The joint operation resulted in the recovery of 11 missing children in Georgia through partnerships with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Interpol, Europol and Ameripol.
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Carr emphasized the necessity of multi-agency collaboration in child recovery operations.
“This is exactly why we can never stop fighting to recover a missing child and we’re using all available resources to bring them home,” Carr said in a statement. “By partnering with law enforcement both in Georgia and around the globe, we’re able to locate even more victims and ultimately save even more lives, but our work doesn’t stop here. We’re going after everyone involved in the trafficking of a child and we won’t rest until they’re off our streets and behind bars.”
Operation Global Chain follows several other law enforcement actions led by state authorities.
Earlier in 2026, the state unit participated in Operation Coast to Coast, a national effort that located 11 missing children in Georgia and initiated several human trafficking investigations.
In addition, an effort known as Operation In Plain Sight has shut down more than 40 illicit massage businesses over a two-year period across eight counties, including Athens-Clarke, Cobb, Cherokee, Fulton, Floyd, Gwinnett, Hall and Henry.
The state unit previously collaborated with the U.S. Marshals Service on Operation Not Forgotten, which located 39 missing children in 2020 and 20 missing children in 2021.
That operation led to the recovery of a 17-year-old girl reported missing from Kansas City, Mo., who was located at a hotel in Fulton County, ultimately resulting in the prosecution of 13 traffickers.
The Georgia Department of Human Services Special Investigations Unit, the Atlanta Police Department, the FBI Atlanta Field Office, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation Special Operations Unit and the Richmond County Sheriff’s Office assisted in the recovery.
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