SAVANNAH, Ga. (AP) — Gov. Brian Kemp signed new laws Thursday that will require Georgia schools to perform annual drills for responding to campus shooters early in the school year and perform literacy assessments for younger students three times per year to see if they can read at grade level. Kemp signed the education measures, which passed the legislature with bipartisan support, into law during a conference of Georgia school superintendents in Savannah.

ATLANTA – A Statesboro man faces up to five years in prison for willfully filing false income tax returns. Samir Patel pleaded guilty Tuesday to evading the proper assessment of his personal federal income taxes. Patel was a tax return preparer at a national return preparation business from 1999 until 2021, according to court documents. In 2015, he bought a franchise of the business in Claxton.

MIDWAY, Ga. (AP) — A South Korean company will build a $72 million factory to make half shafts, axles and brake systems for a Hyundai Motor Group auto assembly plant in coastal Georgia. Seohan Group announced Tuesday that it would build the plant near Midway, south of Savannah, with plans to hire at least 180 new employees.

COLUMBUS, Ga. (AP) — A Georgia police chief will leave his job after accepting a $400,000 payment to retire. Columbus Police Chief Freddie Blackmon went on administrative leave beginning Friday and will retire on April 30 after 37 years with the department. Local news outlets report that city leaders initially offered Blackmon $250,000 to leave. Blackmon responded by demanding $850,000 and threatening to sue the city for racial discrimination.

BRUNSWICK, Ga. (AP) — A Mexican citizen was sentenced Monday to life in a U.S. prison for killing a man who reported him and his brother to authorities for cheating migrant workers out of millions of dollars. A U.S. District Court judge in Brunswick, Georgia, sentenced 46-year-old Juan Rangel-Rubio nearly six months after a jury convicted him of conspiring to kill a witness and other criminal counts.

JESUP, Ga. (AP) — A Georgia chiropractor who served in the military as a Navy SEAL died Thursday when the small plane he was piloting crashed as he tried to land at a rural airport, the local sheriff said. The National Transportation Safety Board said it is investigating to determine what caused the single-engine Cirrus SR22 aircraft to crash in Wayne County, roughly 60 miles southwest of Savannah.

AUGUSTA, Ga. (AP) — An investigation is underway after an inmate died at Augusta State Medical Prison. The Richmond County Coroner's Office said Amos Huff, 60, was pronounced dead at 11:11 p.m. March 30 at the facility in Grovetown, a news release Wednesday said. Officials said they believe Huff's death to be the result of injuries sustained during a fight with another inmate, Johnathan Randy Fesperman, who has since been charged with murder, WJBF-TV reported.

ATLANTA (AP) — A maker of biomedical filters will invest $243 million to build a plant in Athens, Georgia, that is projected to eventually employ nearly 1,800 workers by 2031. Privately held Meissner Corp. of Camarillo, California, made the announcement Wednesday, saying it needs another site to make filters and conduct research. President Christopher Meissner said in a statement that the Georgia location offers “an incredible talent pool and strong geographic position that allows us to serve clients on the East Coast and throughout the world.”

DOUGLASVILLE, Ga. (AP) — A fifth suspect has been arrested in a March 4 mass shooting at a 16th birthday party in suburban Atlanta that killed two teens and wounded seven other people, authorities said Tuesday. Tahkel Marquise Beverly-Smart, a 21-year-old resident of Dallas, Georgia, was arrested Saturday in connection with the shooting at a house in Douglasville, Douglas County Sheriff Tim Pounds announced.

ATLANTA (AP) — Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp on Tuesday vetoed a bill that would have capped tuition increases at public universities and colleges, calling it an infringement on the authority of the state Board of Regents and a violation of the state constitution. Senators amended House Bill 319 on the final day of the legislative session to say that none of the University System of Georgia's 26 universities and colleges could raise tuition or fees by more than 3% from the previous year without approval from both houses of the General Assembly.

JEKYLL ISLAND, Ga. (AP) — A dozen sea turtles returned to the wild Tuesday after several months of being treated for injuries and illnesses on the Georgia coast. A crowd gathered on the beach at Jekyll Island as staff members from the Georgia Sea Turtle Center waded into the ocean with their hard-shelled patients and turned them loose in the water. The center opened on the island in 2007 as Georgia’s veterinary hospital for sick and injured sea turtles.

MARIETTA, Ga. (AP) — Police have charged two former employees of a suburban Atlanta hospital laundry with stealing an urn containing the ashes of a stillborn infant and then throwing away the ashes. Marietta Police last week arrested a married couple, Anilus and Rosnie Frederic, charging them with theft and abandonment of a dead body.

GAINESVILLE, Ga. (AP) — Two northeast Georgia men died Monday after they were electrocuted while breaking into a power company substation. The deaths happened before dawn at a Georgia Power Co. substation in an industrial area south of downtown Gainesville, news outlets reported.

DARIEN, Ga. (AP) — A crash involving three vehicles on Interstate 16 in coastal Georgia early Monday sent 14 people to the hospital with injuries, authorities said. The wreck happened about 3 a.m. in McIntosh County when an SUV traveling the wrong way struck a passenger van carrying 12 passengers, most of them children, said Trooper Marcus White of the Georgia State Patrol.

ATLANTA — Georgia lawmakers wrapped up this year's legislative session on Wednesday, steadfastly refusing to legalize sports betting or pari-mutuel wagering on horse racing.

ATLANTA (AP) — Georgia lawmakers are telling cities and counties that they must enforce existing bans on public camping or sleeping by homeless people while saying local governments and hospitals can't dump homeless people in other counties without permission. The House voted 99-76 to pass Senate Bill 62 on Monday. The Senate later approved House amendments adding the ban on dumping, sending it to Gov. Brian Kemp for his signature or veto.

CALHOUN, Ga. (AP) — Sheriff’s deputies shot and wounded a motorcyclist following a high-speed chase in northern Georgia, authorities said. The shooting happened early Sunday in Gordon County, where a motorcyclist sped away when Gordon County deputies tried to pull him over for not having a license plate, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation said.

BRUNSWICK, Ga. (AP) — Police in coastal Georgia are investigating what led up to a teenager being left at a hospital after becoming severely intoxicated with drugs and alcohol. Glynn County police said investigators interviewed the 19-year-old victim Sunday at a hospital in Brunswick, five days after he was admitted. Three juveniles brought the teenager to the emergency room late Tuesday, police said, and left before officers arrived.

ATLANTA (AP) — Georgia authorities say state troopers in January fatally shot an activist who had fired at authorities after a trooper shot pepper balls into the protester’s tent, according to incident reports obtained Friday by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

MARIETTA, Ga. (AP) — Former Georgia Gov. Roy Barnes has filed a lawsuit against Cobb County regulators after a rezoning request to build homes on his farmland was denied. The lawsuit, filed this week, asks Cobb County Superior Court Judge Sonja Brown to declare parts of the county's zoning code unconstitutional, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported. The lawsuit has not been scheduled for trial but is expected to be heard soon, the newspaper said.

ATLANTA (AP) — Georgia Republicans shelved a plan to broaden state voucher funding for private school tuition and home schooling on Thursday, apparently lacking the votes for passage in the state House after a long debate. The House voted 95-70 to table the bill, meaning it could be taken up again before the 2023 session ends Wednesday. If not voted on this year, it could be considered again in 2024.

ATLANTA — Georgia will ban hormone replacement therapies, gender-altering surgeries for children under 18, under a law signed by Gov. Brian Kemp on Thursday.

ATLANTA – Georgia’s banks are in a strong position in the wake of the failure of two large American banks this month, the deputy commissioner of the state agency that oversees banks said Tuesday. “The state of banking overall in this country is very strong, and that’s especially the case in the state of Georgia,” Bo Fears of the Georgia Department of Banking and Finance told the state Senate’s banking committee. 

ATLANTA (AP) — The Georgia Senate on Tuesday rolled out a budget that would slice $87 million from Georgia's public universities in a power struggle with the House over hospital funding and permitting.

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) — Gopher tortoises imperiled by loss of habitat largely caused by human development should be placed on the endangered species list in four southern states, environmental groups said Wednesday as they prepared to sue the federal government over the issue.