House Committee Approves Bill that would make Grooming Minors for Sex a Felony

State Representative Alan Powell has submitted a bill that would make the grooming of a minor by an adult for sex a felony.

House Bill 993 aims at amending Title 16 of the Official Code of Georgia Annotated that relates to offenses related to minors generally and would provide for the offense of grooming a minor for indecent purposes.

The bill was submitted by Powell in January and had two reads before it was sent to the House Juvenile Justice Committee.

After two amendments by the Committee, the bill passed and Powell tells WLHR News the bill is now in the Rules Committee.

It’s not clear how HB993 if passed, would affect a case in Hart County that has yet to go to trial involving an 11-year-old girl who was allegedly groomed for years by her gymnastics coach at the Bell Family YMCA in Hartwell.

That girl, later identified as Jennifer Cobb, died at the age of 20 after her alleged molester, Jeremy Green, was arrested and then released on bond.

Green was indicted by a Hart County Grand Jury on six counts of child molestation and rape while employed at the Bell Family YMCA in Hartwell.

The indictment alleges Green molested and raped “a teenage girl under the age of 16 from July 2015 to November 2015.”

However, per parents allege the molestation went on for years after that until he was finally arrested in 2021.

Green has pleaded not guilty. He was released on a $250,000 bond and has been under house arrest since then.

Jennifer Cobb died in June 2021 shortly after he was released on bond.

The case is still awaiting trial.