Georgia State Patrol Welcomes Two Troopers to Cumming

Two new graduates from the Georgia State Patrol Trooper School will be joining the  that serves Forsyth, Dawson and Lumpkin counties.

Darius Goss and Andrew Phillips along with 33 other troopers graduated on Thursday at the Georgia Public Safety Training Center in Forsyth, GA.

The graduation ceremony marked the completion of 31 weeks of rigid law enforcement training that included three months of on-the-road field training under the guidance of veteran field training officers.  

"These troopers have received the best training available," said Colonel Mark McDonough, Commissioner of the Georgia Department of Public Safety. "They have undergone grueling physical, academic and field training to prepare them well for a career in the dangerous profession of law enforcement."

And with the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday travel period beginning in less than two weeks (from Wednesday, Nov. 23 through Sunday night, Nov. 27), the current class has received specialized training on impaired driving enforcement in addition to special training on pursuit driving, firearms and drug interdiction techniques.

Colonel McDonough noted that this is the 88th Georgia State Patrol Trooper School to graduate and the new troopers compose the last graduating class before the Department of Public Safety celebrates its 75th Anniversary next March.  

The first troopers in Georgia began patrols in September, 1937.