A Doraville police officer has been arrested on charges that he concealed the death of a 16-year-old Gwinnett County girl whose body was found last week, six months after she went missing.
Miles Bryant, 22, was arrested Monday on one count of concealing the death of another and one count of false report of a crime, Gwinnett police said in a news release. Authorities said he has been linked to the death of Susana Morales, who was found in the woods near Dacula on Feb. 6.
Police did not say how Bryant was allegedly connected to Morales’ death, and investigators are still working to determine how she died. Bryant was booked into the Gwinnett jail, where he remains, police said.
Bryant has since been fired from the Doraville Police Department, spokeswoman Emily Heenan confirmed to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
“A now former police officer was being served felony arrest warrants by the Gwinnett Police Department in connection with the disappearance and murder of Susana Morales,” Heenan said. “Our prayers rest with the family and friends of Susana Morales and everyone else affected by this tragedy.”
Bryant began his career in law enforcement with the Forsyth County Sheriff’s Office in March 2020, according to records kept by Georgia’s Peace Officer Standards and Training Council. He resigned from that position to join Doraville police in May 2021, where he has been employed and in good standing since.
Bryant has no record of sanctions or disciplinary actions issued by POST in the state agency’s records. Any disciplinary issues not involving POST would have been handled by the employing agency itself.
Credit: Gwinnett County Police Department
Credit: Gwinnett County Police Department
Morales went missing the evening of July 26 when she was walking home from a friend’s house in the Norcross area, Gwinnett police previously said. She was reported missing when she did not return home as expected.
Morales’ body was found more than 20 miles from the area where she was last seen near her home. Her skeletal remains were found by a passerby near Drowning Creek, not far from Ga. 316, where they had been exposed to the elements for months.
Morales was the first of two missing Meadowcreek High School students to be found within a few days. The second, 17-year-old Rodrigo Floriano Mayen, was found after he had been missing for several days.
According to the Gwinnett medical examiner, Floriano Mayen had drugs in his system when he died, but no ruling has been made on his official cause of death. Another teenager was arrested and charged with concealing Floriano Mayen’s death, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution previously reported.
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