Solicitor Sherry Boston Wins DeKalb District Attorney Race

DECATUR, GA -- DeKalb County Solicitor Sherry Boston appears to have defeated incumbent Robert James to become the county's new district attorney Tuesday.

With 111 of 192 precincts reporting, Boston had 33,646 votes, compared to 20,639 for James. That's nearly 62 percent of the vote for Boston, compared to 38 percent for James.

The race for district attorney is rarely a heated one, particularly when there is an incumbent involved.

But Boston, who as county solicitor is DeKalb's top prosecutor of misdemeanor cases, provided an unusually strong opponent for James, the sitting DA.

Boston sought to link James to DeKalb County corruption cases like the ones that sent former county commissioner Elaine Boyer and suspended county CEO Burrell Ellis to prison.

Specifically, she accused James of not cooperating with an investigation of corruption in the county by former state Attorney General Michael Bowers.

James has said the Georgia Bureau of Investigation got to look at Bowers' findings and didn't prosecute anyone based off of them because no one's behavior rose to the criminal level.

He also cited his role in prosecuting Ellis not once, but twice.

For his part, James campaigned saying Boston didn't have enough experience prosecuting serious crimes to handle being district attorney.

No Republican is running for district attorney in heavily Democratic, DeKalb, meaning that Boston will be the county's district attorney next year.