Detectives Find Missing Woman Alive After 17 Years in Basement — She Reveals 13 More “Guinea Pigs,” a Secret Laboratory, and a Killer Disguised as a Scientist

Atlanta, Jan. 2015 — What began as a routine lead in a gang-related murder investigation turned into one of the most disturbing criminal discoveries in Atlanta’s modern history — a hidden medical experiment that claimed the lives of 14 college students over nearly two decades.

On the morning of January 10, 2015, Detective Darius Mitchell, a 20-year veteran of the Atlanta Police Department’s homicide unit, followed an anonymous tip to an abandoned pharmaceutical building on Marietta Street. The structure, once home to Meridian Pharmaceuticals, had been shuttered since 2005. Mitchell expected to find a suspect connected to a recent shooting.

Instead, he found a locked basement — and behind it, a series of rooms that revealed a crime almost no one had imagined.

Inside the basement were six clinical rooms. Five contained human remains, each positioned on hospital beds connected to outdated but functional medical equipment. In the sixth room, Mitchell discovered something that stunned even seasoned first responders: a woman still alive, barely conscious, tethered to an IV that provided just enough nutrients to keep her body functioning.

Her name was Briana Jackson.

Doctors later determined that Jackson had been held captive in that basement for approximately 17 years.

Before she died later that day at Grady Memorial Hospital, Jackson whispered words that would transform the case from a closed horror into an ongoing investigation: “He’s still operating. There are more of us.”

A Pattern of Disappearances

As forensic teams identified the remains found at the Marietta Street site, a chilling pattern emerged. All of the victims were Black college students between the ages of 19 and 22. All disappeared in the fall of 1998. All had been reported missing, and all of those cases had gone cold within months.

The victims included students from Spelman College, Morehouse College, and Clark Atlanta University — institutions located within miles of the abandoned facility.

Medical examiners found evidence of IV access points and organ failure consistent with adverse drug reactions. These were not executions. They were experiments.

Investigators soon connected the site to Meridian Pharmaceuticals, a small Atlanta-based company founded by Dr. Nikolai Georgiev, an immigrant researcher whose application to conduct FDA-approved clinical trials had been denied in the 1990s due to safety concerns.

According to police records, Meridian nevertheless recruited students for “volunteer trials,” offering thousands of dollars to those in financial distress.

“They Needed Money — And They Trusted the System”

Families of the victims told investigators a similar story: tuition shortfalls, recruitment booths on campus, promises of safe, compensated participation in medical research.

Gloria Thompson, the mother of Kesha Thompson — a Spelman College sophomore who vanished in October 1998 — said she had searched for her daughter for 17 years.

“They told me she probably dropped out,” Thompson said. “They told me to let it go. But a mother knows. Someone took my child.”

Investigators later confirmed that Thompson’s daughter was listed in Georgiev’s handwritten research logs as “Subject 01.”

Those logs, recovered from the abandoned building, documented escalating dosages of an experimental compound and recorded adverse reactions in clinical, detached language. One entry read simply: “Subject deceased. Data recorded.”

The Inside Recruiter

The investigation expanded when detectives interviewed former classmates of the victims. One witness identified a university administrator — later named as Dr. Patricia Morgan — who had actively encouraged students to participate in Meridian’s trials.

Confronted with evidence, Morgan eventually cooperated with authorities. Prosecutors said she admitted to receiving payments from Georgiev in exchange for identifying financially vulnerable students and steering them toward the program.

According to court records, Morgan helped recruit all 14 victims between 1998 and 2014.

“She didn’t select them at random,” Detective Mitchell said during testimony. “She selected the desperate.”

A Second Facility — And More Victims

Jackson’s final warning proved true.

Armed with new information, police raided a second warehouse in Decatur, Georgia. Inside, they found nine more rooms — and nine more sets of remains. Evidence suggested prolonged confinement and violent attempts to escape.

By then, Georgiev had vanished.

Financial investigators traced shell companies and offshore accounts tied to Meridian’s bankruptcy. Eventually, they uncovered a luxury home in suburban Marietta purchased under a false identity.

On January 28, 2015, a SWAT team arrested Georgiev without resistance.

“Medical Progress Requires Sacrifice”

During interrogation, Georgiev showed no remorse. According to transcripts, he described the victims not as people but as “data points,” arguing they had “volunteered” and signed consent forms.

Prosecutors dismantled that defense during trial, presenting evidence of locked rooms, forced confinement, and decades-long captivity.

In November 2015, a jury convicted Georgiev on 14 counts of first-degree murder. He was sentenced to life in prison without parole.

Morgan pleaded guilty to conspiracy and accessory charges and received a 30-year federal sentence.

Justice — And What Came After

Georgiev died of a heart attack in prison two years later.

For the families, the verdicts brought accountability — but not closure.

“Justice doesn’t bring my daughter back,” Thompson said. “But at least the truth didn’t stay buried.”

The case led to sweeping reforms in Georgia, including stricter oversight of university-based clinical trials and mandatory reporting when participants go missing.

Today, a memorial stands outside the Marietta Street building bearing the names of all 14 victims.

Detective Mitchell still visits their graves each month.

“There are always more cases,” he said. “More families waiting. All you can do is keep looking — even when everyone else stops.”