[3] G. pekinensis was named and described by Heckert et al. (2015) on the basis of ten rows of bony plates called osteoderms, representing the front part of an armored carapace that would have covered the back of the animal.

These plates were found embedded in sandstone and conglomerate boulders near a brick quarry in Chatham County, North Carolina, which likely originated from the Late Triassic Pekin Formation.

Gorgetosuchus was part of a diverse faunal community in a continental rift valley system during the Late Triassic, which also included traversodontids, phytosaurs, dicynodonts, and temnospondyls.

A phylogenetic analysis conducted by Heckert et al. (2015) placed Gorgetosuchus close to these taxa as the most basal desmatosuchine, but the results were not statistically well supported.

On the other hand, other skeletal traits strongly diverge between the two groups, so the position of Gorgetosuchus would likely stabilize if more non-osteoderm bones were discovered.