Police have re-launched the investigation into the “Atlanta Children Killed” case. DNA evidence will be sent to a private lab in hopes of finally getting answers.
Police are looking for answers in the “Atlanta Children Killed” case. The U.S. city mayor’s office announced this week that investigators will send DNA evidence discovered at the time to a private laboratory in Utah. They hope to finally have “concrete answers to give to families”. The events took place between 1979 and 1981. During those years, at least 29 people, mostly black children and adolescents, were killed in and around Atlanta. The mayor recalls that the first two victims were young African-American boys, Edward Hope Smith, 14, and Alfred Evan, 13, who disappeared a few days apart. At the time, because both victims were black, the police determined that these cases were drug-related.
“Even when Milton Harvey, 14, and Yusuf Bell, 9, were both found dead in late 1979 – Bell’s body was found in an abandoned school – the Atlanta police did not link. all disappearances and murders together ”, writes“ Vulture ”. For months, she refused to connect the murders to each other, angering families, as the mayor feared the crimes would tarnish the city’s reputation. The search was ultimately taken seriously when a 13-year-old boy, Clifford Jones, was found strangled dead, because he was from another city and was just visiting relatives in Atlanta. During the investigation, only one suspect was named: Wayne Williams.
Wayne Williams, en prison. © Jonathan Newton / AP / SIPA
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The latter was convicted in 1982 for the murder of two adults and is still serving his sentence. The man, who has never been officially charged with the murders of the Atlanta children, maintains his innocence in this case, even though the crimes ceased after his arrest in June 1981. Several families of the victims themselves remain skeptical as to the fact that Wayne Williams committed all the murders.
The laboratory where the DNA will be sent is “specialized in researching damaged DNA,” police said. “With the emergence of new science and technology related to DNA testing, the Atlanta Police Department has taken the opportunity to reassess the evidence in the Atlanta child murder case,” the Atlanta Police Department said. police in a statement Tuesday. “As with all murder cases, our investigators dedicate countless hours and energy to successfully resolve cases and bring a sense of closure to the victims’ loved ones.” The case of “Atlanta’s Killed Children” was addressed in Season 2 of David Fincher’s series, “Mindhunter”.
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