Between 1979 and 1981, children disappeared from Atlanta’s streets, including boys who never made it home from the store or to the bus stop, and their bodies began to turn up in woods and waterways. The killings of at least 29 young people stunned the city and horrified families, who kept their children indoors for years.
According to the FBI’s publicly available case files, about 29 children, teens, and young adults, predominantly boys, were killed during that time period; in 1980, the bureau formed a multi-agency task team and logged the investigation under the code name “ATKID.”
Parents organized patrols as police investigated homes and woodland corridors where victims were eventually discovered, a pattern described in the FBI’s online case files as dump locations around the Chattahoochee River and in forested areas on Atlanta’s southwest side.
By May 1981, detectives were watching bridges over the Chattahoochee when an officer heard a splash and pulled over a car driven by Wayne Williams, a 23-year-old music promoter.
Wayne Williams, the suspect in the Atlanta killings, is brought away handcuffed.
Getty
According to The New York Times, Nathaniel Cater, 28, was found dead downstream several days later.
Investigators quickly linked Williams to a series of child murders that had terrorized Atlanta for nearly two years. Police said fibers and dog hairs from Williams’ home, car, and German shepherd matched samples found on many victims. Following his detention, authorities closed 22 of the 29 cases based on the fiber evidence, according to the Times.
Williams was accused with the murders of Cater and Jimmy Ray Payne, 21, and was found guilty in 1982. According to the Times, authorities then closed the majority of the remaining cases while publicly tying him to the others, despite the fact that he was never charged in the children’s deaths.
“The bottom line is, nobody ever testified or even claimed that they saw me strike another person, choke another person, stab, beat, kill, or hurt anybody, because I didn’t,” Williams, who is serving two life terms, told CNN.
“The fact is, I did not kill anyone,” Williams stated.
“Wayne Williams did not kill our children. No! And we want justice,” Catherine Leach, the mother of Curtis Walker, 13, who was killed in 1981, told 11Alive.
“Every day and night, it appeared that they were finding bodies…” Sheila Baltazar, whose stepson Patrick, 12, was killed in 1981, told the Times that there was a large dark cloud hanging over them.
In March 2019, city officials announced a new evaluation of saved material using current forensic techniques.
Erika Shields, Atlanta’s then-police chief, stated in an interview with the Times that the goal is to provide closure to families.
Detectives eventually submitted the deteriorated objects to a private lab that specializes in degraded DNA, according to GPB News; officials stated that testing would take time due to the materials’ age and condition.
In June 2023, the city will dedicate the Atlanta Children’s Eternal Flame memorial at City Hall to remember the victims and their families. “This is a really beautiful event to remember and keep out front because this same thing can happen again,” said Rev. John Bell, father of 9-year-old victim Yusef Bell, to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
“Community awareness will make it very hard for this to happen again,” Bell told the crowd.
“It goes to show that they are never forgotten,” June Thompson, victim Darron Glass’ sister, told GPB News. “Their memories are always alive in our hearts, and this eternity flame is very beautiful.”
The review is still open. According to CBS News and GPB, city leaders and police inventoried what evidence was still available and sent it for testing, but cautioned that the results could be limited by age and storage conditions.
Williams, who claims innocence, remains in state prison.
