F
or two years, from the sum-
mer of 1979 to the summer of
1981, African American parents
in Atlanta were terrified. During that
span, at least 24 black children and
teens vanished from the streets only to
turn up later as corpses. The first two,
14-year-old Edward Smith and 13-year-
old Alfred Evans, were found by a
woman rummaging through roadside
woods for aluminum cans and bottles.
Seven-year-old LaTonya Wilson, one
of six children who disappeared over
the summer of 1980, could be identi-
fied only from her teeth and clothing
when her remains were found nearly
four months after she went missing.“Every day, every night, it seemed
like they were finding bodies,” Sheila
Baltazar, whose stepson, Patrick Bal-
tazar, 12, was killed in 1981, told the
New York Times. “And we were just
trying to hold on to our babies.”
President Ronald Reagan ultimately
sent Vice President George H. W.
Bush to Georgia to be briefed on the
murders. But the killer has never been
found.
At least, not officially. Many Atlanta
residents believe they know who the
killer is—and he is already in prison.
On May 22, 1981, police were staking
out the James Jackson Parkway bridge
when they heard a loud splash in theTHE ATLANTA CHILD MURDERS
The question lingers: Who killed the 24?62 april 2020