GA GA - Five child murder cases reopened, Dekalb County, 1980-1981

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LovelyPigeon

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This is one of those cases I've always wondered about. Was Wayne Williams really the serial killer or was he railroaded for crimes he didn't commit?

Chief reopens child murders
DeKalb revisits 1980s killings

Almost 25 years ago, Louis Graham was part of the "missing and murdered" task force assigned to catch a serial killer of boys and young men in metro Atlanta. But Graham didn't agree with the official conclusion that talent scout Wayne Williams was the murderer.

Now, as DeKalb County police chief, Graham is acting on his opinion. He said Friday that his department is reopening four — perhaps five — of the "missing and murdered" cases, widely known as the Atlanta Child Murders, that terrorized the area during the early 1980s.

Williams was convicted of two killings in Fulton County in 1982 and sentenced to life in prison, where he remains. After the trial, authorities said Williams was responsible for an additional 22 deaths, including the five that Graham cited Friday. But there were no trials in those cases.

"These cases are DeKalb County cases. There has not been any finality to these cases," Graham said.

http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/dekalb/0505/07missing.html

I wish DeKalb the very best of luck investigating these cases.
 
I do as well. Although I believe Wayne Williams was responsible for many of the deaths I also believe there was a copycat during this time. I was involved in this case only as a peripheral person. The FBI interviewed me as well as others in my company because of an employee that had extremely bizarre behavior.We know so much more now then at that time. I was a kid with respect to any behaviors we see now and can identify. It was pure hinkey meter with no basis.

I hate to see a category where all unsolved crimes go to one individual and others are not investigated. Obviously, we have many issues and many criminal activities....so many fly under the radar. Many more victims because of this kind of pigeon holing. No disrespect but I couldn't think of a better analogy.
 
I'm glad to hear that they're doing this. I only wish they'd do the same for the Boston Strangler cases too. I believe that Wayne is guilty of a couple of murders, but there is very clear evidence refuting some of the murders he's supposedly connected to.

Did he kill some? Probably.... were there other killers....absolutely.
 
I wonder if there is any evidence to test for DNA and such? I also believe that Williams did commit some murders. I'd like to know if he was the only killer or if there is another sicko out there getting away with murder.
 
When Louise Watley pulled alongside a car that summer day, she sensed something might be wrong.

The driver was a middle-aged white man. A black girl, perhaps as young as 12, sat in the back seat.

Louise Watley recalls seeing a girl jump from a man's car during the time of the Atlanta Child Murders. In those days, anything seemed suspicious.

As she slowed to get a better look, the car quickly turned up a side street. The girl jumped out. The car sped away.

Such was life seen through the eyes of Atlantans from the summer of 1979 to the summer of 1981. It was a time when murder and fear stalked the city, when children were being abducted and killed. When everything, it seemed, took on an unnerving edge.

http://www.ajc.com/news/content/metro/dekalb/0505/0515METwayne.html

Last December, Frank Ski received a letter from Hancock State Prison with the name Wayne Williams on it.

http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/dekalb/0505/15wayneski.html
 
The news that his old friend, DeKalb County police Chief Louis Graham, had reopened five of those 29 cases this month finally made it to his cell — it takes a while in prison — and Dorsey wanted to talk about it.

Dorsey and Graham go way back. They were partners on the Atlanta homicide squad in the 1960s and 1970s.

"We were the best," said the normally reserved Graham, who last saw Dorsey in 2004 when he was being held at the Rockdale County Jail. "He's probably closer than a brother."

Dorsey led an Atlanta police task force when 29 black children and young adults disappeared and were found dead between 1979 and 1981. Graham was the assistant police chief of Fulton County and a task force member. Wayne Williams, a 23-year-old freelance photographer, was convicted in the murders of two adults and later blamed for 22 more deaths, most of them children.

But Dorsey and Graham never believed Williams committed the murders — even the two for which he was convicted. The two former detectives were the only task force members to have publicly maintained Williams' innocence, Graham said.

Wayne Williams "was the perfect suspect, the perfect fall guy," said Dorsey, raising his handcuffed wrists for emphasis. A crucifix around his neck dangled as he leaned forward. "If they arrested a white guy, there would have been riots across the U.S."

http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/dekalb/0505/29dorsey.html
 
The trail of evidence is 23 years old. Much of it — including thousands of unorganized files — is stored in cabinets and dusty boxes, untouched for years. And some crucial evidence may be hopelessly compromised.

Locating and sorting through this morass is the daunting job facing a squad of DeKalb County "cold case" detectives as they investigate five of the infamous "missing and murdered" children cases, the string of 29 deaths of African-American children and young men that terrorized Atlanta from July 1979 to May 1981.

http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/dekalb/0505/29evidence.html
 


ATLANTA — Lawyers for convicted killer Wayne Williams, blamed for the murders of two dozen boys and young men in the Atlanta area during the 1970s and '80s, are casting suspicion on a child molester they say lived or worked near where many of the bodies were found.

In court papers made public Friday, the defense asked a federal judge for access to police files on the molester.

The papers do not identify the man by name but say he is a multiple child molester serving time in a Georgia prison. They also allege that investigators knew the man was a viable suspect in the child murders but never told defense attorneys.
 
dark_shadows said:


ATLANTA — Lawyers for convicted killer Wayne Williams, blamed for the murders of two dozen boys and young men in the Atlanta area during the 1970s and '80s, are casting suspicion on a child molester they say lived or worked near where many of the bodies were found.

In court papers made public Friday, the defense asked a federal judge for access to police files on the molester.

The papers do not identify the man by name but say he is a multiple child molester serving time in a Georgia prison. They also allege that investigators knew the man was a viable suspect in the child murders but never told defense attorneys.
Click to expand...
I wonder why his record is not openly available, is it a juevenile record? The police can access that too if they have reason.
The page cannot be ound so there is no info.
Wayne Williams was recently in the news because the latest idea was he did not commit the child murders he went to prison for. Is this a way to keep him in prison? Is this a way to keep a murderer in prison in case he gets an appeal?
Why is the page not available already?
 
Becba said:
I wonder why his record is not openly available, is it a juevenile record? The police can access that too if they have reason.
The page cannot be ound so there is no info.
Wayne Williams was recently in the news because the latest idea was he did not commit the child murders he went to prison for. Is this a way to keep him in prison? Is this a way to keep a murderer in prison in case he gets an appeal?
Why is the page not available already?
Click to expand...

Try this url: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,198884,00.html

Fox sometimes moves the articles around.

One of the problems is going to be the age of the info on the molester. No computers then, the info was all on paper. Eventually it was probably put in storage or maybe even lost or destroyed. They may be able to contruct a partial record of his criminal history on the charges that led to his incarceration, but anything else is iffy.
 
The police files are being sought by Williams' defense attorneys, who have no access to those police records unless granted by a judge. Police files aren't open and available to the general public, or to defense lawyers.

I hope the defense is given access, and can further investigate the Atlanta Child Killings. Wayne Williams as the final resolution of those child murders has been very unsatisfying on several levels.
 
Man convicted in Atlanta killings points finger at child molester
06/10/2006
The Associated Press
--->>
Most of the victims died from asphyxiation without ligature marks and this suspect has described to police his knowledge and skill as to how to accomplish that act, the court papers say. They don’t elaborate on the man or his methods.
Evidence about the man resurfaced within the last year after a police chief in DeKalb County, near Atlanta, reopened the investigation into five killings, according to the court papers.
‘‘A profound miscarriage of justice has occurred in this matter, which not only has kept (Williams) behind bars for a majority of his adult life, but also which kept a blind eye to bringing the real killers of these many victims to justice,’’ the lawyers wrote.
A spokeswoman for the state attorney general’s office, Kelley Jackson, declined to comment on the defense allegations or on whether her office would oppose the release of the materials the defense is seeking.
Between 1979 and 1981, 29 black boys and young men were killed in the Atlanta area, spreading fear throughout the region. --->> http://www.gwinnettdailypost.com/in..._id=16013&url_subchannel_id=&change_well_id=2
 
He has recently resigned, without fanfare and without announcement about the investigation he opened into the deaths of 4 DeKalb County young males who died between '79 and '81. They were 4 among 24 whose deaths have never been resolved.

Slain children's parents await DeKalb probe

The chief made it official--just over a year ago, on May 6, 2005— when he stood before a bank of microphones and announced to the world that a newly formed cold case unit had been organized to find the real killer of the five DeKalb boys, and perhaps 24 other boys, girls and young men in Fulton County, who died during the horrible summers between 1979 and 1981...

Now, complicating matters, on May 3, Graham resigned — three days short of the first anniversary of the opening of the investigation... "I think that we did a good investigation, and we have discovered some information that would be of interest," Graham said. He did not specify.

Interim police Chief Nick Marinelli said investigators are following leads in the DeKalb child murders. But it's not top priority...

Graham, one of the original investigators in the case, reopened the investigation into the deaths of Aaron Wyche, 10; Patrick Baltazar, 11; Curtis Walker, 13; Joseph Bell, 15; and William Barrett, 17. He said then he never believed Wayne Williams was guilty of any of the slayings.


http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/dekalb/stories/0530metmurders_.html
 
I was around back then, and was interviewed by a couple of FBI agents (about an employee who worked for us). I never could reconcile that Wayne Williams did all the murders...29 is a lot. I think there was a copycat and at least one child molester. But I do believe Wayne Williams was responsible for many.

So, IMO, he is where he should be but others need to come to justice as well.
 
concernedperson said:
I was around back then, and was interviewed by a couple of FBI agents (about an employee who worked for us). I never could reconcile that Wayne Williams did all the murders...29 is a lot. I think there was a copycat and at least one child molester. But I do believe Wayne Williams was responsible for many.

So, IMO, he is where he should be but others need to come to justice as well.
Click to expand...
Yeah, I don't think he did them all, but he probably did enough of them to deserve his fate. He was certainly involved with the last known murder of the mentally retarded teen. Personally, I think a good percentage of the killings were commited by family members of the individual kids who decided to use the serial killer news as cover.
 
CP and all


I will have to reserve my decision if Willaims is guilty..
In the 80's in the South there were still places that were segregated ... his version doens't seem that unlikely to me.
 
LP Remember that bar in Dunnelon?


I heard it was segregated until the mid 80's
 
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