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Most people in Hungary heard about the murder of children in Atlanta when the topic appeared in the second season of David Fincher’s great series Mindhunter. Unfortunately, for now, it seems like Mindhunter isn’t happening, which is why this story has stayed as smooth in the series as it does in reality. HBO’s new documentary series, Atlanta’s Missing and Murdered: The Lost Children, vows to close this (unfinished) story (at least in part).
Speaking of the series, the archives of the series of murders that began more than forty years ago were reopened last year. Police are confident that technology and science have evolved so much in recent decades that, for example, DNA analysis may reveal facts that were not yet available in the early 1980s. Although the police investigation has yet to reopen ongoing, the perpetrators of the disappearances and murders in Atlanta also promise new evidence. Most of these are explored in the last fifth episode of the series, which has yet to be seen.
- Who killed 28 children and young adults in Atlanta 40 years ago?
- Was the real killer caught?
- Why were the files reopened last year?
Some people don’t have questions anymore, And there are those who read the Index.
At a press conference announcing the reopening of the archives, Keisha Lance Bottoms, the current mayor of Atlanta, recalled how the series of murders affected her childhood, how fear changed the lives of black children. He added that it may well be that there is nothing in the world of heaven that they can find, but he believes that history will judge them for their actions and at least they can say that they have tried.
Atlanta child murders are one of the most horrifying chapters in American history, abounding in serial killings.
Between 1979 and 1981, at least 28 children and young adults were killed in the city. We don’t know the exact number because to date it has not been revealed how many of the missing have been the victims of a serial killer or murderers. Of the 28 victims found, the youngest was only 7 years old and the oldest was 28 years old. However, the vast majority of victims came from adolescents aged 10 to 14 years. What they had in common was that they were all black and, with one exception, they were all children.
Photo: Bettmann / Getty Images Hungary
The murders were committed in various ways: there were those who were strangled, others stabbed, shot or beheaded with a heavy object. (The series depicts the corpses mercilessly, without obscuring it at all.) All of the children lived in Atlanta’s poorer and blacker neighborhoods, many raised only by their mothers. Since this area did not receive much police attention anyway, the disappearances and murders were not linked for a long time, making the murderer free of unrest. Later, it was mainly the parents, especially the mother of Yusuf Bell, who was killed at the age of 9, who needed decisive measures to take the matter seriously. At the conclusion of the investigation, more than a hundred agents were already working on the case, the parents removed the children from the schools, without letting them go out on the streets, to the playgrounds.
Finally, two years after his first murder, he became a suspect, photographer and music promoter Wayne Williams, 23. Williams was extremely suspicious from the start, mixed with contradictions, and had physical evidence against him. But he never confessed to the murders and ended up being prosecuted and convicted in only two cases, the murder of two adult victims. He is currently serving a double life sentence, insisting that he is innocent. Most surprisingly, the series of murders ceased after his capture.
BUT THERE IS NO REDUCTIVE CLOSURE BECAUSE A NUMBER OF DISTURBING CIRCUMSTANCES DOES NOT MAKE IT POSSIBLE TO SAY AGAIN THAT THE MURDERER IS.
Williams is a short, physical man who is hard to imagine how he treated his adult victims. Unlike most serial killers, he grew up in a loving family, the teacher’s parents never mistreated or neglected him. It also differs from most serial killers in that it is black. The most widespread theory is that Williams did not kill alone, or that he was not the only one killed in the area at the time. Other theories suggest that members of the racist Ku-Klux-Klan killed blacks, but authorities were more comfortable spreading the killings in Williams because if the clan turns out to be behind them, racial unrest will break out in Atlanta.
Photo: Bettmann / Getty Images Hungary
The disappearances in Atlanta present all the theories and even several alternative suspects. Compared to the forty years that have passed since the murders, surprisingly many of the key players in the story are alive, the police officers leading the investigation, the parents of the children, family members and important figures in the city are talking. Although the documentary series seeks to be very balanced and objective, it cannot be kept quiet because most speakers do not believe in Williams’ innocence. However, they also have doubts about the thoroughness of the investigation.
However, the disappearances in Atlanta are not only interested in the mystery. Its great virtue is that it does not forget what it means in the life of a city when dozens of children disappear. What incurable wounds have been created that are only deepened by the lack of a reassuring conclusion to the case. Mothers, brothers, friends speak. They are just the people who, even now, live with this story every day. An aunt who to this day cannot forgive herself for leaving her nephew outside in front of the store while she was shopping as a child. And that the boy was probably slapped by the killer during that time.
In addition to personal tragedies, the film also represents the social background, Atlanta, the “Black Mecca” in the early 1980s. In a city that proclaimed to itself that everyone here is equal, here blacks have as many possibilities for prosperity as whites. Where they were among the first to elect a black mayor, where there were four black universities where being black did not mean being poor. But where, however, many poor blacks also lived, and the victims had just come out of them.
“The last chapter in this story is not yet written,” writes an American critic of the series. Not only because who or who killed the children has not been established one hundred percent, but because the threads of the tragedy still weave the lives of so many people to this day.
(Cover image: Police plaque on victims – Bettmann / Getty Images)
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