of brown shorts. he got to the store. he bought the snuff. he started back home. less than half a block from this store, yusef bell stepped off this curb and vanished. and nobody saw anybody do anything or anything. but they did see him come back across the street. and that s the last that we saw him. camille bell called the police. they came and said they d write a report. that s all. days went by. camille waited with two older children and yusef s 3-year-old sister. and so she is terrified. if he can go to the store and they can steal him, then she doesn t want to leave the house. she doesn t want to do anything. camille hid her own fear from her children. and you ve got to hold them
children were dying on the streets of atlanta in the daytime. among them, jefferey mathis, only 10. like yusef bell, he walked down the street on an errand to this gas station to buy cigarettes for his mother. she never saw him again. what we had here was a predator. and what he was looking for was somebody who was cut off from the herd. and if you don t realize you re in trouble until you re in trouble, then you have no way of getting out. it would be another year before jefferey mathis body was found in the woods, miles from his home. his mother would join camille bell in forming a committee to confront the city s leaders. the reaction of the police was that we were overreacting and that there was no serial
years ago. the prosecutor. obviously guilty. the defense attorney. not proven. one way or the other. the fbi agent in charge. guilty of two double homicide. sheila baltazar. he could have killed all of them. the supreme court justice. not proven. the witness. guilty. camille bell. innocent but stupid. that first task force detective. no maybes, ifs. guilty. the right man for those homicides is in jail. the original audience verdict, guilty. 69%. innocent 4%. not proven either way, 27%.
in the spring of 1980, no one wanted to believe a serial killer was loose in the city, even when bob buffington spotted a disturbing pattern. there had been a sharp increase in the number of children under the age of 14 who had been killed. when he told his boss at homicide, the major threatened to transfer him. and i truly think that they were afraid that there would be a panic. it was this mother, after the loss of her 9-year-old son, who finally forced police to listen, but not until almost a year after her boy died. camille bell and her children lived in these project apartments. poor to the eye, but rich in mind and spirit. yusef bell was an honor student in the gifted program at school. on a warm october sunday in 1979 he walked away on an errand to buy snuff for an elderly lady downstairs. he went barefooted in a pair
the result in layman s terms, he passed. he wasn t involved in killing jones. only days after wayne williams was convicted of killing two adults, atlanta s police commissioner closed the books on 21 other murder victims, declaring they too were killed by williams. most were children. among them, clifford jones and yusef bell. but without trials, the mothers were left without a verdict, one way or the other, in the deaths of all of the children. camille bell. even if it takes 30 trials, i don t care. you know, prove it. the prosecutor s answer, it would serve no purpose. you can only serve one life sentence. just ahead a new alibi that backfires. he was out that night, no question in my mind. he was not at home. he was out and about. and after all these years, new dna evidence. it probably would exclude 98%