A task force built from Fulton County prosecutors and South Fulton police has cracked six of the 26 unsolved murders it set out to review at the start of 2026, identifying eight suspects now pending court action while roughly 20 cases remain unresolved. Among the families still waiting is that of Nakia Davis, a father and local musician ambushed and shot three times at a Shell gas station on Cascade Road during a suspected robbery attempt on May 1, 2025. He died two weeks later.
Fulton County Chief Deputy District Attorney Chris Sperry said the task force began digging into the 26 South Fulton homicides early this year, all of them occurring between June 3, 2021, and October 16, 2025, according to WSB-TV. The station reports that six of those cases have now been solved, with eight suspects identified and awaiting court action, while roughly 16 remain under active investigation.
A Mother Still Waiting for Answers
Davis's mother, Casonda Harp, told the station her son was a good father who was taken away from his son. South Fulton Police Lt. Nikkita Moss said the attackers took advantage of Davis, who had stopped at the gas station after leaving a recording studio, per the station's report. Police believe three attackers fled in an Audi that was later reported stolen, with a fourth man behind the wheel.
Davis's killing sits alongside other cold cases the task force has revisited, including the 2023 shooting death of photographer Bryan Brown. Brown, 43, was found shot to death inside his car outside a Wells Fargo on Old Bill Cook Road on Feb. 10, 2023, after leaving his East Point photography studio in disarray, with his phone stolen, according to 11Alive. Investigators believe three attackers were involved in a suspected robbery attempt, and surveillance video released in January showed a man believed to be Brown's killer fleeing on foot.
Why the Task Force Exists
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis pushed for the task force approach to unsolved South Fulton homicides, per the station's account. Willis spent 16 years as a Fulton County prosecutor before taking office as DA in 2021, including stints in the office's Major Case and Cold Case Divisions between 2004 and 2012, according to KPBS. She has said she plans to expand the task force model to another Fulton County municipality if the South Fulton effort proves successful.
Dr. Cedric Alexander, South Fulton's interim managing director of public safety, called supporting the task force concept an easy decision. Alexander was appointed to the interim role in August 2025, bringing more than 40 years of law enforcement experience, including a stint as DeKalb County public safety director and a seat on the 2014 President's Task Force on 21st Century Policing, per the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. South Fulton has run its own municipal police department since March 2018, after taking over local law enforcement duties from Fulton County Police following the city's 2017 incorporation.
Not Every Case Ends in Charges
Two of the 26 cases reviewed were determined to be justified shootings, meaning no criminal charges will follow, according to the task force's findings relayed by WSB-TV. That outcome mirrors a case Hoodline previously covered, in which the Fulton County DA cleared an officer in an August 2024 South Fulton shooting after concluding the shooter acted in self-defense under Georgia law.
Fulton County Chief Deputy District Attorney Adriane Love said one of the most rewarding parts of the project has been speaking with families who did not know their loved ones' cases were being reinvestigated. The task force's work follows Georgia's 2023 Coleman-Baker Act, which gives designated family members of homicide victims a formal process to request that law enforcement agencies review and reinvestigate cold cases at least three years old, according to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.
A City Still Grappling With Violence
South Fulton, home to 110,471 residents in 2024, recorded 25 murders that same year, according to OpenCrime data. The task force's caseload reflects a backlog that built up as the city, Fulton County's second-largest by population and area, established its own police force and worked to keep pace with violent crime.
The task force's recent record includes an April arrest of two men on murder charges in the October 2025 shooting death of 46-year-old Lyles Olumuyiwa inside a South Fulton restaurant, a case Hoodline previously reported was cracked with surveillance video and community tips six months after the shooting. Atlanta Crime Stoppers continues to offer cash rewards between $2,000 and $5,000 for anonymous tips leading to arrests in unsolved South Fulton homicides, a tool authorities frequently lean on when physical evidence is thin. For families like Harp's, that tip line remains one of the few paths left toward an arrest in a case that has already stretched well past a year.
