In the early evening of July 10, 2025, Dy'Shaun Terrell Atkins, Black male age 16, was shot inside a townhouse on the 2500 block of East 49th Street in Cleveland's Central neighborhood. Police said the unit was not rented, and officers from the Cleveland Police Third District responded just before 7 p.m. to reports of gunfire, finding two teens wounded inside; Dy'Shaun Terrell Atkins, age 16, was taken to MetroHealth Medical Center, where he died.
A second victim, a 15-year-old, survived with injuries. The setting—a vacant townhouse just off East 49th—framed the sudden violence that ended the life of Dy'Shaun Terrell Atkins, age 16, as summer light faded.
By the next day, city officials publicly identified Dy'Shaun Terrell Atkins, age 16, and sketched a brief portrait of a kid known in the neighborhood for football and for roots in Garden Valley. The confirmation came through Ward 5 Councilman Richard A. Starr and local reporters, who noted the narrow corridor of row houses where the shots rang out and the swift rush of ambulances that could not alter the outcome for Dy'Shaun Terrell Atkins, age 16. Community tributes and memorial pages began to appear online in the days that followed, while funeral notices listed his name and date of death, marking July 10, 2025, as the day his family's world changed.
Detectives from the Cleveland Division of Police Homicide Unit opened the case immediately, asking anyone with information to call investigators or report tips anonymously to Crime Stoppers. As of the most recent local reports following the shooting, police had not announced any arrests, and no suspect description had been released in connection with the killing of Dy'Shaun Terrell Atkins, age 16. The investigation remained active, with authorities continuing to seek leads from the public and to piece together what unfolded inside the unoccupied townhouse that evening.
