Cleo Hill was 20 years old when he was killed in Atlanta on Sunday, October 28, 2007. The Atlanta Police Department investigated his death, and the Washington Post's homicide database, which tracked killings in Atlanta from 2007 through 2017, lists it as a homicide that remained open with no arrest.
Beyond his name, his age and the date of his death, almost nothing about Cleo Hill has been made public.
No news story about the killing, memorial page or family fundraiser could be found for this account. He surely had family, friends and neighbors who remember who he was, but little of that has entered the public record.
Because so little has been released, even the basic circumstances remain unknown. The record does not say how he was killed, whether he was attacked indoors or on the street, whether he knew his attacker, or whether he died at the scene or later at a hospital. It does not say whether investigators ever identified a suspect.
His name makes the search especially hard. Cleo Hill was also the name of a pioneering basketball player, a first-round draft pick of the St. Louis Hawks in 1961, the franchise that later moved to Atlanta, and of his son, Cleo Hill Jr., a college basketball coach. Searches for the name are dominated by their stories and by obituaries of older men and women named Cleo Hill. None of them is the 20-year-old who died in Atlanta in October 2007.
His age stands out most. At 20, Cleo Hill was barely out of his teens, the age at which many young men are finishing high school, starting college or a first job. Classmates, teammates and friends his age, many of whom are now in their late 30s, may still remember where he was and who he was with that weekend.
His case does not appear on the 2018 Washington Post list of unsolved homicides published online, but the Post's underlying database still records it as open with no arrest. No cold-case listing, reward offer or public appeal for information about his death could be found.
The location recorded in the database places his death in south Atlanta, south of downtown, an area of residential streets, apartment complexes and commercial corridors. His death came on a Sunday at the end of October 2007, days before Halloween, when neighbors may have been home and may remember the police activity that followed.
Atlanta, the capital of Georgia and the center of a metro area of more than 5 million people, recorded roughly 75 to 130 homicides a year between 2007 and 2017. Most victims were young men killed with guns, and many of those killings never led to an arrest. Cases with few public details often faded from view quickly.
No arrest, criminal charge or court case connected to the death of Cleo Hill could be found in news archives or public records. More than 18 years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. Anyone who knew Cleo Hill, went to school with him, or heard talk afterward of what happened to him, may be able to help. Even a small detail, such as a name overheard, a car seen leaving the area or a conversation remembered, can help detectives move a case forward. Anyone with information can call the Atlanta Police Department Homicide Unit at 404-546-4235, or leave an anonymous tip with Crime Stoppers Greater Atlanta at 404-577-TIPS (404-577-8477), which may pay a cash reward for information that leads to an arrest.
