Quintavious Waters, 24, was shot and killed inside his home in southwest Atlanta in early December 2015. The Washington Post's homicide database, which tracked killings in Atlanta from 2007 through 2017, records his death on Tuesday, December 8, 2015, and lists it as a homicide that remained open with no arrest. The Atlanta Police Department investigated.
Waters worked as a bodyguard, and news coverage at the time described him as a member of rapper Young Thug's security team.
According to reports at the time, Waters's roommate found him just before midnight, face down in his bed with a gunshot wound to the head. Police said there were no signs of forced entry. "Whoever did this, apparently they were invited in, or they knew the subject," an officer said. Waters was not working that night. His car and his dog were missing from the home. One memorial list records his killing as December 7, 2015, which suggests the shooting may have happened late that day and been recorded the next.
Police said they had no explanation for the shooting. No suspect description, person of interest or vehicle description beyond his own missing car was released in the coverage found for this account, and no reward offer could be found. The missing car and dog were among the few concrete leads made public; whoever took them may have been seen with them afterward.
A friend, Toboris Character, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that he had warned Waters about being too friendly and letting people into his house. "And I told him, 'You can't do that in Atlanta,'" he said. "I guess he did that to someone else, to the wrong person." Some reports gave his age as 23; the Post's record lists him as 24.
Celebrity gossip coverage of his death placed it alongside unrelated stories about the music industry, including a separate shooting at Lil Wayne's tour bus earlier that year. Nothing in the available record connects that case to his killing, and police did not suggest any link.
The location recorded in the Post's database places his death in southwest Atlanta. It was a residential setting, and neighbors may have noticed visitors arriving that evening, or his car leaving the home.
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 in those years were young men, and most were killed with guns. Many of those killings never led to an arrest, and the Washington Post's 2018 investigation of unsolved homicides counted Atlanta among the cities with large numbers of them. His case still appears on SpotCrime's list of metro Atlanta cold cases and as an active murder on CrimeTea.
No arrest, criminal charge or court case connected to the death of Quintavious Waters could be found in news archives or public records. More than 10 years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. Anyone who visited Quintavious Waters that night, saw his car or dog after December 7, 2015, or heard someone talk about the shooting 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.
