Originally posted Tuesday, February 26, 2019 by RODNEY HO/rho@ajc.com on his AJC Radio & TV Talk blog
Twenty years ago today, then Fox 5 reporter Angeline Correa (now Hartmann) drove to a South DeKalb County cemetery after the skeletal remains of an unidentified young boy were found.
It was a wooded area near a small church cemetery off Clifton Springs Road.
Who was this boy? He had been dead for several months, the cops said. He was black, between the ages of 5 and 8. He appeared well cared for and well dressed before he died. Early reconstructions of what he might have looked like bore no fruit. Nor did her multiple news reports.
Nobody came forward who knew who the little John Doe was. The investigators were unable to connect a reported missing child with this particular one. Even after Hartmann left Fox 5 in 2005 and worked with “America’s Most Wanted,” she kept publicizing the case.
In an interview today, Hartmann said the case continues to haunt her. She is now the director of broadcast and digital media for the National Center of Missing & Exploited Children in Alexandria.
“His shoelaces were double knotted,” she said. “He was wearing Timberland boots that were introduced the year before. There were no signs of neglect. In fact, there were signs of love.”
Paloma Galzi, a forensic imaging specialist for the center, created a new reconstruction of the boy's face using his skull that is far more realistic than what had been done before.
“I just believe somebody out there knows this child,” Hartmann said. “It just hasn’t reached the right person.”
She created a podcast called “Inside Crime with Angeline Hartmann” and is spreading a video package with the newly constructed photo throughout social media.
If you know who this child might be, call the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children at 1-800-THE-LOST.
Here is the center’s video package on the missing child:
And here’s the first episode of her “Inside Crime” podcast about the case:
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