Last month, police arrested Delvin Gates, 17, and charged him with the murder of 50-year-old Joseph Livolsi, a special effects technician who worked on blockbuster movies filmed in Atlanta.

Gates' arrest raises some troubling questions, including why he wasn't in jail to begin with. Going back to 2015, Gates was known to Atlanta police as a "top, repeat juvenile offender" in southwest Atlanta. Leaders in the West End neighborhood pleaded to have him removed from their midst, claiming his serial burglaries and other property crimes were causing "havoc."

Yet, he was living in an apartment in DeKalb County this summer in the same complex where Livolsi was killed. Why?

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Flights are shown cancelled on a screen at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport domestic terminal in Atlanta on Friday, Nov. 7, 2025. Cancellations at the Atlanta airport got worse over the weekend, as about 370 flights were canceled Saturday and about another 470 more by Sunday. (Arvin Temkar/AJC)

Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com

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Passengers wait at a Delta check-in counter at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport on Friday, Nov. 7, 2025. It was the first day the Federal Aviation Administration cut flight capacity at airports during the government shutdown. (Arvin Temkar/AJC)

Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com