Over the span of less than three months there were five killings across south DeKalb that authorities attribute to a street gang called the Gangster Disciples.
In September, a grand jury indicted nine alleged gang members for murder and other charges. They are as young as 17, no older than 25.
The five victims of the killings lived and died in a small area of south Dekalb. In the map below, you can view the home address and place of death along with the time of killing for each of the five victims.
Tory Alston, was the first victim in the string of five. On May 13 he was at home in Stone Mountain with his girlfriend, Fabienne Pierre, when he grabbed a few dollars from the bedroom and walked outside.
"He told me someone was going to sell him a phone," Pierre says. But "a minute later," she says, she heard gunshots. She found Alston on the ground and saw a car speed away.
Alston's death started a string of homicides that stretched into the summer, authorities say.
How the killings are related is not entirely clear. Most of the victims and most of the accused killers had criminal records, but none seems to have been caught with any of the others. Three of the killings occurred within a two-mile radius, but weeks apart. Two victims had ties to South Carolina, but to different parts of the state.
If prosecutors know of links between victims and defendants, they are not yet saying.
Read more about the lives and deaths of the victims in a MyAJC special investigation: Life, death and gangs in south Dekalb. Authorities blame a string of killings on a street gang — and say most of the victims were gang members, too. But in a place where guns and drugs are abundant and violence a constant threat, gang affiliation may be beside the point.
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