Atlanta News First staff
Apr 18, 2025
Bail recovery agent Curtis Johnson was killed in a shooting in Stockbridge. Another person was also found dead, according to police.
ATLANTA, Ga. (Atlanta News First) - A bounty hunter and a resident were killed in a shooting at a Stockbridge apartment complex Wednesday, police confirmed Thursday evening.
At around noon, Stockbridge police responded to reports of a person shot at the Southwinds Point apartments on Evergreen Way.
Police said the initial call they received was “a report of suspicious individuals in the area who were believed to be bounty hunters attempting to serve a warrant.”
Soon afterward, 911 dispatch received multiple calls of gunfire in the area. Police then got a call that a person had been shot outside an apartment in the complex.
When they arrived, officers reportedly found two men who’d been shot to death
.
They found one man dead from a gunshot wound outside an apartment. Officers saw “multiple shell casings and a visible blood trail leading back to the apartment unit.”
Inside, officers found another man who had been shot and killed.
Police said one of the dead men was a bail recovery agent — also known as a bounty hunter — identified as 46-year-old Curtis Johnson. The other was a resident of the apartment, 30-year-old Edward Atkins.
In an online fundraiser, Johnson’s friend, Daniel Dubee, described him as an “amazing man.”
“Curtis Johnson was a great person and was a loving and caring man who would give the shirt off his back to help anyone,” Dubee wrote.
Charlie Chase, the vice president of the National Association of Bail Agents, spoke with Atlanta News First about why the bail recovery agent may have been at the apartment complex in the first place.
“Our job as bail bondsmen and bail recovery agents is to guarantee a defendant’s appearance in court,” said Chase, who has more than 20 years of experience in the bail bond business. “If we have to look for you to guarantee that experience, we will.”
“You never know what you’re going to find when you’re looking for people,” he continued. “This is a very rare situation. Bail agents return fugitives to justice nationwide every day, every night. Every once in a while, there’ll be something that doesn’t go right, as is the case with any profession.”