LAWRENCEVILLE, Georgia—The family of 19-year-old twins Qaadir and Naazir Lewis is demanding the release of all evidence and a full and independent investigation after the Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI) ruled the twins’ deaths a double suicide.
The twins were found dead with gunshot wounds on top of Bell Mountain in Hiawassee, Towns County, Georgia, in March (See The Final Call Vol. 44 No. 26 and 28 ). The family held a news conference on June 6 at the Gwinnett Justice and Administration Center in Lawrenceville, Gwinnett County, Georgia.
“Since the investigation began, we have sought to understand what happened that night, almost three months in, and the answers we have do not make sense at all to us. As the investigation closes, we still do not have all of the answers,” Tiger Harris, the twins’ step-uncle, read from a statement written by the twins’ father, Tyrese Lewis, and stepmother, Kaarini Lewis. “We want answers.”
The twins lived with their father and stepmother in Lawrenceville, located approximately 32 miles from Atlanta. Tyrese Lewis was seated at the news conference. Though his speech is limited due to a stroke he had in November, he voiced his thanks to attendees.
The Georgia and Gwinnett County NAACP branches, including branch presidents Attorney Gerlad Griggs and Edward Paul, respectively, stood in solidarity with the family and voiced additional demands for Georgia Governor Brian Kemp to empower independent investigators and the GBI director to walk through all of the evidence with the family.
“The GBI cannot speak out of both sides of its mouth. You can’t publicly say the case is closed, but privately say that they will not release all of the evidence to the family because they are still investigating the case. This lack of transparency is unacceptable,” Mr. Paul said.
A preliminary investigation by the GBI ruled their deaths a murder-suicide, but the agency published updated findings on May 21 of the concluded investigation.
“Based on the results of the medical examiner’s autopsy and other investigative findings, their deaths have been ruled suicide-suicide. GBI agents have met with the Lewis family to share the findings,” the press release states.
The GBI listed the investigative findings in the release as follows:
Cellular location data has established a timeline of their location from their home in Gwinnett County to Bell Mountain. In the video that corresponds to those locations, the Lewis brothers are seen alone.
Only one brother (Naazir) went to the airport on March 7, 2025. He never caught the flight and returned home. Records show Naazir is the only person that had an airline ticket.
Records show Naazir purchased ammunition used in the gun. The ammunition was delivered to his home on March 5, 2025.
Internet history from their phones showed searches for how to load a gun, suicide rates in 2024, and other related searches.
Forensic evidence showed that the Lewis brothers fired a gun.
The GBI noted that the investigation would formally close in the coming weeks and that a copy of the closed investigative file could be obtained. The Final Call submitted an open records request to the GBI concerning the investigative file on May 27 and received the following response:
“The records in this case are part of a pending investigation or prosecution. … (T)he records are not subject to disclosure until the investigation/prosecution is concluded, which includes the appeals process.”
Going through the known narrative and timeline of the twins’ last few days alive, Tiger Harris voiced several questions he and the family still have.
Naazir was planning to catch a standby flight to Boston on the morning of Saturday, March 8, the morning the twins were found dead, after missing his original flight the previous day on Friday. He was set to visit his girlfriend.
“After eating dinner and cleaning up the kitchen, their usual Friday routine, they left their subdivision at 10:17 p.m., making a quick trip to the gas station, then vanished,” Mr. Harris said. Surveillance footage released late April showed the twins at a gas station in Gwinnett County the night before they died.
“What happened after they left the gas station? Show us more videos. Since when does a 19-year-old who just spent money on a plane ticket to see his long-distance girlfriend all of a sudden choose to off himself instead of having fun with his girlfriend?” Mr. Harris questioned.
“Did they have a key to the locked gate at this unheard of mountain to non-hikers? Did they call authorities or emergency services members to unlock the gate for them? Who unlocked the gate?”
In a previous interview, Towns County Attorney Cadman Robb Kiker Jr. confirmed to The Final Call that Bell Mountain Park closes at the end of daylight and that on-road vehicular access is inhibited by a manually operated gate.
Mr. Harris also shared that the twins were “bad drivers” and they would have “driven off of a cliff if they had to drive on a curvy, windy, narrow road up a mountain in pure darkness.”
“Their lifeless bodies were positioned in a way that screamed sacrifice,” he added, expressing his views based on photos shared publicly by volunteer firefighter Scott Kerlin, who was arrested and charged with misdemeanor obstruction in March.
Atty. Griggs likened the twins’ death to the 2020 shooting death of Ahmaud Arbery by three White men in Brunswick, Georgia. Law enforcement initially believed Mr. Arbery’s death to be justified under self-defense until cell phone video footage surfaced.
“We’ve been here before, many times, in many different counties all throughout Georgia when there’s a mysterious death,” he said. “In 116 years that the NAACP has responded to lynching, we know what a lynching looks like. We know what it smells like. We know what a cover-up starts out like.”
He wants to see a video-based timeline of the Georgia Department of Transportation’s traffic cameras, from the moment the twins left the gas station to the moment they ended up on the mountain. “If it truly was a suicide, be transparent.
Release all the information. Let independent investigators determine what happened,” he said. “But if it’s a cover up, keep covering up, because the eyes of the world are on this case.”
In an updated GoFundMe message, the twins’ maternal aunt, Yasmine Brawner, echoed the call for an independent investigation. “(W)e are seeking help to hire a well notable investigator with a reputation specializing in homicide and criminal cases as well as other legal assistants,” she wrote. “We will not stop fighting until the twins get justice.”