JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – The 17-year-old found shot to death behind a Hyde Park home earlier this month has been identified as Koby Coats.
On the night of Oct. 3, Jacksonville Fire-Rescue crews went to a home on Red Robin Drive to conduct a welfare check on a man someone reported seeing lying on the ground.
Coats was found dead, and his family believes his body was dumped behind the house. They are begging the public for information.
Coats' online obituary says he had a huge heart and loved his family more than anything, and that he will be remembered for his smile, big brown eyes and making people laugh.
“That is so young," said A.J. Jordan, outreach coordinator for the anti-violence group MAD DADS, who is helping the family in the quest for justice. “You haven’t even experienced life.”
Jordan said police also didn’t have any more information for them, and that’s why it’s so important for the community to now step up.
“We take a lot of phone calls and we talk to the families to try to keep them encouraged so we need the community just to speak up so these families don’t have to cry so much at night,” Jordan said. "I cry with them because it’s just heartbreaking to hear. Especially that mother, she just don’t know what to do. She said she can’t rest, she can’t sleep she just up walking all night. And we don’t want that. Jacksonville, step up and help these families.”
The house where Coats’s body was found is on the southern end of Hyde Park near Sweetwater.
Police have not released any suspect information.