The body of a gay Atlanta man who had been missing since Jan. 3 was pulled Jan. 20 from the Chattahoochee River, according to the Fulton County Medical Examiner’s Office.

Ka Kee “Keith” Cheung, 32, was last seen on Christmas Day, according to relatives.

Cheung’s family reported him missing to the Atlanta Police Department on Jan. 3. — the day one of his sisters, Polly Cheung, received a package from her brother.

“It was postmarked Dec. 31,” said Alicia Cheung, another sister. “It contained his cell phone, keys and a suicide note telling us where to find his car. He said he was going to jump off the Chattahoochee bridge.”

“He spent the entire day [Christmas] with us,” she said. “We could tell he was low but he interacted with us and the children.”

Soon after he was reported missing, Cheung’s car was found on Roswell Road, not far from the bridge over the Chattahoochee River, leading the Parks Service and Cobb County Police to search the area.

Alicia Cheung said her brother had been struggling with depression for three months.

“He was taking medication but didn’t like the way it made him feel and he wasn’t sleeping,” she said. “He told me that on Christmas Day.”

Patrick Flaherty, who dated Cheung for two and a half years until last June, said Cheung had been off and on anti-depressant medications.

“I had lunch with him on Dec. 20 and he told me he had taken a leave of absence from work to deal with his depression,” Flaherty said.

“He had been talking about moving in with his parents, which would explain why his apartment was packed,” he said. “However, this is not the first time he has disappeared. Once before he said he would kill himself and disappeared. Paramedics found him 24 hours later in a rental car by the airport — he had taken an overdose.”

Political activism

Cheung was born in Hong Kong and moved with his family to Atlanta at the age of four. The youngest of seven children, he graduated from Greater Atlanta Christian School in 1991. He attended Charleston College before graduating from Devry with a degree in telecommunications. Cheung worked for a local wireless phone company.

Two years ago, Cheung became involved in the state legislative campaign of Alex Wan, an Asian gay man running for the District 57 House seat. In a letter to the editor that appeared in Southern Voice on July 2, 2004, Cheung said his father was excited about seeing the first Asian-American elected to Georgia’s legislature.

Cheung said in the letter that while his family accepted his sexual orientation, it was never discussed. When Cheung told his father that Wan was gay, there was a moment of silence. Then Cheung said his father remarked it didn’t matter.

“He was the best man for the job, and it didn’t change how he felt about him, just like it doesn’t mater that I was gay and that he loved me nonetheless,” Cheung wrote.

Wan later lost the election to incumbent Pat Gardner.

Cheung also volunteered for the Atlanta chapter of the Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest gay political group.