CLEVELAND, Nov. 4, 2009
Body Count Hits 10 at Ohio Man's House
Anthony Sowell Charged with 5 Murders, Police Unearth 4 More Bodies in His Yard, Skull in Basement
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This Nov. 1, 2009 photo provided by the Cleveland Police Department shows Anthony Sowell, 50, who Cleveland Police arrested, Oct. 31 on a rape and felonious assault warrant. (AP Photo/Cleveland Police)
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A Cuyahoga County coroner van leaves the home of Anthony Sowell (inset) on the east side of Cleveland, Oct. 30, 2009 carrying a victim discovered in the house. Police who went to a home looking for a rape suspect found decomposing bodies upstairs and what appeared to be a freshly dug grave in the basement. Police later arrested Sowell, a convicted sex offender, and say as many as six bodies may be at his house. (AP/John Kuntz, Plain Dealer; CPD)
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Photo Essay Anthony Sowell: Home of Horror Ten badly decomposed bodies were found at the Cleveland home of convicted sex offender Anthony Sowell.
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Interactive Crime Beat Statistics and specifics on crime in America.
Cleveland police stopped searching for victims for the night and planned to continue on Wednesday. They have extended their efforts to boarded-up homes in the neighborhood where residents complained for years of a stench that one even said "smelled like a dead body."
Some in the community want an investigation into why it took so long to trace the grisly source.
Crimesider: Home "Smelled Like a Dead Body" for Years
Crimesider: Identifying the Victims at Sowell's Home
PICTURES: Anthony Sowell's Home of Horror
Anthony Sowell, 50, a registered sex offender who lives in the home, was charged Tuesday with five counts of aggravated murder, as well as rape, felonious assault and kidnapping. He was to be arraigned Wednesday, police spokesman Lt. Thomas Stacho said.
"It appears that this man had an insatiable appetite that he had to fill," police Chief Michael McGrath said.
Police discovered the bodies of six women Thursday and Friday after a woman reported being raped at Sowell's home. All six were black, and five were strangled. Authorities did not provide the genders or races of the bodies found Tuesday.
Police do not know whether the skull belongs to an 11th victim, Stacho said. McGrath said the skull was found wrapped in paper bag in a bucket.
Fire department crews plan to search in the walls and ceiling of Sowell's home, McGrath said.
"I would like to believe there is nothing else there, but we won't know until we search everything," he said.
The bodies could have been there anywhere from weeks to months to years, said Powell Caesar, a spokesman for the Cuyahoga County coroner, who is attempted to identify the remains through DNA and dental records.
"I can imagine how families feel who have reported a missing person, and anxiety that they are going through," said Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson. "We want to assure them as soon as we know something they will be the first to know."
McGrath said he would not be surprised if some of the victims were never reported missing.
"I have to believe at this point all these victims voluntarily went to this residence," he said.
Detectives used cadaver dogs and digging equipment to scour the home and backyard Tuesday, looking for evidence to connect Sowell to the bodies, Stacho said.
Police turned up nothing in an initial search of a quarter-mile swath of abandoned homes near Sowell's residence, which sits in a crowded inner-city neighborhood of mostly older houses.
Investigators plan to scour another quarter-mile area Wednesday, McGrath said. He said Sowell did not have a car and would have had to take a city bus to travel.
A crowd of about 100 people milled about and chatted near the home Tuesday evening. A short while later, about 50 people joined hands and put their arms around each other in the middle of the street and prayed aloud.
"What kind of man was this?" wondered Regina Woodland, who lives about two blocks away.
"He couldn't have been human."
One of those in the crowd, Antoinnette Dudley, 29, lives a few houses away. She said she could smell a terrible odor like something was dead all summer. She said she saw Sowell only a few times, mainly drinking beer while he sat on his porch.
"I didn't think he was that sick," she said.
Sowell is a registered sex offender and is required to check in regularly at the sheriff's office. Officers didn't have the right to enter his house, but they would stop by to make sure he was there. Their most recent visit was Sept. 22, just hours before the woman reported being raped.
For the past few years, Sowell's neighbors thought the foul smell enveloping their street corner had been coming from a brick building where workers churned out sausage and head cheese.
It got so bad that the owners of Ray's Sausage replaced their sewer line and grease traps.
City Councilman Zack Reed, whose mother lives a block from the area, said he called the city health department on more than one occasion.
"What happened from there, we don't know," he said. "It was no secret that there was a foul odor. We don't want to point fingers, but clearly something could have been done differently."
Reed said he and other community leaders want an investigation into whether police and health inspectors missed signs that could have tipped them off to the bodies.
Reed said he can't imagine how police officers and sheriff's deputies could have missed the smell. His office records show that he called the health department in 2007 after a resident told him about an odor that "smelled like a dead body," he said.
Investigators said one of the six bodies found last week had been in a shallow grave in the backyard. The rest were inside the house - one in the basement, two in the third-floor living room and two in an upstairs crawl space.
EDITOR'S NOTE: The Associated Press has withdrawn reports referring to Sowell as a "convicted rapist." The AP says that Sowell was only convicted of attempted rape, according to police.
© MMIX The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Add a Comment See all 22 Comments
- By-the-way,I'm a loner,but still at age 65,I have never killed anyone
to this date.Put that in your crime profile report. - Reply to this comment
- Were their seat belts fastened?
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- "I have to believe at this point all these victims voluntarily went to this residence," he said.
"I didn't think he was that sick,"
The 2 recipes for disaster.
Don't blame the cops because the reason why it was discovered was they are serving him an arrest warrant. It is the neighborhood that is more at fault here because they are not more vigilant enough to report what they sense were not right at the Psycho's House - Reply to this comment
- He should have got a job at the sausage factory. Not the brightest bulb in the bunch!Look at his mentality and you you can imagine the mentality of his victims.You can't play withj s---t without getting it on you.
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- I don't understand, he looks like such a nice guy.
- Reply to this comment
- serial killers normally keep to themselves, a loner type that blends
in. - Reply to this comment
- Don't blame Ohio "law enforcement"... while this guy was butchering women... Ohio's "law enforcement" more dangerous outlaws to pursue... like citizens who forgot to buckle their seat belts...
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"May, 2008 - The Ohio Department of Public Safety and local police will be pushing seat-belt use this month as part of a national campaign. Seat-belt surveys conducted last year in Ohio found that the overall seat-belt usage rate was nearly identical to the rate in 2006, about 82 percent. The State Highway Patrol aims to raise that this year to 85 percent. Stepped-up law enforcement is planned for the national Click It or Ticket campaign that runs from May 19 to June 1. If a motorist is pulled over for another violation and is not using a seat belt, he or she will get a ticket in any one of Ohio's 900 police districts." - Reply to this comment
- Tragically, this points to the problems with our entire accommodating judicial system. This evil individual should have never been allowed to set foot on the street after he was convicted of his first rape. The system is responsible for all of these murders, which were preventable crimes. Criminals are allowed too much accommodation, understanding and tolerance.
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- You seem, like many neos of late, to disregard the fact that the law prescribes certain terms of incarceration for specific crimes, after which the convicted goes "free". This system of justice predates America, even the ancient Romans freed prisoners after they served the sentence given.
That the criminal commits further crimes after being freed is not a fault of the law, it is the fault of the criminal.
With your logic, if you fail a sobriety test, you should be jailed for life, to prevent your ever driving drunk, and possibly killing someone.
Small wonder neos are being kicked to the curb lately.
- You seem, like many neos of late, to disregard the fact that the law prescribes certain terms of incarceration for specific crimes, after which the convicted goes "free". This system of justice predates America, even the ancient Romans freed prisoners after they served the sentence given.
- So when does he get the check for a million dollars for the book and movie?
- Reply to this comment
- waiting for the bleeding hearts to come out and support him. bleeding hearts will want to rehab the killer, spare him the death penalty or give him a few years in prison with parole option and community service. seems everyone is making excuses for him, assigning causation and forgetting the victims. sometimes it seems that criminals, of all kinds and types, rule because we let them.
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- brianbwb-2009,
Every time you politicize a nonpolitical story, you are telling the world you are an A-list moron who can't stay on subject. - Reply to this comment
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- Perhaps you missed the post I responded to, which was a poster who bet that the murderer was a democrat.
I can understand your error, as both the original post, and my rejoinder are now not shown.
But for someone who makes assumptions without knowing the facts, you show yourself to be more of a moron than even the original poster, and quite probably a neo to boot.
- Perhaps you missed the post I responded to, which was a poster who bet that the murderer was a democrat.
I can understand your error, as both the original post, and my rejoinder are now not shown.
But for someone who makes assumptions without knowing the facts, you show yourself to be more of a moron than even the original poster, and quite probably a neo to boot.
- Perhaps you missed the post I responded to, which was a poster who bet that the murderer was a democrat.
- Wake up, communities!
This is a product of your 'no snitching' policy and your refusal to call the police when you know or suspect a crime's been committed. It's you and your community who suffers from your attitude. Many of these women might have been saved if you'd done the right thing and turned this lunatic in. - Reply to this comment
