CLEVELAND — Six decomposed bodies found at the home of a man previously convicted of attempted rape were females and all were homicide victims, the coroner’s office said Sunday.
Powell Caesar, a spokesman for Cuyahoga County Coroner Frank Miller, said at least five of the victims apparently had been strangled. Decomposition made it difficult to determine how the sixth victim died, he said. None of the victims has been identified, Caesar said. Two victims were black, but race hadn’t yet been determined for the other four bodies, he said.
Police found the first two bodies Thursday night when they went to the home of 50-year-old Anthony Sowell to arrest him on charges of rape and felonious assault, but he wasn’t there. He was arrested Saturday when officers spotted him walking down a street in his east-side neighborhood.
On Friday, police found a third body and remains that were later confirmed to be an additional three bodies. It wasn’t determined how long the bodies were at the house, but “they could have been there anywhere from weeks to months to years,” Caesar said.
People who knew Sowell didn’t think he had a job and said he often walked around his neighborhood looking for scrap metal to sell and asking for money. He spent 15 years in prison for choking and raping a 21-year-old woman who was lured to his bedroom in 1989, police said.
Online court records do not show an attorney for Sowell, and the jail staff said no information was available.
Sowell’s three-story house with neat white siding sits in a crowded inner-city neighborhood of mostly older homes, some boarded up, and small corner stores.
Ida Garrett, 72, walked to church services Sunday a block from Sowell’s home. She said the neighborhood was relieved by the arrest but worried about those missing, including one of her friends who disappeared six months ago, just after Garrett wished her a happy 43rd birthday.
The friend, Nancy Cobbs, lived one street away from the Sowell home. She was reported missing in April, and her family told police they fear she is among the victims.
“She seemed to be a very nice, quiet girl. I’ve known her since she was a teenager,” Garrett said.
As a convicted sex offender, Sowell was required to report regularly to the sheriff’s office, which said he had complied.
The most recent visit to his home by deputies to confirm where he lived came Sept. 22, but deputies didn’t have a warrant and didn’t walk inside. Hours later, a woman told police she had been raped at the house by Sowell, whom she knew. That allegation led to Thursday’s search and the discovery of the bodies.
The home was owned by two of Sowell’s relatives, including a woman — described by neighbors as either Sowell’s stepmother or aunt — who kept up the house.
On Sunday, police urged the public for help in identifying missing people who may have been victims.
This article has been corrected in this online archive. Originally, due to incorrect information provided by the Cleveland Police
Department to The Associated Press, stories this
week about the discovery of multiple bodies in the home of a
Cleveland man misstated his prior conviction. Anthony Sowell was
convicted of attempted rape.
