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Everything to Know About Anthony Sowell, the Serial Killer Dubbed The Cleveland Strangler
A nearby sausage business was wrongly blamed for a stench that actually came from Sowell's three-story house of horrors.
The disappearances of 11 Black women between 2007 and 2009 left the city of Cleveland, Ohio paralyzed with fear, going unsolved until one woman led authorities to the literal doorstep of a serial killer and rapist.
That man was convicted sex offender Anthony Sowell, later dubbed The Cleveland Strangler and once featured in the 2021 Oxygen special Snapped Notorious: The Cleveland Strangler. A city’s shock was only compounded when investigators discovered Sowell lived for two years with his victims’ decomposing bodies in and around his Imperial Avenue home.
Considered one of Ohio’s most heinous serial killer cases, Sowell’s two years of murder highlighted a lapse in prioritizing Black women who’d met with violence. In the case of The Cleveland Strangler, according to The Associated Press, most or all of the victims struggled with substance abuse.
Here’s what to know:
Who was the Cleveland Strangler, Anthony Sowell?
Anthony Sowell, known as The Cleveland Strangler, was a former U.S. Marine who later became responsible for the rapes and strangulation murders of 11 women.
He was born in 1959 and raised by a single mother in a working-class East Cleveland home, according to The Plain Dealer, citing a 2009 evaluation mandated by the Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court. Relatives testifying in his murder trial years later stated Sowell, plus his similarly aged nieces and nephews, suffered severe physical abuse at the hands of Sowell’s mother, including being stripped, bound, and whipped until drawing blood.
At age 11, Sowell allegedly began raping his then-10-year-old niece, per The Plain Dealer.
Once married to a fellow U.S. Marine, Sowell served in the military between 1978 and 1985, honorably discharged after climbing the ranks to sergeant. He later divorced and struggled with substance abuse and alcoholism and “acknowledged having family problems and increased aggressiveness when drinking,” according to the report.
In his late 20s, Sowell was convicted of domestic violence and charged in a separate incident (though not convicted) with burglary. But it was on July 22, 1989 — 20 years before the women’s bodies were discovered — when he lured a pregnant 21-year-old woman from a Euclid Avenue motel to his home, choking and allegedly raping his victim.
"He choked me real hard because my body started tingling," the victim told police. "I thought I was going to die."
In 1990, Sowell was sentenced to 15 years behind bars after pleading guilty to attempted rape and served his time as a model inmate. He was released from prison on June 20, 2005, and categorized as a Tier III sexual offender, according to Fox Cleveland affiliate WJW-TV. It wouldn’t be long, however, until Sowell resorted back to his violent ways.
Who were the Cleveland Strangler's victims?
Sowell murdered 11 women at his home, most of whom he lured with drugs and liquor before raping and strangling, as previously reported by Oxygen.com.
Mother-of-seven Crystal Dozier, 35, vanished in May 2007, reportedly then in the throes of crack-cocaine addiction. Despite the best efforts of her son, a U.S. Marine on leave, she wouldn’t be found until police were led to Sowell’s home two years later. According to The Plain Dealer, her remains were discovered buried near the fence in the backyard.
Loved ones said Dozier became dependent on drugs following the death of one of her children.
Relatives said 33-year-old Tishana Culver, who held a degree in cosmetology and reportedly trained as a nursing assistant, also turned to crack cocaine after her boyfriend took his own life. At some time, she lived only four houses down from her killer before vanishing in June 2008.
Three months after Culver’s disappearance, 25-year-old Leshanda Long — a mother of three and Sowell’s youngest victim — disappeared, though a missing person’s report was never filed. According to CBS News, her skull was uncovered in Sowell’s basement, though the rest of her remains were never found.
Weeks later, on or around October 4, 2008, 45-year-old Michelle Mason disappeared. As previously reported, Mason lived with HIV and heroin addiction, but after a shooting, she turned her life around, working with an AIDS outreach program and devoting her life to her children.
On December 8, 2008, the mother of 52-year-old Tonia Carmichael — the first victim to be identified from Sowell’s House of Horrors — reported her missing, per the Fox affiliate. Carmichael, too, struggled with substance abuse, though her week-long absence was suspicious to those who knew her best, according to The Plain Dealer.
Forensic scientist Kristopher Kern would testify years later that Carmichael was strangled to death with a telephone charger, according to Reuters.
Forty-four-year-old Kim Yvette Smith was her ailing father’s sole caretaker before disappearing in January 2009.
Amelda “Amy” Hunter, 47, was an avid reader raised in Chicago. Family members told reporters that she became pregnant by one of her teachers at age 14, giving birth to a deaf child with cerebral palsy, according to The Plain Dealer. Like the other victims, Hunter became dependent on crack cocaine.
Nancy Cobbs, a 44-year-old grandmother, disappeared in April 2009, according to the Ohio outlet. Relatives were said to have “kicked in doors of abandoned houses” to find Cobbs, though her body wasn’t found until the others were in 2009. She’d been wrapped in six different plastic bags when brought in for a postmortem examination and strangled with a shoelace, Kern testified.
Telacia Fortson, 31, was raised as a foster child and frequently ran away from home before falling into the traps of cocaine addiction. She, Culver, and Hunter were not reported missing until after authorities began finding bodies on Sowell’s property, per The Plain Dealer.
Janice Webb, 48, was last seen on June 3, 2009, at her boyfriend’s Lakewood, Ohio, home, just outside Cleveland.
Diane Turner, 38, struggled with addiction, especially when dealing with the pain of losing her six children to the state, according to The Plain Dealer. She was the last of Sowell’s victims to disappear in September 2009, the same month Sowell attacked Latundra Billups, 37, according to the Fox Cleveland affiliate.
Billups — who narrowly survived — said she went to the residence to smoke crack with Sowell and asked him if there was any veracity to a rumor that he attacked other local women, according to Reuters.
“He hit me, and he hit me hard,” Billups later testified, claiming that he raped her and used an extension cord to strangle her. Billups said she lost consciousness and that Sowell looked “surprised” when she came to.
Billups reported the incident to police, but not before Shawn Morris — who appeared on Snapped: Notorious narrowly escaped Sowell via an upper-story window, as previously reported by Oxygen.com.
Gladys Wade-Thomas was another one of Sowell’s survivors featured on Snapped: Notorious.
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About Anthony Sowell’s Cleveland House of Horrors
For years, locals complained about the foul odor emanating from Sowell’s residence at the corner of Imperial Avenue and East 123rd Street. However, the blame fell on Ray’s Sausage, a family-owned business next door to where the bodies were concealed.
The stench was so offensive that city officials ordered the company to make repairs to the tune of $30,000, including on the sewage and ventilation systems.
“We used a lot of bleach,” said proprietor Renee Cash in the Snapped episode. “We used so much bleach, we could have made a commercial.”
On Oct. 29, 2009, following up on Billups’ claims, authorities descended onto Sowell’s home, initially finding two bodies. The next day, another two victims were discovered in the crawlspace and another in the basement.
Sowell was arrested two days later on Halloween, and investigators eventually located all 11 victims on the property. The women were found in garbage bags and sheets, naked from the waist down, and strangled with everyday household items, according to CBS News.
The home was demolished in 2011, as reported by The Columbus Dispatch.
"It will definitely give the families some added closure," Frances Webb-Speed, the sister of victim Janice Webb, told The Plain Dealer at the time. "A lot of the families still live in the neighborhood, and it will be good for it to be gone. The place is an eyesore, and some people have tried to use things from the home for personal gain."
A memorial garden was unveiled at the property on November 6, 2021, with loved ones in attendance, as reported by CBS affiliate WOIO.
Where is Anthony Sowell now?
Sowell was charged with 11 counts of murder and 74 other counts including rape, attempted murder, tampering with evidence, and abuse of a corpse, as covered in Snapped: Notorious. The defendant initially pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, but then changed his plea to not guilty.
A jury convicted him in 2011, he was sentenced to death.
On Jan. 21. 2021, while on death row, Sowell was admitted to an end-of-life unit at a Columbus prison, succumbing to terminal illness on February 8, 2021, according to NBC News. He was 61 years old.
Officials didn’t specify which terminal illness Sowell had, though they clarified his death was unrelated to COVID-19.
Authorities continue to investigate the possibility that Sowell was involved in more unsolved homicides in and around Cleveland.
