Cleveland clergy urge families of missing people to give DNA, help coroners ID more victims

Clergy urge Ohio families of missing to give DNA

CLEVELAND — Pastors urged the families of missing people Thursday to provide DNA samples that could help the coroner’s office identify the remains of 10 people found in a home, and they claimed nearly two dozen others are still missing in the community.

About two dozen clergy rallied at Providence Baptist Church, declaring the justice system broken and saying 22 other missing people, men and women, have yet to be found. Of the bodies found at the home of 50-year-old Anthony Sowell, only one victim has been identified so far — 52-year-old Tonia Carmichael of Warrensville Heights.

“There have been 11 bodies found on Imperial Avenue, but where are the other victims?” said Pastor Eugene Ward.

Police have recovered 10 bodies and a skull from Sowell’s Imperial Avenue property. Sowell, a registered sex offender who moved back to his family’s house in 2005 after serving 15 years in prison for attempted rape, is being held without bond on five counts of aggravated murder.

Near Sowell’s home, a memorial materialized. Someone had hung a sheet of plywood painted white on a chain link fence, with the word MISSING stenciled in black. Five stuffed animals and an artificial rose adorned the sign, which now holds flyers showing 13 women and three men. Most of the missing are black, but a few are white or Hispanic.

A large black-and-white police van arrived at the scene just before noon, and police prepared to re-enter the house to search for more evidence, and possibly more bodies. Officers extended the line of yellow caution tape to keep spectators, mainly media, out of the way.

At the prayer rally, Councilman Zach Reed, who helped organize the event, assumed responsibility for his office’s role in the disappearances of so many people, admitting it did not properly deal with complaints of foul odors.

“This is not about finger-pointing. This is not about blame,” Reed said. “In my opinion, the system is broken.”

Reed also said he wants people to stop stereotyping the victims.

“I want us to stop this conversation that they were crackheads, they were this and that,” he said. “They were people.”

About 50 people were in the crowd, including representatives of funeral homes who said they would try to assist victims’ families, and Police Chief Michael McGrath, who did not address the group.

“We come to offer hope in a hopeless situation,” said Pastor C.J. Matthews. “We’re upset, we’re angry, and we’re willing to do something about this.”

After the rally, McGrath said police searched their missing persons database a few days ago and found 14 missing black women between the ages of 25 and 60 in that neighborhood. Investigators are currently cross-referencing those missing women with the remains at coroner’s office, he said. Some of the cases date back several years.

The police chief said he had no idea if investigators will find more bodies.

Stanley Miller, executive director of the NAACP in Cleveland, said people concerned about turning over their DNA to authorities might be reassured by the coroner’s offer to use the DNA only for the purpose of identifying victims.

“People are very reluctant because they don’t trust the establishment,” he said. “They don’t trust the police, and they are not very apt to give up something like DNA that can match you to anyone, anytime forever. That’s an issue.”

Powell Caesar, spokesman for the coroner’s office, said no one should be alarmed about providing DNA, a painless process that involves swabbing the inside of a person’s cheek . The program is voluntary, and samples from a mother or a child of a missing person are most helpful in matching genetic markers.

“We do not use this for any purposes other than identification purposes. We don’t turn this over to anybody,” he said.

For those who still don’t want to provide samples, he recommends they supply dental records, which are just as helpful. Relatives of missing women, in particular, can provide the coroner’s office with the names of dentists who may have treated their loved ones, he said.

Assistant Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Brian Murphy, meanwhile, has called Sowell “an incredibly dangerous threat to the public” and said he could face the death penalty if convicted of the aggravated murder counts. Sowell also faces charges of rape, felonious assault and kidnapping after a Sept. 22 attack on a woman at his home.

Another woman, who said Sowell attacked her on the street and dragged her into the home in December, told Cleveland television stations she would never forget the look in his eyes.

“It was like the devil, eyes glowing,” Gladys Wade said in an interview on WKYC-TV. “He was demonic or something. You could see the demons in him.”

Wade said she fought back as Sowell,” kept twisting my neck, twisting it, twisting it. And I was gouging his face at the same time. I was trying to take his eyeballs out.”

It was unclear whether Wade had filed a formal complaint about the alleged attack. McGrath referred questions about other victims who have come forward to a department spokesman. A listed telephone number could not immediately be found for Wade.

Associated Press writers Tom Sheeran and Vicki Smith contributed to this report.