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Jeffrey Dahmer a part of small subcategory who hunted for victims from sanctuary of home
By John Seewer
and Andrew Welsh-Huggins
Associated Press
Published on Sunday, Nov 08, 2009
CLEVELAND: Authorities say Anthony Sowell lured women into his home in a busy neighborhood, killed them — most by strangulation — and scattered their remains throughout the inside and buried some in the backyard.
Such brazenness defies logic, but experts identify a narrow subcategory of serial killers who hunt from home, including former Bath Township resident Jeffrey Dahmer and the 1893 Chicago Fair killer, Dr. H.H. Holmes.
''These types are so rare that you can't make a summary estimation as to why or what went wrong or anything,'' said Robert Keppel, a national expert who investigated serial killer Ted Bundy in Washington state in the 1970s.
''There's just not a whole lot of these folks running around the world.''
Sowell's home was the perfect lair.
The house and backyard — a burial site for five victims — were shielded by an empty home to the left and the windowless brick wall of a sausage company on the right.
Any time the stench of decaying bodies blew over the street, neighbors blamed the meat processing next door.
His house stood out only because it was one of the nicest on a block dotted by homes with peeling paint and broken windows, some of them vacant.
Sowell often sat on the front steps, sipping beer out of a bottle and greeting residents passing by on their way to the corner store for alcohol, snacks and cigarettes.
Neighbors say he'd offer a few the chance to get high.
Sowell's alleged approach reflects an obvious point, said forensic psychologist N.G. Berrill: the potential role of mental illness in such unusual behavior.
''The fact that they would dirty their own nest, as it were, is peculiar to me and suggests a level of mental illness or sickness,'' said Berrill, director of the New York Center for Neuropsychology and Forensic Behavioral Science.
Image of serial killer
When people think of serial killers, they imagine predators like Bundy, who stalked women and killed them in Washington, Oregon, Utah, Idaho, Colorado and finally Florida.
Or Gary Ridgway, dubbed the Green River killer, who pleaded guilty to the deaths of 48 women, many of them found in or near Washington State's Green River.
But some of history's most notorious serial killers literally worked close to home.
Holmes, born Herman Webster Mudgett, built a ''World's Fair Hotel'' he used to lure women to their death during the 1893 World's Fair.
While Holmes confessed at one point to killing 27 people, the true number is unknown; some authorities placed it as high as 200.
In Houston, Dean Corll, Elmer Wayne Henley and David Owen Brooks killed 27 boys and young men in a torture-murder ring in Houston from 1969 to 1971. Police found a plywood ''torture board'' in Corll's home used to torment many of his victims before they were killed.
In Illinois, John Wayne Gacy, a building contractor and amateur clown, was convicted of luring 33 young men and boys to his Chicago area home for sex and strangling them between 1972 and 1978. Most were buried in a crawl space under the home; four others were dumped in rivers. Gacy was executed in 1994.
In Milwaukee, Dahmer confessed to killing and dismembering 17 people from 1978. He mutilated and cannibalized some. His victims included 11 males whose remains were found in his apartment.
Dahmer was raised in Bath Township and graduated from Revere High School. He was convicted of 15 murders in Wisconsin and a 16th, his first victim, in Summit County.
Dahmer was serving a life sentence when he was killed by another inmate at a Wisconsin prison in 1994.
Category of killer
The crimes that Sowell is accused of put him in the same category as Gacy and Dahmer, said Jack Levin, a Northeastern University criminologist.
At the same time, the Cleveland murders resemble the more general portrait of a serial killer who doesn't stray far from his comfort zone.
''They never leave town. They never travel to another state. They stay close to home, where they're familiar with the victims and escape routes and dump sites,'' Levin said.
Hunting from home may have been easier because of the lives led by the Cleveland victims. Four of the Cleveland women identified so far battled addiction.
It wasn't unusual for some of them to disappear for a week or two and then return.
Naticia Duncan, who lives a few houses away from Sowell, fears that her friend, Kimberly Sharp, may be one of the victims. Sharp would often stay at Duncan's house, do her laundry and then leave when she met a new man.
''I'd see her a month later, then she'd do it again,'' Duncan said. ''Then I never saw her again.''
Police remain at Sowell's house, but investigators say they have no immediate plans to search for more remains.
Sowell, 50, was in jail Saturday in lieu of a $5 million bond on charges of rape and aggravated murder.
Police released the identities of three more victims Saturday. Four others are still unknown. The latest are Amelda Hunter, 47, Crystal Dozier, 38, and Michelle Mason, 45, all of Cleveland.
CLEVELAND: Authorities say Anthony Sowell lured women into his home in a busy neighborhood, killed them — most by strangulation — and scattered their remains throughout the inside and buried some in the backyard.
Such brazenness defies logic, but experts identify a narrow subcategory of serial killers who hunt from home, including former Bath Township resident Jeffrey Dahmer and the 1893 Chicago Fair killer, Dr. H.H. Holmes.
''These types are so rare that you can't make a summary estimation as to why or what went wrong or anything,'' said Robert Keppel, a national expert who investigated serial killer Ted Bundy in Washington state in the 1970s.
''There's just not a whole lot of these folks running around the world.''
Sowell's home was the perfect lair.
The house and backyard — a burial site for five victims — were shielded by an empty home to the left and the windowless brick wall of a sausage company on the right.
Any time the stench of decaying bodies blew over the street, neighbors blamed the meat processing next door.
His house stood out only because it was one of the nicest on a block dotted by homes with peeling paint and broken windows, some of them vacant.
Sowell often sat on the front steps, sipping beer out of a bottle and greeting residents passing by on their way to the corner store for alcohol, snacks and cigarettes.
Neighbors say he'd offer a few the chance to get high.
Sowell's alleged approach reflects an obvious point, said forensic psychologist N.G. Berrill: the potential role of mental illness in such unusual behavior.
''The fact that they would dirty their own nest, as it were, is peculiar to me and suggests a level of mental illness or sickness,'' said Berrill, director of the New York Center for Neuropsychology and Forensic Behavioral Science.
Image of serial killer
When people think of serial killers, they imagine predators like Bundy, who stalked women and killed them in Washington, Oregon, Utah, Idaho, Colorado and finally Florida.
Or Gary Ridgway, dubbed the Green River killer, who pleaded guilty to the deaths of 48 women, many of them found in or near Washington State's Green River.
But some of history's most notorious serial killers literally worked close to home.
Holmes, born Herman Webster Mudgett, built a ''World's Fair Hotel'' he used to lure women to their death during the 1893 World's Fair.
While Holmes confessed at one point to killing 27 people, the true number is unknown; some authorities placed it as high as 200.
In Houston, Dean Corll, Elmer Wayne Henley and David Owen Brooks killed 27 boys and young men in a torture-murder ring in Houston from 1969 to 1971. Police found a plywood ''torture board'' in Corll's home used to torment many of his victims before they were killed.
In Illinois, John Wayne Gacy, a building contractor and amateur clown, was convicted of luring 33 young men and boys to his Chicago area home for sex and strangling them between 1972 and 1978. Most were buried in a crawl space under the home; four others were dumped in rivers. Gacy was executed in 1994.
In Milwaukee, Dahmer confessed to killing and dismembering 17 people from 1978. He mutilated and cannibalized some. His victims included 11 males whose remains were found in his apartment.
Dahmer was raised in Bath Township and graduated from Revere High School. He was convicted of 15 murders in Wisconsin and a 16th, his first victim, in Summit County.
Dahmer was serving a life sentence when he was killed by another inmate at a Wisconsin prison in 1994.
Category of killer
The crimes that Sowell is accused of put him in the same category as Gacy and Dahmer, said Jack Levin, a Northeastern University criminologist.
At the same time, the Cleveland murders resemble the more general portrait of a serial killer who doesn't stray far from his comfort zone.
''They never leave town. They never travel to another state. They stay close to home, where they're familiar with the victims and escape routes and dump sites,'' Levin said.
Hunting from home may have been easier because of the lives led by the Cleveland victims. Four of the Cleveland women identified so far battled addiction.
It wasn't unusual for some of them to disappear for a week or two and then return.
Naticia Duncan, who lives a few houses away from Sowell, fears that her friend, Kimberly Sharp, may be one of the victims. Sharp would often stay at Duncan's house, do her laundry and then leave when she met a new man.
''I'd see her a month later, then she'd do it again,'' Duncan said. ''Then I never saw her again.''
Police remain at Sowell's house, but investigators say they have no immediate plans to search for more remains.
Sowell, 50, was in jail Saturday in lieu of a $5 million bond on charges of rape and aggravated murder.
Police released the identities of three more victims Saturday. Four others are still unknown. The latest are Amelda Hunter, 47, Crystal Dozier, 38, and Michelle Mason, 45, all of Cleveland.
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