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News & ArtsThursday, November 5, 2009
Crime Connecting Three Serial Killers
Posted by Charles Mudede on Thu, Nov 5, 2009 at 8:29 AM
With this section:
Cleveland, Ohio (CNN) — Authorities have identified one of 11 bodies found at a Cleveland, Ohio, home as a 52-year-old woman who had been missing for about a year.Tonia Carmichael's remains were found at the home of Anthony Sowell, but the news was no surprise to Carmichael's family members. Tonia Carmichael was last seen on November 10, 2008, police said in a statement Wednesday...
In the missing persons report, Carmichael's mother, Barbara, told police her daughter was addicted to crack and had previously disappeared for several days at a time. But she said she believed something had happened to her because she had not picked up two paychecks.
...and this section:
As police work to identify the other victims, many in Sowell's neighborhood wonder how they could have missed the signs of the violence. For some time, some in the area said they complained about a foul smell that permeated the neighborhood, turning the stomachs of residents and curtailing their outdoor activities....we can connect Anthony Sowell (Cleveland) to Gary Ridgway (Seattle) and Robert Pickton (Vancouver). What these serial killers have in common is this: One, their victims were poor or homeless women; and, two, their murders are somehow associated with an industrial/commercial complex—with Ridgway, it was Sea-Tac; with Pickton, it was a rendering plant near commercial drive; with Sowell, it's a sausage factory. Something in me also wants to connect Sowell's murders with the subprime mortgage crisis, which has its epicenter in Cleveland. Overall, crime must not be reduced to an individual and dissociated from the social and economic climate."We used to think that it was coming from out of Ray's Sausage," said one resident. "But you smell these smells, and I live right there and ... we used to come out here and oh, these smells would just be horrible."
Ray's Sausage Co. replaced a sewer line and grease traps, trying to rid the area of the stench. But the stench, of course, stayed until police found the bodies at Sowell's house adjacent to the sausage company.
1
Horrible, horrible acts of inhumanity indeed. And true that the prey were typically homeless, down and out women. But...industrial complex? Since when do airports and a meat processing have anything to do with one another? Might as well say they were linked in that they were all located near strip malls.
2
This arch, hanging symbolism that ends so many of Charles's posts is pedantic and elitist. OK, Charles...enlighten us. Industrial complexes. Why should we give a fuck? What does this shared detail offer to our greater understanding of the issue?
Or are you just kissing to be clever at the expense of the dead? Wouldn't be the firstime on that count, would it, Charles?
If you have a point to make, make it. You seem intelligent...stop being ridiculous.
Or are you just kissing to be clever at the expense of the dead? Wouldn't be the firstime on that count, would it, Charles?
If you have a point to make, make it. You seem intelligent...stop being ridiculous.
3
tenuous. ridgeway worked at a truck factory. the bodies were abandoned in the industrial peripheries, not crawlspaces or backyards.
4
Maybe you should start ignoring your instincts, Charles, unless they are also telling you to post a nice boobie photo to liven up our day. How about, "the victims were all women, and so is this scrumptious specimen. [inserted photo of someone with boobies]"
6
Overall, mixing crime stories with Marxist and post-modern claptrap has earned Charles much noteriaty and many paychecks. Charles' writing must not be dissociated with the social and economic incentives that determine it.
7
Comparing Ray's - a small corner sausage shop to Sea-Tac is a bit of a stretch.
Connecting to the subprime mortgage crisis is less of a stretch. Police have a ton of work to do searching vacant houses in the neighborhood for further victims. Also, more vacant houses = less neighbors to notice what's going on.
Connecting to the subprime mortgage crisis is less of a stretch. Police have a ton of work to do searching vacant houses in the neighborhood for further victims. Also, more vacant houses = less neighbors to notice what's going on.
8
there might be a connection charles, as you know cleveland, specially inner city cleveland was decimated during subprime mortgage crisis, to the extent that thousands of row houses were (are) abandoned all over cleveland, yes cleveland has always been a wee shit hole, but this made it worse and left plenty of abandoned houses and abandoned place where a serial killer can commit atrocious crimes and people assume smells are just part of a decaying city or a decaying sausage factory. For all practical purposes cleveland is a dead city where a lot of the abandoned houses are owned by europeans who snatched them up for 8 grand. So there is a colonialist connection there too. that’s the best i can do I reckon.
9
or like lester in the Wire said when he found all the dead bodies that marlo left in b-more's abandoned houses, "les is in there, this is a tomb"
10
just as long as they don't connect the sausages in said sausage factory to the serial killer...
Now I don't only feel for the victims and the families but i can't help but feel for Ray's, too. Horrible PR.
Now I don't only feel for the victims and the families but i can't help but feel for Ray's, too. Horrible PR.
12
i would imagine ray's sausages are going to be at a considerable discount during next year's cleveland indians games.
13
"the subprime mortgage crisis, which has its epicenter in Cleveland"
If people haven't read it, this NYT article about the Cleveland housing situation is worth a read:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/08/magazi…
An excerpt:
"But while there he noticed with alarm what looked like a prone body in the yard next door. As he moved closer, he realized he was looking at an elderly woman who had just one leg, lying on the ground. She was leaning on one arm and, with the other, was whacking at weeds with a hatchet and stuffing the clippings into a cardboard box for garbage pickup. “Talk about fortitude,” he told me. In a place like Cleveland, hope comes in small morsels."
If people haven't read it, this NYT article about the Cleveland housing situation is worth a read:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/08/magazi…
An excerpt:
"But while there he noticed with alarm what looked like a prone body in the yard next door. As he moved closer, he realized he was looking at an elderly woman who had just one leg, lying on the ground. She was leaning on one arm and, with the other, was whacking at weeds with a hatchet and stuffing the clippings into a cardboard box for garbage pickup. “Talk about fortitude,” he told me. In a place like Cleveland, hope comes in small morsels."
16
Exactly how does one confuse the smell of sausage making with the smell of decaying human flesh?? Is it that similiar of a smell?
17
And possibly squatters in those abandoned houses. I wonder if that's where/how Sowell found some of his victims.
Also, more vacant houses = less neighbors to notice what's going on.
And possibly squatters in those abandoned houses. I wonder if that's where/how Sowell found some of his victims.
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