CLEVELAND
The man who lived in the house of rotting corpses never gave people a reason to wonder what he was really doing behind closed doors.
Anthony Sowell was the guy who liked to sit on his front steps drinking King Cobra Malt Liquor for $1.50 a bottle, sometimes in the company of a woman. He was the guy who hung around the corner convenience store bumming change off his neighbors. He was the guy who scrounged around sidewalks and backyards for empty cans and scrap metal to sell.
The suspected serial killer seemed so harmless that when he invited neighbors over for a barbecue in his driveway, they came. So benign that when he beckoned women inside his house that smelled of death, they apparently went willingly.
"If it's up to the people in the neighborhood, he probably never would have got caught," said LaBaron Simpson, 52. "Because he didn't cause no problems around here."
The house where the authorities say 50-year-old Sowell lived was silent yesterday, and investigators say they have no plans to resume searching for additional remains. The ex-Marine, who served 15 years in prison for attempted rape, is being held without bail on five aggravated murder charges.
So far only four victims have been identified, including 43-year-old Nancy Cobbs of Cleveland, whose name was released yesterday. Others already identified are Tonia Carmichael, 52, of Warrensville Heights; Telacia Fortson, 31, of Cleveland; and Tishana Culver, 31, also of Cleveland.
"Nobody could imagine that this man was capable of doing what he was doing," said Fawcett Bess, the owner of Bess Chicken & Pizza, across the street from Sowell's house. "He always showed respect to you -- ‘good morning' and ‘good evening' and that kind of thing."
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