Police refused to take missing person reports in serial killer case
Saturday, Nov. 7 2009 @ 11:26AM
UPDATE: A woman says she went to three police precincts to file a missing person's report. But she couldn't find a Cleveland cop willing to do it. See update after the jump...
Police found 11 decaying bodies in Anthony Sowell's indoor graveyard
Fawcett Bess owns Bess Chicken and Pizza, across the street from the home of Anthony Sowell. This is where police found the bodies of 11 women -- left in the attic, stuffed in crawl spaces, and buried in his backyard. This is also where Cleveland police were called to at least five times in the weeks and months leading up to the discovery. But they did almost no investigation.
Bess recalls an incident two weeks before police discovered the bodies. He found a naked Sowell standing in the bushes next to his house. On the ground was a naked woman bloodied and beaten. Bess called 911 and an ambulance took the woman away. But police didn't arrive until two hours later -- and never bothered to interview him...
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Saturday, Nov. 7 2009 @ 8:00AM
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| Joyce Crider disappeared seven years ago. Her family is offering a $20,000 reward for information leading to her whereabouts. |
It's been barely more than seven years since Joyce Crider disappeared, and investigators are still trying to determine what happened to the Lexington, Kentucky woman. So is her family.Crider was last seen at about 7:15 p.m. on October 27, 2002, when she told a friend that she was going to visit a relative who was staying at the Holiday Inn on Athens-Boonesboro Road. According to family members, no on has seen or heard from her since. The relative that she had purportedly gone to visit was her former husband, Bill Crider.
Although police have investigated her ex-husband, no arrest have been made despite the fact that police say he initially lied about when he last saw her. Bill Crider has steadfastly maintained that he had nothing to do with her disappearance...
Friday, Nov. 6 2009 @ 8:00AM
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| Calvin "Hook" McWilliams was recently picked-up for the 1992 murder of Edward Davis |
On May 22, 1992, a man knocked on the door of Davis' Detroit home while he was eating dinner with his family. The man demanded that Davis give him money. Davis refused. As Davis tried to close the door, the man reached through a tear in the screen door and shot him dead. He was 20-years-old at the time...
Thursday, Nov. 5 2009 @ 11:20AM
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| Sharon left for ballet lessons and was never seen again alive |
It was 27 years ago that 16-year-old Sharon Thor was slain after preparing to leave her home in Franklin Township, New Jersey, for one of her twice-weekly ballet lessons. When she left at 5:30 p.m. on October 26, 1982, she was never seen again alive.
Prior to leaving home that evening, Sharon received a telephone call and appeared to be pleased to hear from the caller. The conversation was brief, but it was obvious that she had wanted her privacy with the caller -- she took the corded phone as far as it would reach, to the stairway that led to the cellar, so that her parents could not hear...Wednesday, Nov. 4 2009 @ 10:00AM
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| St. Louis police say the young girl's murder is the worst they've ever seen |
But despite the nerve-numbing number of violent crimes, St. Louis investigators still can't shake the details of one particularly gruesome murder case from 1983...
Tuesday, Nov. 3 2009 @ 9:27AM
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| Jessie Foster disappeared from her expensive North Las Vegas home without a trace |
Jessie, as she preferred to be called, was born on May 27, 1984 in Calgary, Alberta, but moved with her mother to British Columbia when she was 3-years-old and attended school, grades K-11, in Kamloops before moving back to Calgary to live with her dad, where she finished school...
Monday, Nov. 2 2009 @ 11:00AM
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| He lived with his frail stepmom, making it easy to kill and hide the bodies |
Sowell made spare money scrapping for metal to sell. And since he refused to pay stepmom rent because his dad owned the house, he could use his meager earnings to drink and do dope. Neighbors say he often invited them in to party -- especially the women. Once he got them in the house, they were on his killing grounds.
His stepmom was too frail to climb stairs, so she didn't know what Anthony was doing on the third floor. But according to police, that's where he raped and killed at least six women, then strangled them before burying them in the house...
Monday, Nov. 2 2009 @ 8:00AM
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Pettem, a mother of two women who were 19 and 23 at the time, instantly felt a connection. "When I learned that she had been a murder victim and her killer not only took her life but also her identity, I became indignant that Jane Doe was buried without a name," Pettem writes on her website...
Saturday, Oct. 31 2009 @ 1:33PM
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| Faylene and Doug Grant, in obviously much happier times |
"I know I will be here with my body until it is buried," the 35-year-old mom wrote. "I have held a secret hope and desire for several weeks that I would be able to see you both married, that I could be there!" But her husband wasn't figuring on a murder rap when he followed his wife's instructions to marry his ex-lover.
Paul Rubin, a reporter at our sister paper Phoenix New Times, has been following this story for more than a year. He'll be appearing on tonight's show, but you can see his initial investigation here, as well as the many subsequent stories he's written here.
Saturday, Oct. 31 2009 @ 6:21AM
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| Five years later, the brutal slayings of Tammy Cooper and her three children remain unsolved. |
The bodies were found in the kitchen, living room and bedroom. Lt. Victor Quintano described their injuries as "violent in nature," and aside from saying that the crime scene was bloody he said that he could not comment. Lubbock Police Chief Claude Jones, however, said that the victims' injuries appeared to be a result of blunt force trauma....
