More bodies at rapist's home

CLEVELAND - More remains were found yesterday at the Cleveland home of a convicted rapist, raising to 10 the number of bodies that have been found there, authorities said.

Four more bodies and a skull were found at the home, where the remains of six women were removed last week, Police Chief Michael McGrath said. Anthony Sowell, 50, who lives in the home, is in jail and was charged yesterday with five counts of aggravated murder.

"It appears that this man had an insatiable appetite that he had to fill," McGrath said.

He said the additional bodies were found buried in the backyard of the home. The skull was found in a bucket in the basement. Authorities do not know whether the skull belongs to an 11th victim.

The search was to continue today, with fire department crews planning to search in the walls of the home, McGrath said.

Last week, investigators said they found one body in a shallow grave in the backyard. The rest were inside the house - one in the basement, two in the third-floor living room, and two in an upstairs crawl space.

Police found the first six bodies Thursday and Friday, after a woman reported being raped at Sowell's home, and Sowell was also charged yesterday with rape, felonious assault, and kidnapping related to her complaint. Sowell is to be arraigned today.

The Cuyahoga County coroner is attempting to identify those women through DNA and dental records. All six were black, and five were strangled. The bodies could have been there anywhere from weeks to months to years, said Powell Caesar, a spokesman for the coroner.

Yesterday, detectives brought in cadaver dogs and digging equipment to scour the home and backyard, looking for evidence to connect Sowell to the bodies, police spokesman Thomas Stacho said.

Police turned up nothing in a search of a quarter-mile swath near Sowell's residence, and plan to scour another quarter-mile area today, McGrath said.

Sowell is a registered sex offender and required to check in regularly at the sheriff's office. Officers did not have the right to enter his house, but they would stop by to make sure he was there. Their most recent visit was Sept. 22, just hours before the woman reported being raped.

For the last few years, Sowell's neighbors thought the foul smell enveloping their street corner had been coming from a brick building where workers churned out sausage and head cheese. It got so bad that the owners of Ray's Sausage replaced their sewer line and grease traps.

Antoinnette Dudley, who lives a few houses away, said she could smell a terrible odor all summer. The discovery of more bodies surprised her. "I didn't think he was that sick," she said.