Mass murder probe may have ties to North Carolina

Multiple news outlets have reported that accused serial killer Anthony Edward Sowell may have spent time in eastern North Carolina in the 1980s while serving in the U.S. Marine Corps.

Sowell, 50, is charged with five murders in Cleveland, Ohio after police found the remains of ten or more people in and around his home last Thursday, Friday and yesterday.

Police went to the residence looking for Sowell, who had warrants for rape, kidnapping and felonious assault when the first decomposing bodies were found.

Sowell, a Cleveland native, was later arrested on Halloween blocks from his residence.

According to Rick Hepp, a producer working on the story for WKYC, an NBC television affiliate in Cleveland, Sowell was in the Marine Corps from 1978 to 1985. Hepp said by phone Wednesday that a Nexus Lexus inquiry indicated that Sowell had been in both Craven and Carteret counties in the middle 1980s.

Hepp said that Sowell had been ticketed here after being caught driving on a suspended license.

The U.S. Marine Corps in Quantico, Virginia refused to confirm whether or not Sowell had been attached to MCAS Cherry Point or any other Marine Corps installation here. Details of service personnel records are not available to the public because of the Privacy Act.

One unconfirmed report from Ohio indicated that Sowell had served in North Carolina, Okinawa, Japan and in California.

The arrest of Sowell came after a Cleveland Police Department SWAT team discovered two decomposing bodies in the third story of the man’s Imperial Avenue home.

Three more bodies were found inside the home after a search and a sixth was found outside.

Police returned Tuesday with a backhoe and uncovered four more bodies buried outside, according to Cleveland Police Chief Michael McGrath, who delivered a news conference on Tuesday afternoon following the discoveries.

“The dig continues. The dig continues. We’re not finished,” McGrath said.

Authorities also discovered a human skull in a paper bag in a bucket in the basement of the building, McGrath said.

Local neighbors had complained for years about a mysterious stench near the home.

McGrath said Sowell was discharged from the Ohio penitentiary in the summer of 2005 after having served 15 years for a 1989 rape conviction.

“When this gentleman was discharged from the penitentiary he was labeled as a sexual predator,” McGrath said.

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

At least six females are among the bodies and a medical examiner has said that five of them were strangled, McGrath said.

Police have been searching unoccupied homes around the Sowell house but had not found any more remains, McGrath said.

Investigators spent Wednesday tearing out walls in the Sowell home.

“We’re going to look at the walls, ceilings, whatever until we are convinced there is nothing else there,” McGrath said. “I would like to believe that there’s nothing else there.”

None of the apparent victims has been identified and McGrath said DNA testing would be necessary.

Asked if the investigation included time Sowell spent in the military, McGrath said not at this point. “When he was discharged in the summer of 2005 he was discharged to the Imperial Avenue address. Right now we’re focusing on the Imperial Avenue address. As we receive additional intelligence on his whereabouts and where he may have been, then we will continue our investigations at those locations.”

“We have not had any official requests come here for anything from law enforcement or media regarding this,” said Havelock Police Chief G. Wayne Cyrus.

Cyrus said he had been in contact with at least one former Havelock Police officer to see if there were any unsolved cases during the timeframe when Sowell may have been in the area.

“We’ve seen about it on the news but haven’t been contacted by anyone about it,” said Capt. Joe Heckman of the Craven County Sheriff’s Office.

The Carteret County Sheriff’s Office could not be reached for comment Wednesday.