Foul odor leads Ohio authorities to grisly find

Authorities responding to a report of a foul odor from a home ultimately discovered three bodies and arrested a registered sex offender who sent police and volunteers through a poor Ohio neighborhood in a search for more victims Sunday, officials said.         

East Cleveland Police Chief Ralph Spotts had cautioned searchers to be prepared to find one or two more victims. But after a daylong search that included 40 abandoned houses and other areas, no more bodies were found.              

Spotts identified the suspect as 35-year-old Michael Madison. He said Madison is expected to be formally charged Monday, but did not elaborate.                       

Mayor Gary Norton said the suspect has indicated he might have been influenced by Cleveland serial killer Anthony Sowell, who was convicted in 2011 of murdering 11 women and sentenced to death.               

It's the latest in a series of high-profile cases involving the disappearance of women from the Cleveland area.                      

The odor led to the discovery Friday of one body in a garage. Two others were found Saturday — one in a backyard and the other in the basement of a vacant house. The bodies of the three women, all wrapped in plastic bags, were found about 100 to 200 yards apart, and authorities believed the victims were killed in the last six to 10 days.                 

Searchers rummaging through vacant houses in the same neighborhood Sunday were warned by Spotts to brace themselves for the smell of rotting bodies and to look out for trash bags that might conceal a body.       

Spotts indicated later Sunday that the suspect's comments haven't provided clarity on whether more bodies might be found.          

Norton said authorities have "lots of reasons" to suspect there are more victims, but he refused to say why, adding that Madison, who was arrested Friday after a police standoff, has indicated to authorities he might have been influenced by Sowell.        

Madison was classified as a sex offender in 2002 when he was sentenced to four years in prison for attempted rape, according to Cuyahoga County court records. He had previous convictions in 2000 and 2001 for drug-related charges.        

Cuyahoga County medical examiner Dr. Thomas P. Gilson said Sunday that the bodies were in advanced stages of decomposition and that it would take several days to identify them and how they died.         

In May, three women who separately vanished a decade ago were found captive in a run-down house. Ariel Castro, a former school bus driver, has pleaded not guilty to nearly 1,000 counts of kidnap, rape and other crimes.              

In 2009, Sowell was arrested after a woman escaped from his house and said she had been raped there. Police found the mostly nude bodies of 11 women in garbage bags and plastic sheets throughout the home.        

Prosecutors described him in court papers as "the worst offender in the history of Cuyahoga County and arguably the State of Ohio."     

He was found guilty in 2011 and sentenced to death. 


AP