Cold Case Files - I SURVIVED A SERIAL KILLER: The Cleveland Strangler

Episode Date: April 11, 2026

In September of 2008, Vanessa Gay met Anthony Sowell on a sidewalk in Cleveland Ohio. He invited her to share drinks and drugs at his home. She was unaware that she was walking into a house where 11 of his victims had been hidden and buried. Vanessa recounts her escape from death, as Detective Lemmy Griffin and Prosecutor Rick Bombik walk us through this murderer's capture and sentencing.This Episode is sponsored by BetterHelpAngi - Download the free Angi too today or visit Angi.comApartments.com - To find whatever you’re searching for and more visit apartments.com the place to find a place.BetterHelp - Visit BetterHelp.com/SURVIVED to get 10% off your first month!Mint - To get the new customer offer and your new 3-month premium wireless plan for just $15 a month, go to Mintmobile.com/survivedTesterUp: Download TesterUp for free now using our link https://bit.ly/411Wdaw See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This program contains subject matter that may be disturbing to some listeners. Listener discretion is advised. On August 12th, Anthony Sowell is sentenced to death for the murders of 11 women whose remains were found in and around his Imperial Avenue home. He prayed upon African-American women, down on their luck, hooked on drugs. He continued and he continued, and that's how sick he was. He's a sick individual. You choke someone with your hands.

That's all I can think. He looked me in my eyes and I never, ever seen eyes like that. They were just black holes. Police officers see bad things every day, but this is about as bad as it gets. And as I'm walking, I see sitting on the floor, what appears to be a body lit in on head. I just kept thinking, is this how I'm gonna die?

Is this how I'm gonna die? You remember what happened, right? Yeah, but it's like a draining life. Like hate, honest, I... Maybe not you have you been. Did you tell us about one of the dreams? All I know is that I'm not. Real people who faced death and lived to tell how.

This is I survived a serial killer. My name is Vanessa Gaye, and I survived a serial killer. I grew up in Cleveland, Ohio. You know, we had a pretty normal, happy life. But I met my husband, and that's where I started to use drugs. That's where cracked entry into my story. I was in my 30s when I smoked it. I began to let everybody down, including myself.

We were used to doing things as a family, so my time with them got shorter and shorter and shorter. Lemmy Griffin is retired Cleveland homicide detective. East Cleveland is a low-income section. Drugs are prevalent. When the crack cocaine hit the scene, everything changed. My life became a nightmare. One day I just left home because I didn't know how to turn my life back around. It was September 2008, and it had been a while since I had been home.

I had been home maybe a year. It was warm outside. Everybody was out and about a guy I walked past. He said, it's my birthday today. And I said, happy birthday. He said he had nobody to celebrate this birthday with him. So did I want to celebrate his birthday with him? He said he had some crack, some weed, and he had some drinks.

And we walked to his house to get high. While I walked to his house, there was no signs that the worst night of my life was about to take place. On the walk, he talked about his life in the military. He talked about his family. He didn't try and hide anything. He had much respect in the streets. People were greeting them, you know, saying, how you doing? So it didn't throw red flags.

up. I remember that when we walked to his house, there were posters of a female who had been missing everywhere. You see these posters. But I didn't think about it. And I just kept walking. Rick Bombick is a retired Coyahoga County Assistant Prosecutor. A year earlier, Chrysno Dozer disappeared around Mother's Day of 2007. The Dozer family reported Crystal missing. Being missing is not a crime. So until you have evidence that the person may have been kidnapped or some type of ill will was begotten upon them,

there's nothing you can do about it. Walking up to the house, everything was normal. But opening the door and stepping in, I felt something they right. You could just feel the thickness of dread in the the air. As we walked in, he put all the lots back on the door. It was just like lot after lot after lot. I felt like I should turn around and leave, but I walked all the way over there and I'm thinking to myself, okay, well, we're here now. You know, what's the worst that could happen?

There was a smell in the air and it just threw my whole everything off, everything. But as we walked up his stairs, he had boxes of foot. food lined up. You know, it was like a lot of stuff that would spoil. That could be the reason for that smell. We were conversing, and about 15 minutes went past. I'm sitting on the bed, and he's just talking and talking. And I said, so what's up?

We don't smoke away. That's when he turned around and punched me in my face. There was no time to think. I didn't have time to do anything. Totally, the bitch, take your clothes on. He looked me in my eyes, and I never, ever, ever, ever seen eyes like that. They were just black. They were black.

Holes. And he kept saying, you know, you don't deserve what's about to happen to you. And I'm thinking, oh, God, nobody knows where I'm at. My family, they won't know. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Money stress has a way of creeping into every part of life. It's not just numbers on a screen, it's the tension in your chest, the arguments at home, or the sleepless night spent wondering if you're doing enough.

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But God said, you're not going to do. die the day, and I believed, and all the pain went away, everything. He was still doing what he was doing, but I didn't feel anything else after that. It's like a peace that came over my body. God directed me through that whole thing. I put myself in that situation, but he got me out. After a while, he didn't come in with me, but he allowed me to go to the bathroom and one I walked out that room, a room that I had passed was taped off like there was some work being done.

But the plastic tart had been ppped back. And as I'm walking, I see sitting on the floor, what appears to be a body lit up on head. She was wrapped in plastic and taped. So you see the perfect form of what it was. But no head. No head. Never could I have imagined that. There was no way he was going to let me go after that.

Several months earlier, victim number two, DeShanna Calver, went missing in approximately June of 2008. She had a longstanding drug problem. Lashonda Long disappeared. At this point, three women have gone missing. Ms. Long's parents last saw her sometime around August 2008. She, too, had a drug problem. This guy targeted the women, his victims, due to the lifestyle they had.

At this point in time, the police have no reason to believe that any of these women have come in harm's way. arm's way. From the time he punched me in my face until the next day, I got beaten rape. There was no sleep throughout that entire ordeal. And then that morning, he said, he don't know what he's going to do with me because I'm a tell. He said, I ain't going to tell. I want to come back. And he did calm down. When I would answer his questions, I would say, yes, sir, no, sir. And it would diffuse him. He kept being thrown off guard. And soon after that, he told me to get dressed. We start walking to that front door. I stayed side by side with him every step. Because if I got too

anxious looking, he could have killed me. I stayed arm and arm. with him. And we stepped right to the door, and he let me out. God fought for me. God made him walk me out that door. The sunlight hit me, but I couldn't run. I couldn't barely walk. I couldn't look back.

I didn't look back. He might have been behind me. And it seemed like, if I look back, he can kill me. At that moment, I felt like I was just too, As I walk up the street, fighting to stay alive. I couldn't run because my body was damaged that bad. I was hoping somebody would at least see that. Something was wrong with me, and nobody helped.

I got to a pay phone and tried calling the police. But when the police tell me I got to come down to them and they won't come to me, God just really lost it there. I never felt that disposable. I felt like less than human at that point. There is a classic example of the system breaking down. She was not given the benefit of the doubt. I felt like it was my problem now.

I survived it. It's my problem. And nobody going to do anything anyway. So let me not say anything. He prayed upon African-American women. down on their luck, hooked on drugs. He felt that they wouldn't go to the police and complain. So he continued it, and he continued.

And that's how sick he was. He's a sick individual. One month later, in October of 2008, Michelle Mason went missing. Her family put up flyers in the area of the Imperial Avenue, and someone would take down the flyers. This is the voice of Anthony Sowell. I remember I seen this, a picture of this girl, just on the door to the store of something.

And I know her. I think I'm having to see her. The next woman to go missing was Tanya Carmichael. She was last seen in November of 2008. After that, six more women over the course of 2009, go missing. Personally, I've never seen a timeline of a... of victims so big. And all of a sudden, it was a great case.

Latunder Billets was attacked on September 22nd. She knew this person. They were friends. They were getting high, and all of a sudden, he asked Latander Billups to turn around. He was viewing her body in a sexual manner. And once she refused, he assaulted her.

She talked her way out of it because they were friends, but it was just her lucky day. Billups went to the police, detectives interviewed her. It was Billups that set everything in motion and right at a very wayward ship as far as justice is concerned. She told the guy that we're looking for is Anthony so well. Anthony so had just gotten out of prison a few years earlier, having done 15 years for attempted rape.

A warrant was issued. They went to his house to execute that warrant. They knock on the door, no one's home. They breached the door, they go in. They search for Anthony Sowell. He's nowhere to be found. There's another locked door. They breached that door.

Behind that door are two very badly decomposed human bodies. Just, I mean, whoa. And they call us, the homicide unit. And the smell was so bad. You had to dispose of the clothes that you had on because the scent was embedded in the material in your clothes. We found two more bodies. One was in a black garbage bag, and he had placed one victim behind the crawl space behind

the wall. We went through the entire home, and we found that a body was behind the stairs going into the basement as well as the skull. That was in a red bucket. And we proceeded to dig up the yard. And we found five bodies all wrapped in plastic that he had buried no more than 18 inches in the ground. Cleveland police are using a backhoe

to dig up the yard of a cube serial killer Anthony so well as they search for the bodies of his victims. Police officers see bad things every day, but this is about as best. as it gets. 11 dead victims. You have 11 families that you're responsible for getting some answers to.

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breathing room in your budget, try MintMobil's deal for three months of premium wireless for just $15 a month. If you like your money, MintMobile is for you. Shop plans at mintmobile.com slash survived. That's mintmobile.com slash survived. Up front payment of $45 for three months, five gigabyte plan required, equivalent to $15 a month. New customer offer for first three months only, then full price plan options available. Taxes and fees extra, see MintMobile for details. They search for Anthony Sowell. He's nowhere to be found. Cleveland Police and other law enforcement agencies have cast a dragnet across the city. As they search abandoned homes and buildings and anywhere else, Anthony So

well may be hiding. I started to try and work my way back to some type of normality. And when I saw his picture in the paper, that was the first time over the course of maybe a year. I'd seen him again. When I seen the face, I lost everything if kind of like fell on the floor. The caption was 11 women murder. And that's when I came to the realization.

that I am blessed to be alive. Turning every rock over, our reach goes anywhere in the United States of America. That Halloween, the whole city was made aware of what was unraveling at this house on Imperial Avenue. And it just so happened that a guy who was driving down the street saw Anthony so well. I was shocked to see him out just walking down the street. And notified a couple officers. They pulled up next to him, and he matched the description of mail we were looking for. They had to take him down back to the police station and get him to open up a little bit.

He was kind of tight-lipped at first. Just because the bodies was found in his house, we know that he'd done it. But you have to prove that he connected with each body. It was like I had a dream. Can you tell us about one of the dreams? All I know that I'm from somebody. Did the dreams say that you shot up? The dreams say that you stabbed them.

Did the dreams say that you choke them with your hands? And the next thing you know, he's telling us more than we ask. He choked someone with your hands. That's all I can think. After So Will was in the jail, I felt like I had to do. had to say something. I just wanted to make sure that I did everything I can, so nothing like that could happen again.

We wind up talking to Vanessa Gaylee. She told us about the hitless body that she saw. I had to testify. I had to, especially knowing that he killed 11 women. I had to be a voice for the voiceless. Anthony Saul was charged with 11 counts of aggravated murder who was facing the death. He said, you don't deserve what I'm open to do to you.

When I gave my testimony, I could not look his way. I was so fearful that I was going to see those eyes again. And it was all bad after that. You could probably hear a pin drop during her testimony. She brought to the jury's attention the amount of terror that not only she had Not only she experienced, but each and every one of the 11 women who did not survive, the type of terror that they experienced. On August 12th, Anthony Sowell is sentenced to death for the murders of 11 women, whose remains were found in and around his Imperial Avenue home in the fall of 2009. In the end, got exacted justice.

He let me out of there, allow me to testify to get this man put. away. Tear it down. Residents cheered as Anthony Sowell's House of Horrors was demolished this evening. Every day is a fight. Fight. Fight for your life.

So whatever happens, love yourself, you know. Know that you are worth it. Know that you are somebody. When I heard he died, I was at home and it caught me up guard. It just, I wasn't expecting to hear that news.

That was the first day since this has happened that I know that he would never get out and hurt nobody again. I survived a serial killer. You know, how could you not come away with a grander appreciation for life? Thousands of free movies and TV shows. We're coming at you with everything we got. This is the mindset. Free. This is the mantra.

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