Suspected East Cleveland serial killer Michael Madison to go on trial April 4, 2016.....Imperial Women leader and activist Kathy Wray Coleman led a 400-person rally, one covered by CNN, after the remains of the Black women were found wrapped in plastic bags, at least one dead body thrown in a backyard....Coleman also led anniversary rallies in 2014 and 2015 to remember the murdered Black women....By www.clevelandurbannews.com
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From left: Angela Deskins, Shirellda Terry and Shetisha Sheeley
From the Metro Desk of Cleveland Urban News. Com and the Cleveland Urban News.Com Blog, Ohio's Most Read Online Black Newspaper and Newspaper Blog. Tel: 216-659-0473. Email: editor@clevelandurbannews.com. (www.clevelandurbannews.com) / (www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com) |
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| Suspected East Cleveland serial killer Michael Madison |
CLEVELAND URBAN NEWS.COM, EAST CLEVELAND, Ohio-Suspected East Cleveland serial killer Michael Madison, 38, will go on trial on Monday, April 4 before Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas Judge Nancy McDonnell in the deaths of three Black women whose remains were found wrapped in plastic bags near the intersection of Shaw and Hayden Avenues in East Cleveland, a largely Black and impoverished suburb of Cleveland.(Editor's note: The trial is at the Cuyahoga County Justice Center in downtown Cleveland in Courtroom 17B and begins with jury selection at 10:00 am).
Madison, who is Black, is in jail on a $6 million bond, and faces the death penalty if convicted. He has said that he does not want to be compared to serial killer and death row inmate Anthony Sowell, who murdered 11 Black women and raped three others at his since demolished home on Imperial Avenue on Cleveland;'s east side.
He is charged with 12 counts, including rape, abuse of a corpse and three counts each of kidnapping and aggravated murder relative to Angela Deskins, 38 and of Cleveland, Shetisha Sheeley, 28, and Shirellda Terry, 18 and also of Cleveland.
Deskins and Sheeley were strangled to death, and the remains of Terry were too decomposed to access the extent of the damage, the Cuyahoga County medical examiner said.
It has been nearly three years since the discoveries of the gruesome bodies, and a longtime coming for trial, a departure from the quickness by which county prosecutor Tim McGinty brings rape and murder of women cases to trial when the victims are White, including the infamous child rapist Ariel Castro, whom McGinty bragged of reaching a plea deal with in under a month.
Police found the first of the three bodies on July 19, 2013 after a foul smell was reported coming from a garage leased to Madison. The other two remains were discovered a day later, one in the backyard of an abandoned home and the other in the basement of a nearby vacant house.
Deskins was reported missing in June 2013, Sheeley in September 2012, and Terry was last seen leaving her summer job at Carver Elementary School in Cleveland on July 10, 2013.
The suspected serial killer, a registered sex offender, purportedly told police that there are more bodies in Cleveland, East Cleveland and Mansfield, Ohio, but gave no more specifics, law enforcement authorities said.
Led by local grassroots activist Kathy Wray Coleman, who leads the Imperial Women Coalition, the community rallied at length on July 24, 2013, shortly after the bodes were discovered, a rally that drew some 400 people to the intersection of Shaw and Hayden Avenues, and one covered by all mainstream media outlets and CNN, which subsequently aired a segment on Anderson Cooper 360. (Editor's note: Coleman also led anniversary rallies in 2014 and 2015 to remember the murdered Black women and to highlight the epidemic of violence against women).
The rally was the largest in the greater Cleveland Black community in recent years on the erroneous murders of Black people, and was organized by the Imperial Women Coalition and the Oppressed People's Nation in conjunction with a host of other community activist organizations.
"We appreciate what CNN does and we thank the producers and reporters that were in town to bring more needed attention to the epidemic of violence against women, which is a universal problem that disproportionately impacts women of color," said Coleman at the time of the rally in 2013.
Other participating grassroots groups include the Carl Stokes Brigade, Revolution Books, Peace in the Hood, the Greater Cleveland Immigrant Support Network, the Fairfax Business Association, Ohio Family Rights, the Audacity of Hope Foundation, the Task Force for Community Mobilization, Organize Ohio, the Northeast Ohio Poor People's Economic Rights Campaign, the National Organization for Parental Equality, Stop Targeting Ohio's Poor, Survivors/ Victims of Tragedy, the Cleveland Chapter of the New Black Panther Party, and Black on Black Crime Inc.
