The woman pictured at the left is 38-year-old Angela Deskins, missing since this June. Her body was found behind an abandoned house in an East Cleveland neighborhood, wrapped in plastic garbage bags. To the right is 28-year-old Shetisha Sheeley. Her body was found in a nearby field, also wrapped in plastic garbage bags. These two are joined by a third victim who has yet to be identified, also found in the same way.
The alleged suspect in this triple homicide is Michael Madison, a 35-year-old registered sex offender who's done a four-year stint in 2002 for attempted rape and attempted possession of drugs.
First Anthony Sowell, then Ariel Castro and now Michael Madison. The above title isn't meant to be an indictment on East Cleveland, its law enforcement or its residents. It was just the first thing that came to mind after seeing a tragedy like this unfold yet again. It's a sort of damn-near-helpless sense of shock and disbelief.
The neighborhood all three were found in shares a common denominator with Ariel Castro's house of horrors and Anthony Sowell's hunting grounds - all are dilapidated, neglected and relatively impoverished areas where it's easy for a poor or working-class woman of color to go missing and stay that way, sometimes for years at a time. It's a place where a sexual predator won't have any problems maintaining his predation just as long as he doesn't make waves or pick the wrong targets.
Two of the three victims have been revealed to have their run-ins with violence and the law, but that doesn't matter now. What matters is making sure that there aren't any more additional victims. If there are, making sure they're found should be the priority. Next priority is making sure the likes of Michael Madison never sees the outside of a prison cell.
