An empty lot full of meaning

Two and a half years ago, a house in a poor neighborhood in Cleveland made international headlines for the saddest of reasons.

For 10 years, I lived only a couple of miles from this house, but I was in Hong Kong when I heard the news. I mention this only to convey the magnitude of the story and the horror of watching it unfold so many miles from home.

Day by day, the news just got worse. First it was one body found in the two-family home on Imperial Avenue. Then it was three bodies. Soon it was six. By the time I flew home, the bodies of 11 women, all of them African-American, had been discovered at the home of Anthony Sowell.

Last December, the house was demolished. Now a task force wants to convert the vacant lot into a memorial to the women who died there.

This was no ordinary crime scene in the fall of 2009. Two of the women were buried in the basement. Five were buried in Sowell