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You are now listening to True Murder, The most shocking killers in true crime history and the authors that have written about them Gaesy Bundy Dahmer, The Nightstalker BTK. Every week another fascinating author talking about the most shocking and infamous killers in true crime history. True Murder with your host, journalist and author Dan Zufanski.
Good Evening. This January, film Rise released the chilling true crime documentary Unseen, from award winning director and producer Laura Paglan. For two years, women had been disappearing from Mount Pleasant, a poverty stricken African American neighborhood in Cleveland, with little investigation from police and city officials. Then, in two thousand and nine, a reported rape led Cleveland police to a grisly discovery the bodies of eleven women decomposing in the
house and yard of known sex offender Anthony Soul. How was it that a serial killer was able to operate virtually in plain sight for two years? Told in riveting detail by the women who were able to escape Soul's deadly clutches, Unseen draws viewers into a world where marginalized women plagued by drug use, shunned by society, and dismissed by the police, become easy prey for a predatory monster.
Unseen questions not only the police failures in this case, but also why Soul's neighbors turned a blind eye to his bizarre activities. Through intimate, revealing interviews, Paglin gives voice to Soul's victims, allowing them to tell their stories, showing us how the attempt to come to grips with their horrific experiences. Unseen was in an official selection at Cleveland
International Film Festival and doc New York City. It was also a contender for the Social Impact Award at Greenwich International Film Festival and Documentary Award nominee at Portland Film Festival. Unseen acts as a haunting indictment of a police force that failed its citizens. The subject of our program this evening is Unseen, a true crime documentary about a Cleveland serial killer and the women he prayed on with my special guest producer and director and co writer Laura Paglin.
Welcome to the program, and thank you very much for green to this interview. Laura Paglin, thank you, thank you very much. Incredible Unseen about Anthony Soul. Tell us when this was released, you'd say, it just released. To tell us how it's available, and tell us when it was released, and just tell us a little bit about these film festivals that it was premiered at.
Okay, well, it's kind of a long process because the film was you might say, released in film festivals, started exhibiting at film festivals in twenty sixteen. However, I didn't secure distribution until twenty eighteen with film Rise. So now people can watch it on iTunes and Amazon. And I'm sorry, I forgot your other question.
You know, I just want to see where it was available and that it is as of we mentioned in the introduction as of this January, So the end of January it's available. Now it is. Yes, Now, I just looked basically at just your IMD background, So tell us it doesn't look like from that background that you'd be interested in something like this. So tell us how you came to do this film, why you wanted to do this film, what you thought you might be able to
say with this film. Tell us a little bit about why you wanted to do this film Unseen.
Okay, Yeah, I mean I'd never really done anything involving true crime before. I never had any particular interest. However, my past documentaries have dealt with kind of you might say, underdogs of society.
You know.
The last film I did, called The Facing Forward, a students story, was about a young inner city teenager who came from a very kind of chaotic background and he was put in this very rigorous, strict school. So it's kind of a culture shock for him. And so the whole film I follow him for a span of several years, and so I deal with that. And then another another film that went to sun Dance was called No Umbrella.
Election Day in the City And realize it's been a long time, but you might remember that the two thousand and four national elections was a very very close one, and so the whole film takes place at this one polling location where this eighty two year old city council woman who's about five foot tall is trying to get enough voting machines for again, these inner city people to vote with. So, yeah, I was more interested in, I guess,
portraying people. So yeah, you would think, well, how does that really segue into something like this, So kind of the long answer to your question is that when I heard about these murders in October two thousand and nine, I kept telling myself, no, I was not interested in doing this, but it's really literally the scene of the murders is about fifteen minutes from my house. So I kind of just created a reason to go down there.
And again, I didn't want to be a gawker. I thought I couldn't think of what I could possibly contribute because there was so much press. There was press from all over the world, and you know, I thought, well, what you know, this is just being covered. It's very depressing. Again, what am I going to contribute? So what happened was I was working on another film that actually kind of took place in the same neighborhood. So I create an excuse just to go there. I thought, of women, I'll
just get a few shots of the house. Maybe I can kind of tie it in. And at that point there, as you know, the twenty four hour news cycle being what it is, all of the press had left because of the Fort Hood shooting, and so you know, there were a few camera local camera people, but so I was just filming the house and all of these people started coming up to me. Neighbors who were still so upset by this, and they just wanted to talk. So I guess my first sort of aha moment was thinking, Wow,
people really want to talk about this. You know there is something here, There's something for me to do, though again I didn't know what it was yet.
Now, part of the process to do this is very similar to you are a writer, so very similar to an author in many ways, and part of that is just basic. Your beginning process is probably a lot of research. And I saw Robert Sperner's name and he was on the program talking about his book House of Whorors and say he's involved in this film in some way tell us about Robert Spyerna's involvement. But also just the research that you did do before you underwent this project.
Actually, surprisingly I did. I didn't do that much research because I guess at the beginning in two thousand and nine, you know, not that much was known. I mean, when I first started, we didn't even know who the women were. They were still trying to identify the women, so it's not as if there was anything to research. I was just sort of following what was going on in the papers. So I guess Unlike a book, where you can kind of cover a lot, you have to very quicklyocus in
on a theme. And so I knew sort of write off that I wasn't particularly interested in serial killers because to me, im, you know, they're not It's not someone I can identify with as a person, you know. I mean, I'm curious as a as an individual about you know, what makes them tick. But as far as making a film, I want to make it about people that I might be able to identify and sympathize with. So I decided
to focus it more on the victims. The problem with that again aside from just getting access to families, especially during this time of grief, as you know, how do you kind of recreate someone who has already passed, And a lot of these women were poor, they'd been away from their families because of drugs, and so a lot of them didn't even have photos. It was you know, pre digital aid, so you know, there might be just
one or two photos. So then I thought, well, it's got to focus more on the women that escaped, But so far there had only been a couple that had actually spoken to the media, and again, the media is sort of all over them. Because they had come forward, and so I really didn't get very far. You know, I've just sort of filmed a lot of the things, you know, the action that was going on outside the house and sort of whoever whoever was accessible at the time.
But it really wasn't until twenty eleven when there was the trial that I was aware of of more of the women that escaped, and that's how I met Robert actually was at the trial. I mean, it pretty much drew all the reporters and writers and people who were working on this. So it was really at that point that because they were, as I should explain, that the judge had put a gag order on the witnesses, so even if they were willing to talk, they simply couldn't.
So around you know, twenty eleven twenty twelve is when we were able to meet many of these these people, including more of the women that escaped, and again Robert writing a book, had and having he was really great at tracking people down, interviewed you know, far more people, and also was able to get his book out sooner. Film is a very long process, so he was very helpful in terms of of you know, setting me up with some of the subjects who particularly some of the
women that has had escaped. So that is how that worked.
Now you talk about before we talk about some of the victims, and especially as you do in the film, you opened with victim Melvet Sockwell and she leads to Anthony Sowell receiving a fifteen year sentence or a sentence where he is in there for fifteen years rape that she reports to police. Melvet Sockwell. Very powerful opening to unseen for all of the victims. And you say you met them after the trial. Obviously you couldn't speak to them before that. What did you say to them to
convince them? Because this is a film that goes beyond the typical even with victim centered or focused documentaries, to get that much more information, it's that much more intimate. It's everything that possibly you would want to know about how they got to where they got to. What did you say to them to convince them? How did you go about convincing them that you were going to do something different than some people that are even leary of
the media, and they may have been as well. Tell us about that.
Well, I can't say it was, you know the same for everybody. It's hard to say, I mean Vanessa Gay for example, I think she was more willing to tell her story. I mean, it was kind of a cathartic experience for her. But initially, actually, as it happened, my previous film was screening and I invited her to a screening of that, and so she actually met the subject
of my last documentary and they had conversation. So that was really fortuitous, and they kind of hit it off, and that was kind of an amazing experience to have, you know, the subject of my past film talking to potentially the subject of my new film. And I mean, and she is just a people person, and you know, I kind of hit it off with her just personally. I mean, she has a great sense of humor, and so I think, you know that that may have had
something to do with it. And initially I did interview her first with an interview I didn't use uh, but I actually we talked all about her background and you know, nothing about actually what happened in the house. And at the time, to be honest with you, I was kind of shy about asking about the how she had given this really powerful testimony in Core, which you see in the film, and I thought well, I don't want to
drag her through that again. I mean, I have to say, this is not something I enjoyed doing, you know, dragging someone having them relive, you know, what happened in there, and to relive all the horrors. So, you know, I spent a lot of time on you know, I wanted to know what she was like as a person growing up, and so we spent a lot of time on that initially, but then I realized, wow, I really do have to talk about what happened. So then later we we kind
of redid the whole thing. And so these interviews, they were long, and again I didn't just get right into hey, you know what happened. That was usually after a couple hours. So yeah, it wasn't it wasn't easy, and it wasn't something they just agreed to right away. Usually wouldn't meet with them first. But yeah, I mean I can't tell you. It's not like I have some some men formula.
And you wouldn't give it to me anyway.
So yeah, no, I really don't know. I mean I didn't make any assumptions that they would want to do it. You know, I just told them what the film was about and it's about humanizing the victims and telling their story and not because you do see in most films that deal will deal with a serial killer, the victims are just kind of the tools. I mean that they're just sort of thrown in there like okay, yeah, here was his first victim, and you know that kind of thing.
Yeah. What I wanted to say too, is that you in you do have that one interview with her, another interview, another interview, then you show the powerful court testimony and then it's juxtaposed or you cut to your interview which deals with the same thing, and then again her very very powerful DEMONI and her powerful testimony in this film.
I also wanted to just tell people that are trying to visualize this as well, is that this Vanessa Gay and other victims in this despite what you might think when you you know, when you picture these people in your mind, I want you to tell us about Vanessa Gay as well, in terms of what she looks like, by what you might think, despite all this background, and then this film is quite a bit about not to say that it's only about that, but it is quite a bit about drug addiction, isn't it.
Yes, it is well to your first question. Yeah, Vanessa is a really effervescent, kind of bubbly person like when you first meet her. In fact, I didn't I specifically did not label the women, you know, when you id them and lower. I just put her name. I didn't say survivor or victim because I don't even well kind of giving it away. But I don't want you to know immediately who they are. I just want you to kind of see them on their own terms. And so, yeah,
she and Latundra Billups are two women. They're they're really well spoken. You know, Latundra comes off as kind of a business woman, maybe you know again, someone you might want to chat with over, you know, with over a cup of coffee, have a conversation. So and and you know, you asked me about kind of what I learned from this, because I had a picture in my head of what a crack addict was. I mean, most these women were lured in with the promise of crack to Sowell's house.
So I kind of had this picture of, you know, these women with their teeth falling out, hair falling out and skinny, and so you know, they were anything. But I mean, of course that it does affect a lot of the women that way, but they had been kind of spared the physical ravages of this addiction or so, so yeah, it's not always what you think. And again, and that's how I want the audience to view them
as well. You know, these could be my neighbors people I know, and I think, actually, I mean, it's interesting because back then the whole heroin addiction or epidemic hadn't really hit. And so I think now, you know, middle upper classes people are kind of realizing, yeah, this stuff isn't just something that happens in urban neighborhoods or in poor neighborhoods. This could happen to me or to my friends. So I may be digressing, so feel free to stop me.
You talk about as well in your show, and then you have a very dramatic and very interesting subject here. Pastor Larry Harris a very interesting character, and he talks about Mount Pleasant then in the beginning, or when he was young. And now when you were making this film, Mount Pleasant is where all of this happened. As you show and as you tell through this film, tell us a little bit about Mount Pleasant and Pastor Larry Harris.
Okay, well, it's ironic that the place where this happened is called Mount Pleasant. I mean it's a sad irony, but in fact it was a very pleasant place to live. And you know, it's been kind of an immigrant neighborhood, but then for a very long time a solid working class black, you know, mostly black neighborhood up until maybe the early eighties, and then again when the crack epidemic hit and you know, it just it just got destroyed.
So it's in it even now. It's it's pretty sad when you drive around and you see these cute little houses, the little porches, and yeah, people talked about how they leave their doors unlocked at night, and all the little stores and breakfast places and just the sense of community. So you know it just like it kind of kills
me to see that. And then it's you know, it's right next door to Shaker Heights, which again is one of the more affluent neighborhoods, and it's it's kind of amazing how you can just kind of go around a corner and feel like you've dropped off the edge of
the earth. So so Pastor Larry his church is right in Mount Pleasant, and again, you know, I couldn't put a lot in the film, but he talked about how, yeah, the the people that come to the church were mostly from the neighborhood, but now they you know, they've moved out and a lot of them drive in just from the suburbs and so, uh so, yeah, even the church, and he admits this in the film, there's kind of a schism or not a schism, but the church is
maybe not as involved with the community around it as much as it could. And uh so, I think he kind of admits some of his failures as a as a church to really kind of embrace these women that are addicted to crack and oh and really kind of
give them their full love and support. And you'll see that in other parts of the film where there's this really harrowing description that Vanessa talks about after she escapes from the house that was on a Sunday and then there were these church people and they just kind of looked away. So yes, but Pastor Larry makes some very powerful statements in the films.
Absolutely, you have a character that really stands out at first, you sympathize with them to a certain degrees. Obviously, somebody immigrated to America and he is in this new transformed neighborhood in Mount Pleasant across from Anthony Soul's home and
raised sausages at the corner and all of this. Mayhem goes on in that neighborhood and his name's Assad and he's a store owner, and you show his background and he talks about these two young crackheads and his brother tell us about this character, and that first interview, it's like you do, do the interview and then continue later and later it becomes more and more powerful. Tell us about this very very interesting character that you dug up.
Yeah, well he is, you know, the Arab store or corner store owner. And you know, you see that in a lot of these poor black neighborhoods there's usually a corner store. And you know, originally he talks about his brother getting shot and killed because these these two I don't know if it was over some drug deal or you know what exactly happened, but he was held up and shot, and so yes, you do feel sympathy for him.
And you know, he talks again about just how he and his wife and family have to work in this really dangerous environment. And he even again it's not in the interview, but he even you know, kind of is nice to some of the kids that come in and gives them candy and so so, yeah, you kind of feel for him. But then I don't know if I
should be giving away the whole story. But then later you learn some of his real views about how he feels about the women who were so Well's victims, and it is it is kind of shocking, but you kind of have to put it in context as well, because he reflects I think what many people in society think of these women that were addicted to crack, and it just would be afraid to say in front of a camera or would know better. So I guess that's what I have to say about him.
It's amazing though he has do You ask him in these interviews about his impressions of him, and he said, you know, I had you know, I hate to give this away, but this is powerful. He says, I had a really good feeling about this Anthony soul. He seemed like a high class guy, right right, you know, And then yeah, we also get and I know that you have obviously a focus in this and and sort of
a perspective for this documentary. So you take information, you have short clips of the police and very again I think interesting, fascinating and disturbing, actually police officers eating bags of potato chips talking to Nancy Soul. Tell us a little bit about your impression and what you were trying to convey or what you thought was conveyed with these short clips.
I guess I wanted to. I wanted this on the surface to feel like kind of a crime thriller or I don't know, just a regular crime documentary where you're kind of trying to figure out, Hey, what happened, what did so well? Do you know, is he gonna tell us the identity of these women? So I threaded the I used the interrogation footage that the police had and kind of threaded that throughout the film. But but you know, you kind of learn that he's just playing with them.
He's almost pretending to be as if someone who's insane, and so that's pretty much how I used it. And you're kind of asking me before the interview, you know, did I try to interview so Well? And in fact I didn't, and I knew Robert had had interviewed him and written to him, But I think to do that would have just made him seem more like a regular guy. And again the focus was really on the women, and I just don't think it would have really added anything.
So here he's kind of just this unpleasant, cipher like individual. So yeah, I guess that was more sort of an intuitive to use that material the way I did.
You have, as I mentioned before, you opened the film with Melvit Sockwell, and that's the first victim, and that's where she escaped. And what happened is he got fifteen years and he was released and he came to Imperial Avenue, the infamous address. You have access to and gained access I should say, not had you gain access to Latundra Leila Billups you have access in it? Okay, thank you. And you had Crystal Dozier's son. You had a sad Taya like we mentioned, a store owner. You had survivor
again incredible, Gladys Wade. You had Anthony Soul's sister, Tresa Garrison. And then you have Lussanda Landa Sanda Losande Okay, sorry, Long's mother you have, and you have some Vanessa Gate as we mentioned, and you have pastor Larry Harris. You also have this is incredible too, is this Lloyd Roosevelt, former sex offender, just tell us a little bit about this. This is not given too much away. This is interesting footage.
Which one now Roosevello. Yeah, actually that's someone that Robert was really helpful in tracking down. In fact, he had not registered. You know, you're supposed to register if you're a sex offender anytime you move, and he hadn't, so we couldn't find him. And it involved you know, going around to all these former residencies, asking neighbors, winding up at some you know, a little dive bar and slipping a note to the owner because he supposedly came in there.
I mean, how we actually you know, got to him was kind of amazing. But yeah, he tells a story of how, you know, he was so Well cellmate, and you know, they offer these programs for sexual offenders, and so Well would not admit to being a sexual offender, so he never got any of the you know that I guess went through any of these programs that are supposed to help you cope and real life and admit your problems. And so when so Well got out, he
was deemed you know, of low risk. So only because he wouldn't admit that he was sexual predator, which it sounds ridiculous, but that's sort of another way. He kind of, you know, fell through the cracks.
And.
You know, maybe people weren't paying as much authorities weren't paying as much attention to him. I don't know. So, yeah, Roosevelt talks about that, and Roosevelt Lloyd was a sex offender himself. Yeah, which I mentioned.
Sure certainly everybody wanted to be wanted to cooperate on this incredible One of the most powerful things in this incredibly powerful film is Gladys Wade and the response from the police. And of course you mentioned how crucial this is because six more women are killed after this. So this premise that you're presenting is is super reinforced by Gladys Wade. Tell us a little just a little bit about Gladys Wade.
Yeah, now that is probably one of the most shocking stories, just on the surface. So Gladys was attacked by Sowell and she met she managed just incredible, you know, to escape, and she escaped down the stairs, cut her hand on the glass and she got out. And this part is not even in the film, but she she actually went to It wasn't the corner story we're talking about before, but another store, she ran over there and asked them to call the police, and they said, oh, get out
your your hand. You know, you're bleeding on the floor, if you can believe that. And then Sowell is even standing right out there while this was going on, and you know, people and then he said she stole money from him. People believed him. And but at any rate, finally I think she she ran from the scene and she flagged down some police, and they actually did their job. They came and they collected evidence. They found, you know, the blood. You know, obviously they must not have gone
all the way into the house. But oh no, they did, that's right. They rested so well. So they did everything they were supposed to do. They treated her well, you know, she got treated for her wounds. And and then ultimately, when it went to I guess this it was an assistant prosecutor said, uh, you know, obviously she had a background, of course, because she'd been on drugs and there had been some violence in her background. And so they the
prosecutor deemed her case. They said she was not a credible witness and decided there was not enough evidence to continue investigating the case and so as she says, they took his word over hers and dropped the case. And then after that six women were murdered by so well. So, I mean, that's the pride, the most shocking part of
this whole story. And in fact, recently I think it went to this case went to the the Supreme Court, but they've decided that the families do in fact have a right to sue the city over this.
Wow. Yeah, you talk about Latundra Billups or you have an interview with or a few interviews with Latundra Billups Leila, And this is again incredibly powerful too because in the later interview she talks about her I mean, really we're talking on not exaggerating brush with death and how exactly she did it. I've read a lot of things. This is more than I've ever read exactly what she said
to convince this guy. So tell us just not to give it away too much away, but just tell us a little bit about that interview with Latundra Billups and her incredible brush with death.
Yeah, you know again, I think some of the women that got away just had a talent for talking themselves out of it or sort of acting as if you know, I mean Latundra billups, I mean she blacked out, she was nearly choked to death and then amazingly woke up. And she describes her shock at kind of looking at so well, he was shocked to see that she was
still alive. And uh, and again I think she she just sort of acted like, oh no, you know, no big deals if she didn't remember, and you know, pretended to be all upset over her shirt that was ripped, and then went on about, oh, you know, that was my mother's shirt, and just kind of diverted the attention and managed to talk her way out of the house,
you know, just acting pissed off at him. And so that's just an amazing story because you have kind of what she sang on the outside and then what's going on you know inside. And I think the same with Vanessa. It's a very similar kind of story, you know, how they sort of kept their composure.
Yeah, similarity. The similarity was that it looked like and you you could I don't I just don't want to underestimate or downplay how crucial it was both of them, and you could see that that probably is a part of their transformation from this to the people to recover psychologically from this is amazing. So it's way beyond survivor. But both of those people had to talk him into not killing them, they thought, because that's the kind of language.
When Lidundra woke up and he was watching her, he said, Oh, I gotta kill you and I got to kill myself. You are certainly going to go to the cops. And she had to really do an acting performance of her life, didn't she.
Oh, yeah, yeah, it's amazing.
Now you have these other interviews with Crystal Dozier, another victim, obviously Crystal Dozier's son, and again a lot of these interviews really explain the personal tool on the families. Tell us a little bit about that interview with Crystal dozier son.
Okay, so Crystal Doser was one of the victims, and so her son, Anthony Doser describes, you know, what it was like to grow up with his mom on on crack and often how he and his younger sister, who was kind of protecting, just didn't have enough to eat, and you know, so they would they would sometimes live off of teaspoons of peanut butter and then the horror of this was that when he was taken out of his mother's house, that even his grandmother was addicted to crack.
And you know, that's one thing I learned. I originally thought, well, you know, I knew about the crack epidemic, and but I didn't. And I thought that these women that had been the victims were maybe the one person in the family that had been addicted to crack. But the more interviews I did, I realized, you know, their whole families addicted to this stuff, just I mean, almost like a
lost generation or two generations of people. And so Anthony Doser, yeah, he so he talks about yeah, and you know, his grandmother was on crack as well, and he has a lot of mixed feelings about his mother, which you can imagine, you know, because he kind of says, well, she wasn't he didn't call her on Mother's Day because she wasn't really his mother, you know, he hadn't acted like a
mother and it's not in the film. But he was very lucky in that he was taken in by a foster dad who I met, who was just a really warm and caring person. That didn't happen till he was a teenager, but I think that that really saved his life. And it's also interesting because at one point he himself was thinking of becoming a police officer and was doing
some of the training. So he even had some sympathy for some of the police officers and you know, why they couldn't find these missing women or why they didn't take some of the reports seriously. Though ultimately he was definitely, you know, really critical, and that's that's another part of the film, about how some of the families had reported their loved ones missing, but that the police didn't take it seriously or won't even issue a missing person's report.
So they said, well, she's an adult, you know, she'll come back when she wants to. So his feelings about his mother are just very conflicted, and it makes makes a really kind of interesting character in this film.
He seemed to have a lot of sympathy for his mother that he really didn't ever get to know, right, So it was really sad to hear that he seemed to have a comprehension of his mother's situation and their relationship, but after the fact, much after the fact, Yeah, I mean.
He did get to see her in her sober moments and could kind of see the person or the mother that she could have been.
Yeah, and he actually knew that that. He was convinced from the information that he had heard that she wanted to be clean, and it was evidenced by her being around. She wasn't like, she wasn't around, and so when she did go missing, it wasn't a matter of it took too long. Every other people in the family also reported her missing, as you re.
Right, right, Yeah, I mean it's true a lot of these women would go missing, but they would still call, they'd still come by after a while, So I think I think that's where you know, a lot of the families had difficulty conveying this to the police that yes, she is on crack, but she still calls, she still comes by. You know, she doesn't disappear for a year half a year, So yes, and yeah, you know, it's
I think again, it's hard for people to comprehend. But when this drug addiction gets a hold of people, it just it just changes them. So yes, they may be, you know, in their heart of hearts, they're a family person, but they still kind of have to go out there and get that drug.
So yeah, you have very powerful footage of Vanessa Gee and again very similar in that this is crucial. You know, this is addition to anybody that's read anything as these peoples, these victims brush like I say, near brush with death.
And again we won't give it away, but her it's amazing that we have her looking and sounding that together after what she experienced, because even though these other people had this brush with death, this woman had even more in terms of things to wipe out of her mind that she saw. Just tell us a little bit about how she escaped from this, and again you provide this footage for the trial and the interview. Tell us a little bit about Vanessa Gay and this very powerful part of the film.
Well, I don't know if you want me to give that part away to you about what she saw when she left the house, but yeah, I would say she saw what you could only be described as something you'd see in a horror film. I mean, really, just so you know, I can't tell you. I just think she's a really resilient person. You know, she has other interest
beyond the horrors of what happened to her. And she's again really a people person, and I think you know she has strong relationships with her friends and family, and I think that that's helped her to a large extent to try to get past this. Though she's myth. You know, you can never get past something like this. But I mean, I think she just has a real love of life and that's how she's been able to cope with this.
So and you know, I can't say, oh, she's just I'm sure she would never admit that she's perfectly okay, but you know, she moves on and in fact, right now, I know she's she's actually working for a victim's advocacy group and so she really finds that work fulfilling. And so you know, she she's just like anyone else she sees. You know, she's living her life.
So you have a very amazing interview, and especially that she agreed to an interview with This is Tresa Garrison, Anthony Soul's sister. What does she speak to in the interviews that you have with her? Ah?
Well, I did feel, as I said, I wasn't focusing on so well, but I felt I kind of needed to give a little background to kind of lead you up to this. So you know that there's you know, you know something about him so she was his sister, and yeah, she paints a pretty scary picture of him, you know, even when he's a child, and she describes him as a mean child and so uh and then she also describes that and I think what's what's interesting about this is that she is as just as shocked.
I mean, she knew he had problems, and but that she's really just as shocked by what happened is as we are, you know, being his sister.
But you include you include the footage where he calls her on the run and he's he's on the run and they find Yeah. Yeah, so it's amazing what he says to her. And again we won't give that way, we give those for people the word Well.
Yeah, I don't want to give it away because I was actually just as shocked when I was interviewing her that she revealed this. But I again, I don't want to give away the whole whole film, but I I was kind of Actually you can kind of see the person behind the camera looks a little unprepared to kind of adjust the camera suddenly when she makes the statement. So but yeah, you'll have to just watch the film.
Yeah, it's just it's it's amazing. That's all I can say is that just as the film slowly develops and moves forward, just more and more to ponder and and there's more and more revealed. What we didn't mention too is that again everyone knows the story that there was this incredible smell in the neighborhood, so much that raised sausage that was at the corner was forced to put expensive modification environmental controls to be able to deal with
that smell, and yet the smell persisted. And do you have footage with very powerful footage of Asad the store owner talking about smell and garbage bags and so incredible that this could go on, like you say, and we did in the beginning of this, that this could go on for so long.
Yeah, I mean again, it is a bit of irony that you would have. I mean, people make a joke of it, but yeah, yeah, you would have a sausage factory right next door to so old house. But you know, just to people know, this was a family owned business. So the owner Race Sausage, you know, they were like the first owners of or African American owners of a sausage business. And they actually employed ex offenders and so they were probably one of the strengths of the community.
Again there, I did do some interviews which were not included in the film, but you know, got to know them. And so when the smell of the dead bodies first became noticeable, of course neighbors complained and the health department was sent out, and the first thing they looked at,
of course, was the sausage company. And then you know, they made them go through all these costly modifications, I mean totally, like thirty thousand dollars redoing their sewage system and you know, installing all kinds of things, and I mean again, it just sounded like a nightmare from their
perspective because they could barely afford to do this. And then after all was said and done, you know, the place is spotless, and they smelling the smell and yeah, and then even they again it's not in the film, but they described so well as kind of like he was. They thought of him as the stable and reliable neighbor because they had some cop some pipes or copper pipes or siding on their house or on their factory that
was stolen. And you know, he said, oh well, I'll keep an eye out you know, so, and I believe actually he had he had stolen some of this, so so, yeah, it just damaged them and then obviously but you know, prevented them from investigating what was really going along. And then you know, some of the people thought it was coming from a sod taia store because it smells. Being what they were, you know, it depended on what direction the the air, I mean, the wind was blowing, so
he couldn't really tell. So they you know, people would accuse him of you dirty Arab and so he would get comments like that, and his you know, his wife got too sick from the smell to work there. But yeah, even he thought, well, it can't be the sausage. It's just so clean. So just nobody, nobody knew where it was coming from. So I mean, yes, in retrospect, you could blame the health department. I don't know, you know,
should they know what a dead body smells like? It's but they're just such odd circumstances in this case.
You do talk about this though, that that when these bodies were discovered in two thousand and nine, up to that point, those eleven women, there was no investigation by police of those level women until that two thousand and nine, and then Anthony Soul promised to help authorities identify those victims. And yet, as you put in this, that didn't happen, did it?
Right? So what is the the question or the.
I'm just saying, I'm just making a statement. But you also have that the result of all of this, this was a death penalty case. You show the very powerful reaction in court. You have that footage included, you have we mentioned Vanessa Gay at trial talking about this incredible horror story that she witnessed. But you show the reaction of Anthony Soul and it seems to be no reaction when she's making these claims and her testimony and she's hysterical.
But the death penalty gets his reaction, doesn't it.
Oh yeah, I mean he no, he's just stony faced. And I and actually that he acted rather peculiarly. Sure during the death pen I mean he kind of bows to the audience. There's this one place and it's again not in the film, where his one of his sisters is talking or one of his family members about how they love him or something and he cries a bit. But yeah, any any kind of emotion is for himself and nobody else. So yeah, and I don't know if
you know lawyers told him not to react. That's very possible, but but yeah, I mean you can't expect him to react as if he did something, because that would be admitting it. And yeah, as we discussed earlier, he never helps the police with anything and to this day is never admitted that he killed any of the women's.
And you have that on tape as well. It's interesting with the police where he just he pretends he can't remember. It's a cloud. He is not cooperative at all. I think we need to say that mentioned as you do the all the victims, Melda Hunter and Turner, Crystal Dozier, a La Chandra Long, Michelle Mason, Nancy Cobbs, Janice Webb, to Shanna Culver, Fealacia Fortson, Tanya Carmichael, Kim Smith. This film was you wrote this with someone else as well?
Could you tell us Anell's bang Girder. Could you tell us a little bit about his contribution to this and that a little bit of that writing process.
Yeah, I mean, I guess it's it's not really writing. I mean, it's now something that documentary filmmakers will put in when they've now the director and the editor of you in a you're writing it, but you're really editing it and making decisions about what to put in and where. So so actually we both agreed Nels and I to not use that credit, but once I entered it in IMDb, there it was. But still, I mean, there is a storytelling process going on, and Nell's is just a brilliant editor.
His one of the last documentaries he edited, called Camera Person, was nominated for an Academy Award. And I have to say, you know, I made a rough cut myself, which was kind of pedestrian. I mean, it kind of proceeded chronologically told the story, but it wasn't really working the way it should. And he just he grabbed that material and in two weeks had just like a really powerful opening.
So and I think it's also a matter of you know, just just using there was so much material, but it's just a matter of using just enough to tell the story and for us to feel the emotion of the scene. And yeah, he just has kind of the magic touch. So I would, in fact watch any film that Nels Bangerterer has put his editing hands on. It's just it was just a real joy to work with him.
Yes, it's seventy five minute film and it really does move despite people sitting and being interviewed. But just incredible way put this together and also very very effective music, very effective. Thank you.
Yeah.
Actually my composer too, is fabulous, Simoni Juliani, who I used for my previous film Facing Forward again. You know, just getting the editing the music to me is really it's not just something you just do at the end. It's everything.
So yes, I want to applaud you for this. It's incredible. It's been very careful, very powerful, very dramatic, very explorative. I don't know anymore superlatives I can give you except this is a must see. This is unseen true crime documentary about a Cleveland serial killer and the women he prayed on. A fantastic job. Thank you very much, Laura Paglin. For those that might want to see this, to give us information, maybe a Facebook page, a website, or how they could get to see.
Unseen, Okay, hopefully you can write the sun your your website, but it's the The website is www Unseen documentary dot com and there you'll find all the links to iTunes and Amazon and the other platforms. At one point I got up to number two on iTunes, So if people can watch it on that that would be marvelous because we want to keep it up there and have people recognize the film.
Absolutely well. Thank you very much, Laura Paglin. It has been a pleasure. Thank you very much for coming on talking about Unseen.
Thank you very much, thanks for having me.
You have a great evening you too. Good Night.