Violence Against Women rally to be held Wednesday evening in East Cleveland

Pictured is accused East Cleveland, Ohio serial killer Michael Madison, who was arrested last week and charged on July 22 with 3 counts each of rape and murder of 3 Black women whose bodies were found last week  in a fetal position wrapped in plastic bags inside and outside of vacant buildings in East Cleveland. Also pictured is convicted serial killer Anthony Sowell (in eye glasses), who strangled and murdered 11 Black women at his home on Imperial Ave in Cleveland, Ohio between 2008 and 2009.  East Cleveland is a neighboring predominantly Black impoverished suburb of Cleveland, a largely Black major American city.

From the Metro Desk of Cleveland Urban News.Com, Ohio's most read online Black newspaper. (www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com) and (www.clevelandurbannews.com). Reach Cleveland Urban News.Com by phone at 216-659-0473 and by email at editor@clevelandurbannews.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio- Community activists, family members of  victims of rape and murder in greater Cleveland,  and Black elected officials will hold a "Stop Violence Against Women and Find the Missing Rally, Vigil and March" at 5 pm on Wednesday July 24, 2013 at the southwest corner of the intersection of Shaw and Hayden Avenues in East Cleveland near where the bodies of 3 Black women were found last week by police in a fetal position and in plastic bags both inside and outside of vacant buildings. Suspected serial killer Michael Madison, 35, is in police custody and has  reportedly said  that more missing Black women are his alleged victims.

Only one of the 3 Black women found murdered has been publicly identified by law enforcement authorities and she  is Angela Deskins of Cleveland.

For contacts for the rally, vigil, and march call Imperial Women Leader Kathy Wray Coleman at 216-659-0473, Oppressed People's Nation Chairman Ernest Smith at 216-682-5268, Black on Black Crime Founder Art McKoy at 216-253-4070 and Peace in the Hood President Khalid Samad 216-538-4043.

Rally speakers include family members of greater Cleveland rape and murder victims, State Rep. Bill Patmon (D-10), East Cleveland City Councilwoman Chantelle C. Lewis,  East Cleveland School Board Candidate Tiffany Fisher, Cleveland Ward 6 Councilwoman Mamie Mitchell , Cleveland Ward 10 City Council Candidate Donna Walker Brown, Betty Mahone of the Federation of Women and owner of The Chateau Mansion, and Community Activists Kathy Wray Coleman of Imperial Women, Judy Martin of Survivors and Victims of Tragedy, Ernest Smith of Oppressed People's Nation, Mary Seawright of Imperial Women, Art McKoy of Black on Black Crime Inc., Khalid Samad of Peace in the Hood, Abdul Qahhar of the Cleveland Chapter of the New Black Panther Party, Don Bryant  of the People's Forum and the Greater Cleveland Immigrant Support Network and Al Porter of Black of Black Crime Inc.

Madison remains in jail on a $ 6 million bond. He was taken  into  custody  on Friday  after a police standoff at his mother's home several miles away on Chickasaw Ave. where he reportedly lived. Today  the alleged serial killer was charged with 3 counts each of rape and murder of the dead Black women.

East Cleveland Police Chief Ralph Spots called the murders a "worst case scenario."

Police began searching abandoned and vacant buildings and other places for more missing women, and with the help of community activists and volunteers.

"We have been out here helping," said Khalid Samad , president of Peace in the Hood.

Community Activist Ernest Smith, who leads the Oppressed People's Nation of young Black community activists,  told Cleveland Urban News.Com. that his grassroots group out of East Cleveland has also been walking the streets with police to find the women.

Longtime East Cleveland Community Activist Art McKoy, founder of Black on Black Crime and the executive producer of The Art McCoy University Show on WERE 1490  AM Radio in Cleveland,  said the killings are heartbreaking and troubling, and that he will participate in Wednesday's rally.

East Cleveland is a neighboring predominantly Black and impoverished suburb of Cleveland, a largely Black major metropolitan city where the remains of  11 Black women were uncovered at the home of serial killer Anthony Sowell in 2009. And just two and a half months ago  three women, Gina DeJesus, Amanda Berry and Michelle Knight, were  freed from captivity after being held kidnapped for over nine years by Arial Castro on Cleveland's majority White west side. Castro is in jail awaiting trial on numerous counts, including multiple counts of rape and kidnapping.

East Cleveland Mayor Gary Norton told reporters that Madison, a registered sex offender who spent four years behind bars,  allegedly said that he was imitating Sowell, who sits on death row while is aggravated murder and other convictions are on appeal before the Ohio Supreme Court.

Since March, more women have been found raped and murdered on Cleveland's majority Black east side of town,  including Christine Malone, 43, Jazmine Trotter, 20, and Ashley Leszynski, 21.

Pictured is Marcia McCoy, president of the Greater Cleveland National Action Network

CLEVELAND, Ohio- The mainstream majority White media in Cleveland, Oh virtually ignored the call by  the Greater Cleveland National Action Network, a local chapter of the national group founded by Civil Rights leader Rev. Al Sharpton, for a national boycott of Florida businesses and for federal Civil Rights charges against George Zimmerman during a 300-persons rally and vigil held Saturday at the federal courthouse in downtown Cleveland, though both issues were the focus of the event, and of national rallies held across the country the same day.

And aside from Cleveland Municipal Court Judge Pauline Tarver, who spoke, no Black elected officials were there for the event, one sponsored in cooperation with NAN's 100 Cities Vigil and Rally for "Justice for Trayvon."

Cleveland television news channels 5 and 3 did not cover the Cleveland rally. News Channel 19 gave it a minute, and though News Channel 8 and the Cleveland Plain Dealer, Ohio largest newspaper, covered it, there was no mentioning of the call by Sharpton and NAN for a Florida boycott or for federal charges to be lodged against Zimmerman, who was acquitted last weekend by an all White Florida jury of murdering unarmed Black teen Trayvon Martin.

Greater Cleveland NAN President Marcia McCoy told Cleveland Urban News a day before Saturday's Cleveland rally that she had interviewed with several local media groups and that Sharpton and NAN were demanding " a Florida Boycott and federal Civil Rights charges against Zimmerman."

But not one local media outlet mentioned Greater Cleveland NAN. And  McCoy, a Cleveland schools student recruitment coordinator, was not quoted in a single greater Cleveland media venue, not on television and not in the Plain Dealer, and by design, said a Black elected official of greater Cleveland, who said he deliberately stayed  away from  Saturday's rally and vigil.

"We were told not to come to the rally yesterday at the federal courthouse in Cleveland because Rev Sharpton is taking on President Obama by requesting that U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder bring federal Civil Rights charges against Zimmerman," said the Black elected official on condition of anonymity.

Zimmerman, who took the stand but did not testify during the month long trial, is now a free man.

His acquittal has unnerved America's Black community, some  members of whom say that an all White jury was prejudicial and that a special prosecutor should have prosecuted the case since prosecutors only brought charges against Zimmerman under pressure from Civil Rights leaders, including  Sharpton,  and National NAACP President Ben Jealous, who has also called for federal charges against the neighborhood watchman for stalking Martin and allegedly racially profiling him.

"Saturday's rally and vigil in Cleveland did not get the attention it should have gotten." said Community Activist Al Porter, vice president of Black on Black Crime Inc.

Martin, 17 at his death, was Black, and Zimmerman is White by most measures.