© 2024 Ideastream Public Media

1375 Euclid Avenue, Cleveland, Ohio 44115
(216) 916-6100 | (877) 399-3307

WKSU is a public media service licensed to Kent State University and operated by Ideastream Public Media.
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
News
To contact us with news tips, story ideas or other related information, e-mail newsstaff@ideastream.org.

Five Imperial Avenue Funerals Over the Weekend

A portrait of Crystal Dozier was on display at Mt. Olive Baptist Church on Saturday morning
A portrait of Crystal Dozier was on display at Mt. Olive Baptist Church on Saturday morning

(MUSIC)

DCB: A slide show of Crystal Dozier's life played on video screens as family, friends and community members filled the pews of Mt. Olive Baptist Church, Saturday morning.

In remembering Dozier, Pastor Larry Harris and several other speakers put the emphasis on the 31-year-old as a daughter, sister, aunt, mother and grandmother, as opposed to a lost, young woman who allegedly fell into the clutches of accused murderer Anthony Sowell, some four blocks from here. A choir garbed in black swayed behind a white coffin singing "I Shall Wear a Crown (When it's all Over)."

Crystal Dozier, Tonia Carmichael, Amelda Hunter, and Leshanda Long were all eulogized in memorial services that were held within minutes of each other across Cleveland's east side on Saturday. Tishana Culver was remembered in a ceremony that took place Sunday evening --- the last of the ten victims who have been identified so far from the bodies found at Sowell's residence on Imperial Avenue. The remains of the 11th and final known victim have yet to be matched with a name...yet to be matched to a face...in some family's scrapbook of memories.

David C. Barnett was a senior arts & culture reporter for Ideastream Public Media. He retired in October 2022.