Ohio kidnapper Ariel Castro commits suicide in prison
Ariel Castro, sentenced to life in prison for the abduction, rape and torture of three Cleveland women, hangs himself with a bedsheet in his prison cell.
The 53-year-old, who was under protective custody in isolation from other inmates, was found hanged by prison staff during their rounds at the facility, prison officials have said.
After prison medical personnel tried to resuscitate him, Castro was transferred to an area hospital and pronounced dead about 90 minutes later.
An Ohio coroner confirmed on Wednesday that Castro had killed himself, using a bedsheet.
Castro was sentenced on 1 August to life plus 1,000 years in prison without the possibility of parole for abducting his three victims between 2002 and 2004 and keeping them imprisoned in the dungeon-like confines of his house, where they were starved, beaten and sexually assaulted for 10 years.
He pleaded guilty in July to a total of 937 offences, including kidnapping, rape, felonious assault and a charge of aggravated murder under a fetal homicide law for the forcible miscarriage of one of his three victims.
Spared death penalty
A deal with prosecutors spared Castro a possible death penalty for murder.
Cuyahoga county prosecutor Tim McGinty acknowledged after Castro’s sentencing that a suicide note and confession written by Castro was found by authorities at his residence when they searched his home following his arrest in May.
Castro was taken into custody just after the three women he held captive – Amanda Berry, 27, Gina DeJesus, 23, and Michelle Knight, 32 – were freed from the house with the assistance of neighbours who heard Berry’s cries for help.
Rescued along with them was Ms Berry’s 6-year-old daughter, fathered by Castro and born during her mother’s captivity.