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Cleveland suspect Ariel Castro was investigated by police for child kidnap

Man accused of holding three young women captive for a decade had been sacked as school bus driver but not charged

Ed Pilkington in Cleveland
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 8 May 2013 03.50 BST

The suspect accused of holding three women captive in Ohio for a decade was investigated by police in 2004 for abduction and endangering children after he kept a boy on his school bus for two hours.

Ariel Castro, 52, was revealed to have driven the boy around instead of dropping him off at school, at one point ordering him to "lay down, bitch".

Castro, who was fired from his job as a school bus driver in 2012, has been arrested with his two brothers Pedro, 54, and Onil, 50, in connection with the imprisonment of three women who escaped from his home in a western neighbourhood of Cleveland on Monday night.

Senior police officers have insisted they did everything they could in the course of the decade to try and find the women: Michelle Knight, who was abducted in August 2002 aged 21, Amanda Berry, who vanished the following April at age 16, and Gina DeJesus, who was 14 when she disappeared in April 2004.

But a disciplinary file prepared by Cleveland metropolitan school district shows that he was investigated by police, shortly before DeJesus went missing, in connection with two serious alleged crimes: abduction and child endangering.

On 26 January 2004 Castro picked up two children to take them to a special program to treat their attention deficit disorder at Wade Park elementary school in Cleveland. Castro dropped off one of the children but according to the police incident report the other child, a boy, was not escorted to school and stayed on the bus.

Castro came back to the bus and drove it, with the boy still present, to Wendy's fast-food restaurant where he had lunch, leaving the child in the vehicle alone. As he did so, he told the boy: "Lay down, bitch".

After eating, the report says, Castro "returned to the bus and drove around for a while. [He] parked the bus at a bus parking lot for a period of time" before finally dropping off the child about two hours after he had picked him up.

In the course of that inquiry police visited Castro's house in Seymour Avenue where on Monday night the three women escaped. But finding no one at home, officers went away and never came back.

The police report said the investigation found no evidence of sexual assault or other assault of the boy. The inquiry concluded that Castro had broken no law, though the school board suspended him for 60 days for the incident.

The disciplinary file also shows that he was reprimanded by his employers on three other occasions. He was suspended for a further 60 days for having made a U-turn in a school bus packed with students amid rush-hour traffic, an incident for which he apologised.

He was also castigated for having used a school bus to do grocery shopping, and most recently for having left a bus at Scranton school for four hours to return home. In his self-defence he handwrote a letter to the board in which he said: "I felt tired that day."

For these cumulative breaches of the rules Castro was sacked from his bus driving job in November 2012.

Cleveland man charged with kidnapping, rape; no charges for 2 brothers
By Erin McClam, Staff Writer, NBC News

In the Cleveland house where they were held for years on end, the three kidnapped women either remained chained in the basement or lived upstairs. Ariel Castro, who has been charged with four counts of kidnapping and three counts of rape, reportedly kept the doors locked. On the rare occasion that the women did go outside, they were heavily disguised, according to police. NBC's Ron Allen reports.

The Cleveland man charged with holding three women captive for a decade impregnated one of them five times and punched her in the stomach until she miscarried, police said Wednesday in a chilling report on the kidnappings.

The man forced one of his captives, Michelle Knight, to deliver the baby of another captive, Amanda Berry, in a kiddie pool, and threatened to kill Knight if the baby died, police said.

Police made the revelations in a report that laid out a nightmarish captivity, including starvation and imprisonment in the basement. One official said the women apparently were allowed outside the house only twice, and briefly, in the years after they were captured.

The Cleveland city prosecutor charged the man, Ariel Castro, with four counts of kidnapping — one for each of the three women and one for a baby that was born to Berry six years ago. Castro was also charged with three counts of rape for each of the adult women.

But authorities filed no charges against two of Castro’s brothers who were arrested Monday night, after Berry escaped the house with the help of a neighbor and the other two women were freed.

Authorities said they had no evidence that the two brothers, Pedro and Onil Castro, were involved in the kidnappings.

The three captives — Berry, Knight and Gina DeJesus — were allowed only in the backyard when they were let outdoors at all, and were forced to wear wigs and sunglasses when they left the house, the report said.

The escape came on Monday, when Castro went to McDonald’s and left a “big inside door” unlocked, the report said. That was when Berry broke through a locked storm door, afraid to open it further because she worried that Castro was testing her, the report said. Berry made it out and called 911.

“From what we know, their only opportunity to escape was the other day when Amanda escaped,” said Ed Tomba, the deputy Cleveland police chief.

All three women told police that Castro initially chained them in the basement, the report said, but he ultimately let them live on the second floor of the home, a shabby, two-story dwelling on Cleveland’s West Side.

The women were not in the same room but did know the others were there, Tomba said.

“As far as what the circumstances were inside that home, and the control he may have had over those girls, we don’t know that yet,” he said.

According to the report, Knight told investigators that she carried Castro’s baby “at least” five times, and that when he found out, he “would make her abort the baby” — starving her for two weeks and repeatedly punching her in the stomach until she miscarried.

When Berry’s baby was born, Knight put her mouth to the baby’s to keep it alive — and keep herself alive because Castro had threatened to kill her, the report said.

Berry told investigators that none of the women had seen a doctor during their captivity, the report said.

One police source close to the investigation cautioned earlier in the day that it was hard to be sure the women’s memories were completely accurate after such a long time in captivity.

Earlier Wednesday, DeJesus and Berry returned home to their families, both greeted by cheering crowds and huge displays of balloons, ribbons, teddy bears and encouraging signs. DeJesus gave a thumbs up.

“She was happy,” said her aunt, Sandra Ruiz. “She looked at the house and wanted a tour.”

Knight remained in a Cleveland hospital and was getting mental health treatment, her mother said.

Cleveland authorities said that a search of the Castro house had revealed no human remains. FBI agents returned to the house Wednesday and also searched a house two doors down that appeared to be abandoned.

Authorities said they did not suspect Castro had kidnapped anyone else. They said they had questioned Castro about the disappearance of a fourth Cleveland woman, Ashley Summers.

Castro was due in court Thursday morning for arraignment. The two brothers are also due in court Thursday, but on unrelated misdemeanor charges, authorities said.

“There is no evidence that these two individuals had any involvement in the commission of the crimes committed against Michelle, Gina, Amanda and the minor child,” said Victor Perez, the city prosecutor.

The three women were reported missing in Cleveland months apart: Knight in August 2002 after losing custody of her son, Berry in April 2003 after finishing her part-time shift at a Burger King, and DeJesus in April 2004 while walking home from middle school.

The police report suggests Castro used the same tactic to capture each of them: He offered them a ride. In Berry’s case, he told her he had a son who also worked at Burger King.

When Berry made her break for freedom years later, kicking the door and screaming, a neighbor, Charles Ramsey, helped free her. In her 911 call, Berry pleaded with the dispatcher to send help: “I’m Amanda Berry. I’ve been on the news for the last 10 years.”

When help came, two police officers crawled through a broken panel of the storm door and kicked it open to allow other officers in, the report said.

Two officers went upstairs, and the other two women threw themselves into the officers’ arms, it said.

Berry is now 27, DeJesus 23 and Knight 32.

McGrath said that the house had come to the attention of police only twice — in 2000, when Ariel Castro called about a fight on the street, and in 2004, when Castro, a school bus driver, had left behind one of his passengers.

The chief’s account conflicts with that of at least one neighbor, Israel Lugo, who told MSNBC on Tuesday that he called the police in 2011 after his sister spotted a woman with a baby in the home, banging on the window “like she wants to get out.”

McGrath said that his department would have a record of such a call and that there was none. He said that he was “absolutely confident” that his officers did not miss a chance to free the three women.

Ariel Castro, 52, was accused in 2005 of attacking his former wife, The Plain Dealer newspaper reported. Her lawyer at the time said that although the ex-wife had custody of their children, Castro “frequently abducts daughters and keeps them from mother,’’ the newspaper reported.

Khalid Samad, a community organizer, told NBC News that Castro had accompanied him on searches for the missing women.

First lady Michelle Obama told NBC News that the kidnappings were “probably a parent’s worst nightmare.”

“These families are going to have to wrap their arms around these young women and make sure that they get all the help and support they need so that they will go on and lead healthy, normal lives,” she told TODAY. “We’re just grateful that they’re safe.”

Videos and pics: http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/05/08/18123601-cleveland-man-charged-with-kidnapping-rape-no-charges-for-2-brothers?lite

Pedro Silva wrote:Sabot, your words are mine:

"The first thing we are likely to hear about Madeleine being found is that she is at a secret address with her Mother and Father and the twins."

bb1 wrote:http://news.sky.com/story/1088675/ohio-kidnap-rescue-recordings-released

Good job it wasn't a forker who took the call. They would have decided it was a hoax, and rushed to tell their fellow-forkers all about 'Clarrie's latest'.