Robert Castro Incident

The Incident

Ariel Castro the 53 year old former school bus driver who abducted and held three young girls captive for 10 years was sentenced to life in prison plus 1,000 years as reported on CNN (Brown and McLaughlin). Three young women between the ages of 14 and 21 went missing a year apart from one another in a small “tight-knit community” in Cleveland (Donaghue). All were lured into a van with a promise of a ride by a friend’s father. There the girls were held against their will for ten years filled with torture, rape, starvation, pregnancy and miscarriages. The girls were tied up with chains and ropes in several rooms throughout the house that were rigged to keep them from the outside world. One of the young girls, Amanda Berry along

He considered this to be a symbol of having a higher status. He became a school bus driver for Cleveland ISD, and maintained this job for a while. In 2000, Castro met Lillian a woman almost half his age, but he soon broke it off when they became too close. She questioned as to why his house was kept with padlocks not knowing that Michelle was chained in there. He explained that he broke up with her because he “couldn’t juggle both of them” (Berry and Dejesus 117-127). In the book Hope I can see that the three victims were all similar to one another. They were young girls who had known Castro’s daughter. Amanda Berry and Gina DeJesus had family waiting for them when they returned and were sought after their disappearance. Michelle Knight was not looked for when she disappeared. This angered Castro and he played mind games with Michelle telling her that no one even wanted her. She had several pregnancies while in captive, and all ended in brutal beatings so that she miscarried(Brown and McLaughlin). She was a small girl who looked younger than her actual age. This is what made Castro kidnap her; however, he was upset to find out her real age later (Berry and DeJesus168). He liked younger woman (394). We see this pattern with his first girlfriend being younger than him. He was addicted to porn, and watched it often while masturbating to it (528). What is surprising is that he had kids of his own whom were around the age of the victims