CLEVELAND, Ohio: Unem-ployed US bus driver Ariel Castro was ordered held on an $8m bond yesterday on charges he kidnapped and raped three women and held them in his home for a decade.
In his first court appearance since the revelation of a crime that has shocked and disgusted a nation, the 52-year-old suspect did not enter a plea and was sent to county jail, where he is to be placed on suicide watch.
Castro was arrested on Monday. He was presented to the court by public defender Kathleen DeMetz, who said he was “charged with kidnapping and rape on one charge, kidnapping and rape on the second, kidnapping and rape on the third, and kidnapping on the fourth.”
After the hearing she said: “I would imagine the county will place him in a single cell under a suicide watch and in protective custody where nobody has access to him.”
She said Castro could not meet the bail terms, as he would have to provide $800,000 in cash, and said that it was normal that no plea be entered at a preliminary municipal court hearing on a felony charge. Arguing for an astronomically high bail bond that would effectively ensure that Castro is not freed pending his trial, county prosecutor Brian Murphy told the court that the suspect had “manipulated and deceived.”
“The charges against Castro are based on premeditated, deliberate, depraved decisions to snatch three young ladies from Cleveland West Side streets to be used in whatever self-gratifying, self-serving way he saw fit,” he said. “Two of the victims incurred a horrifying ordeal for more than a decade, a third for close to a decade, and the ordeal eventually resulted in a little girl believed to have been born to one of the women while in captivity.
“And also, along with captivity, there were repeated beatings. They were bound and restrained and sexually assaulted, basically never freed to leave this residence,” he said.
Castro kept his head bowed impassively through much of the hearing, chewing on the collar of the dark-blue uniform issued to him during his detention. Municipal court judge Lauren Moore set the bond terms — $2m in each of the four cases — and instructed that Castro was to have no contact with any of his alleged victims.
Meanwhile, Cleveland media reported details of a note reportedly found by police in Castro’s home in which he describes himself as a “sexual predator” and ponders killing himself and leaving his savings to his victims. “They are here against their will because they made a mistake of getting in a car with a total stranger,” said the note, apparently written in 2004.
Castro’s brothers — 54-year-old Pedro and 50-year-old Onil — were also arrested on Monday following the women’s rescue, but prosecutors say they have found nothing to link them to the kidnapping case.
Deputy Police Chief Ed Tomba refused to comment on reports that Castro had impregnated Knight at least five times and would punch her in the stomach until she miscarried. DeJesus, Berry and Berry’s six-year-old daughter Joceleyn have returned to their families. Knight is still receiving treatment after her ordeal.
Afp
