Cleveland Kidnapper Commits Suicide
I have no particular feelings about this, other than to note that he never suffered the way his victims did:
Ariel Castro, the man convicted earlier this year of kidnapping three woman, holding them in his Cleveland home for nearly a decade, and repeatedly sexually assaulting them, committed suicide in his Ohio jail cell Tuesday night, according to an Ohio corrections official.
A statement from the Ohio Department of Corrections said Castro, 53, was found hanging in his cell at the Correctional Reception Center in the town of Orient at 9:20 p.m. local time. After prison medical staff attempted to perform life-saving measures, Castro was transferred to The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center in Columbus, where he was pronounced dead at 10:52 p.m.
Castro, a former bus driver, was sentenced to life in prison plus 1,000 years on August 1 for kidnapping and sexually assaulting Amanda Berry, Michelle Knight, and Gina DeJesus while holding them captive in his house. He even fathered a daughter with Berry, but was barred from seeing the child as a consequence of his sentence.
So there you have it.
Good riddance.
SPQR (768505) — 9/3/2013 @ 10:46 pmSaved taxpayers a lot of money he did!
Yoda (ee1de0) — 9/3/2013 @ 10:58 pmHe has gone on to what he deserves.
Dustin (303dca) — 9/3/2013 @ 11:13 pmDoes this say how he did it?
He had said he had a sickness but the judge didn’t wan to credit that. I don’t know why.
Sammy Finkelman (67ff63) — 9/3/2013 @ 11:14 pmI’m sure he was motivated by the vision of what his “future” was going to be.
Frankly, this was the best outcome for the victims and the state. He’s dead and they don’t have to pay thousands to keep him alive.
Wish more guilty criminals would take this way out.
Jcw46 (6106c6) — 9/3/2013 @ 11:25 pmSammy, they claim that he “was found hanging in his cell”; but that’s impossible cuz of how the only thing he coulda made a noose out of was his prison pants, and they had been spot-welded to his legs!
Icy (3919ae) — 9/4/2013 @ 12:08 amInvestigate & discuss.
Icy,
Suspicious to Yoda, it is not! However, Spammy a totally illogical
Yoda (c1642d) — 9/4/2013 @ 1:07 amhypothesisfantasy undoubtedly will make! ie., Victims three, into jail they break, hang tormentor they do, etc., etc., ad infinitum he will purvey.Icy,
Encourage hyperventilating paranoid schizophrenics do not!
Yoda (c1642d) — 9/4/2013 @ 1:08 ami love a story with a happy ending…
now cremate the body and send his ashes to the city dump.
redc1c4 (abd49e) — 9/4/2013 @ 1:33 amIt’s nice to wake up to good news.
nk (875f57) — 9/4/2013 @ 3:00 amWhat took so long?
mg (31009b) — 9/4/2013 @ 3:15 amHe could have used quicker suicide assistance.
Don’t you just love how even with someone serving a sentence of natural life or facing execution that they have to try life saving measures? Personally I would say if such a prisoner is found hanging leave them for half an hour or so to make sure the job is truly done and only then investigate to make sure it really was a suicide.
Soronel Haetir (02427a) — 9/4/2013 @ 3:31 amI wonder how he’s getting along with Welcome Woman.
(Karma points to those who get the reference without googling.)
nk (875f57) — 9/4/2013 @ 3:58 amHe was likely to be killed in prison, anyway, so this saved the taxpayers money.
joe (93323e) — 9/4/2013 @ 4:45 amIt seems satire that this happened in the Ohio prison system’s “reception center.”
What a name! It sounds like the kind of place you go to meet your cruise ship.
Steve57 (35dd46) — 9/4/2013 @ 5:30 amOur esteemed host wrote:
Well, at least for a couple of minutes while he was strangling himself to death, he did.
I am opposed to capital punishment but would very much allow the idea of suicide rooms, or even the convenient placement of a noose in every cell, just in case the prisoners wanted to use it.
I’m not sure why “prison medical staff attempted to perform life-saving measures,” other than they have to.
The malevolent Dana (3e4784) — 9/4/2013 @ 5:40 amSaved some bucks. Got rid of a bad guy. What is not to feel good about?
Rodney King's Spirit (ae12ec) — 9/4/2013 @ 5:47 amWhat took so long?
He could have used quicker suicide assistance.
Comment by mg (31009b) — 9/4/2013 @ 3:15 am
— Prisoners are not required to enroll in Obamacare.
Icy (3919ae) — 9/4/2013 @ 6:04 amThis is not justice. This is not even dignity.
Amphipolis (d3e04f) — 9/4/2013 @ 6:46 amHe was in protective custody, but not under a suicide watch.
This is the second recent suicide of a major criminal in an Ohio prison. On Aug. 4, death row inmate Billy Slagle was found hanged in his cell just days before his scheduled execution.
Sammy Finkelman (67ff63) — 9/4/2013 @ 6:59 amI suppose it’s possible maybe there are some people in the prison system helping this along.
The family complained that it took so long to inform them (2 hours) that they were told he was dead by a reporter.
Sammy Finkelman (67ff63) — 9/4/2013 @ 7:01 amAs a CO my only concern is that this scumbag’s family is now going to sue and claim they lost a valued family member, and are deprived of visiting him etc. Then the officers on duty are going to get a free rectal exam courtesy of the state and their jobs will be in peril. Seriously though..mark my words..his ‘family’ will sue and claim to have lost some sort of close relationship..the same family who wasn’t ‘close’ enough to him to know he held three women captive while brutalizing them! If this doesn’t happen over the next 2 years I will host a beer summit at my house and admit I posted stupidly!
Pamela (8d3d77) — 9/4/2013 @ 7:03 amI hope he repented but it sounds like selfish despair.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 9/4/2013 @ 7:06 amI know that as a Pious Agnostic, I am supposed to grieve for any suicide who succumbs to despair and denies himself the saving grace of God and the certainty of salvation.
But as a truthful Pious Agnostic, I have to confess that I don’t feel that way. Good riddance to bad rubbish.
Pious Agnostic (6c0f18) — 9/4/2013 @ 7:21 amFor his three victims and the child I hope this “closure” (and I tend to hate that word generally) will substantially aid their healing and give them a better chance to live out their lives known for other things than just people who were tied to Ariel Castro’s evil. They’ll not have to be constantly reminded of him in the news or appeals courts or read about his taking prison “beatings” or worse. Hopefully the press will leave them alone.
May they find peace and some value in “out of sight out of mind”.
elissa (7929de) — 9/4/2013 @ 7:31 amHang him again, just to be certain.
Orcadrvr (5daf3f) — 9/4/2013 @ 8:20 amI hope nobody is recanting their view on right to die.
Richard Aubrey (6c93a4) — 9/4/2013 @ 8:51 amnk#13: It’s from “Inferno,” by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inferno_(Niven_and_Pournelle_novel)
Did you like the sequel?
Where do I obtain those kharma points of yours? I could use some.
Simon Jester (290534) — 9/4/2013 @ 9:06 amNope. Heroes in Hell. Most prominently in the Martin Caidin “There Are No Fighter Pilots in Hell” story. She is very alluring as she welcomes the new sinners in the elevator going down. Guess where she has sharp teeth.
nk (875f57) — 9/4/2013 @ 9:25 amHe avoided the death penalty by accepting a plea deal that did not include the murders of the babies. Thus even this thread calls him a kidnapper, but not a murderer.
This is not justice.
Amphipolis (d3e04f) — 9/4/2013 @ 1:32 pmAh, nk. I still remember the poem from that story, and who does live in Hell other than fighter pilots.
You and I apparently share some tastes! I loved Martin Caidin’s workmanlike prose. Quite a fellow. He believed some odd stuff, but he could sure turn a phrase.
He was the guy you invented the “Six Million Dollar Man” as a novel and had a piece of the series.
I’m very fond of Dean Ing. You?
Simon Jester (c8876d) — 9/4/2013 @ 2:34 pmThis is the right thread. Nk, here is the not-in-super-good-taste song:
http://www.fighterpilotuniversity.com/music-and-theater/songs/ain-t-no-fighter-pilot-s-down-in-hell/
Simon Jester (c8876d) — 9/4/2013 @ 2:38 pmHe hanged himself with a bedsheet.
Sammy Finkelman (2646d3) — 9/4/2013 @ 3:47 pmAgreed on both Caidin and Ing, Simon. I had read Marooned and Cyborg, before I saw them on the screen.
Full disclosure, I was the sci-fi expert in Miss Mertes’s Battle of the Books team on Chicago’s PBS station, with a sub-specialty in Norton and Heinlein, 1969-1971. Have spacesuit, will travel with the Time Traders through Star Gate and meet you at Farnham’s Freehold. 😉
nk (875f57) — 9/4/2013 @ 5:08 pmKarma points for the song, those are the lyrics that Caidin recited in the story. The Lords of Karma have already entered them in your account.
nk (875f57) — 9/4/2013 @ 5:27 pmWe should talk sometime. I have a bit of trinitite that RAH collected himself and had sitting in his office for twenty years, sent to me by Ginny herself.
Those were the days, huh?
Simon Jester (c8876d) — 9/4/2013 @ 6:10 pmAnd on the subject of cyborgs, 20/50 without glasses, up from 20/2400, four days after the operation. I now feel secure knowing that I will be able to find food and water if I am ever stranded on a desert island.
nk (875f57) — 9/4/2013 @ 6:19 pmGood for you, nk!
(The eyesight, that is).
I read Sci-Fi in Jr. high and high school, then took a class on sci fi in college in the comparative lit department. I forget who the author was that gave a lecture one day…but it seemed that about everything was supposedly phallic symbolism (Nazis on motorcycles with clubs or some such).
MD in Philly (f9371b) — 9/4/2013 @ 6:28 pmMost of us shook our heads and said, “That’s what we’ve been reading?”
I remember Have spacesuit, will travel. What kid wouldn’t want a spacesuit with a built-in drugstore? I bought that book along with the Dueling machine at the school book fair.
felipe (6100bc) — 9/4/2013 @ 6:41 pmFidel Castro hanged himself ?
Elephant Stone (6a6f37) — 9/4/2013 @ 6:43 pmWhat ?
MD, I think that author was prolly projecting.
felipe (6100bc) — 9/4/2013 @ 6:44 pmsave everybody some money, more should go like he did!
marc (dadcb0) — 9/5/2013 @ 5:46 amMD, I’ve been racking my brain … does either Zebrowski or Stirling ring a bell? Vonnegut??
In any event, I recommend “Dredd” on Netflix for you. Not the Stallone one, new and much better. Bloody, don’t let your daughter near it, but you saw worse in anatomy. You’ll like the message.
nk (875f57) — 9/6/2013 @ 5:51 amNone of those names ring a bell, definitely not Vonnegut, Asimov, Clark
At least the paperback version was red with an illustration of the nazis on motorcycles coming at you. their weapon of choice was some club thing which they would have people kiss as an act of submission, which was which he said was phallic symbolism (with a chuckle and snicker).
MD in Philly (f9371b) — 9/6/2013 @ 6:11 amI know, I know, that’s the bookcover that’s in my head, too. Dang.
nk (875f57) — 9/6/2013 @ 6:47 amThis was in the ’70s, right? Norman Spinrad!
nk (875f57) — 9/6/2013 @ 7:27 amThe Iron Dream (images of several bookcovers) or one of its sequels. Not my bag, but some of his other stuff was great.
nk (875f57) — 9/6/2013 @ 8:39 amYes, nk, that was it. The cover on the second row, 2nd from the Left was the book.
MD in Philly (f9371b) — 9/6/2013 @ 3:26 pmWonderful news, nk #37.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 9/6/2013 @ 3:38 pm