Kidnapper of Cleveland accepts life imprisonment
Ariel Castro, who was accused of keeping in captivity, for more than one decade, three young women in the city of Cleveland, accepted on friday his sentence, without parole, which determines that he must remain for more than 1000 years in prison to avoid being executed.
“Do you understand that you will never get out of jail?”, asked the judge to the defendant, who answered a simple yes .
Castro faced a total of 977 charges, 512 of them for kidnapping, 446 for rape, 7 for sexual abuse, and 2 for aggravated homicide for allegedly having beaten one of the kidnapped girls to cause an abortion.
To this list, seven charges for sexual assault were added; three, for child neglect and another one for possession of criminal tools.
The start of the trial was scheduled for next August, but the agreement between Castro and the judge will prevent the three women to take the stand and relive their memories in captivity.
Castro’s family, among them, his brothers Pedro and Onil, said that they didn’t regret the sentence and that they hoped that “Ariel stagnate in prison” by the damage caused to the victims and his own family.