Ariel Castro Did Commit Suicide: New Report

Prison consultants reject notion that he died of autoerotic asphyxiation
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Dec 3, 2013 9:20 AM CST
Ariel Castro Did Commit Suicide: New Report
In this Thursday, Aug. 1, 2013, file photo, Ariel Castro makes a statement in the courtroom during his sentencing phase in Cleveland.   (AP Photo/Tony Dejak, File)

Two corrections consultants have concluded that Cleveland kidnapper Ariel Castro committed suicide in his prison cell and didn't die by accidentally killing himself while attempting to achieve a sexual thrill. The nationally regarded consultants rejected a suggestion in a state prisons report in October that Castro's Sept. 3 hanging was not a suicide as originally believed.

The consultants' report released today says all available evidence, including a shrine-like display in Castro's cell and an increasing tone of frustration in his prison journal, points to suicide. The 53-year-old Castro had just begun serving a life sentence plus 1,000 years for imprisoning and raping three women in his shuttered house for a decade; he was found hanging in his cell from a sheet attached to a window hinge. Click for more on the case. (More Ariel Castro stories.)

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