Sex act might have killed Castro: Authorities
COLUMBUS, Ohio — Kidnapper Ariel Castro’s death by hanging in his prison cell may not have been suicide, but an attempt to choke himself for a sexual thrill, authorities said on Thursday.
They also said two guards falsified logs documenting the number of times they checked on Castro before he died.
The report from the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction suggests — but does not conclude — that Castro may have died as the result of auto-erotic asphyxiation, whereby individuals achieve sexual satisfaction while choking themselves into unconsciousness.
Castro’s pants and underwear were pulled down to his ankles when he was found Sept. 3 in his cell at a prison reception centre south of Columbus, the report said.
He had a sheet wrapped around his neck, which was attached to a window hinge, investigators said.
Officials found a Bible open to John, chapters two and three and pictures of Castro’s family arranged “in a poster-board fashion,” according to the report. Those facts were forwarded to the state highway patrol “for consideration of the possibility of auto-erotic asphyxiation,” the report said.
The coroner classified Castro’s death as a suicide last week. The day he died, he expressed interest in the possibility he would serve his time segregated from the general prison population. Castro, 53, was a few weeks into a life sentence after pleading guilty in August to kidnapping three women from the streets of Cleveland, then imprisoning them in his home for a decade during which time he repeatedly raped and beat them.