Ariel Castro death: Prison guards falsified monitoring logs

An Ohio officials report note that two prison guards falsified logs documenting their observation of kidnapper Ariel Castro in the hours before he killed himself.

A state inquiry has found video footage indicating that two guards failed to make checks at least eight times on the day Ariel Castro was found hanged in his cell.

It also asks authorities to consider whether he died of auto-er**ic asphyxiation.

Ariel Castro, 53, was jailed for life for abducting three women – Michelle Knight, Gina DeJesus and Amanda Berry – over a decade.

He had raped them repeatedly at his home in Cleveland.

The Ohio Department for Rehabilitation and Correction published its findings on Thursday.

The report said that prison guards had failed to check Ariel Castro at least eight times between 15:03 and 20:15 local time on 3 September. He was found hanged in his cell in Orient, Ohio, at 21:18.

The document said that “post log books were falsified” and that “there was no satisfactory verification process in place”.

It was also revealed that Ariel Castro “was found in his cell with a Bible open to John Chapters 2 and 3”.

“Additionally, he had pictures of his family out and arranged in a poster-board fashion. His pants and underwear were pulled down to his ankles.”

The convict left no suicide note.

The report said Ariel Castro’s intentions were unclear, however the facts had been “relayed to the Ohio State Highway Patrol for consideration of the possibility of auto-er**ic asphyxiation”.

Ariel Castro was supposed to have been checked by guards in his isolation cell in Orient, Ohio every 30 minutes.

He was taken off suicide watch in June after authorities determined he was not at risk of taking his own life.

They also denied Ariel Castro permission to receive independent mental counseling, even though he had previously contemplated suicide and was likely to suffer depression after his sentence, his lawyer Craig Weintraub told reporters last month.

The former school bus driver abducted Michelle Knight, 32, Amanda Berry, 27, and Gina DeJesus, 23, from the Cleveland streets between 2002-04.

The three women escaped from Castro’s home on May 6.

Ariel Castro was sentenced on August 1st to life imprisonment without parole plus 1,000 years.

In an interview soon after his conviction, Ariel Castro’s lawyers said that he fit the profile of someone with a sociopathic disorder.

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