Ariel Castro indicted on aggravated murder, rape, kidnapping charges

[alp227]

Source: Plain Dealer

A Cuyahoga County grand jury returned a 329-count indictment this afternoon against Ariel Castro, charging the 52-year-old Cleveland man with the kidnapping and rape of Amanda Berry, Gina DeJesus and Michelle Knight.

Castro was indicted for one act of aggravated murder – for purposely and with prior calculation and design causing the unlawful termination of another's pregnancy,said County Prosecutor Timothy J. McGinty.

The indictments cover only the period from August of 2002, when the first of the three women discovered in his Seymour Avenue house disappeared, until February of 2007.

Castro also was indicted on 139 counts of rape, 177 counts of kidnapping, seven counts of gross sexual imposition, three counts of felonious assault and one count of possession of criminal tools.

Read more: http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index.ssf/2013/06/ariel_castro_indicted_on_charg.html

[heaven05]

1. well

good. may he never have a moments peace, ever again.

[bluedigger]

2. I hope he pleads out.

That case is going to take forever - let the victims get on with their lives.

[freshwest]

3. Life in prison without parole. He'd do if again if he got out.

[Cha]

4. Those poor girls now women who had to endure

that monster.

[historylovr]

5. K & R

I hope he rots in prison.

[davidpdx]

6. Interesting, the prosecutor had mentioned possibly charging him with a count of kidnapping

for each day he held each of the three victims which would have been well over 2,000 counts.

The 329 is manageable seems reasonable. The only one that maybe hard to prove is the aggravated murder depending upon what evidence they have. I have a feeling that one is there to leave the possibility of going after him with the death penalty (most people including myself would rather see him rot in prison).

I think he's going to have to plead out to avoid the death penalty. Of course looking at Ohio's history it appears they haven't actually carried out an execution in the last five years and several people's sentences have been commuted by both Governor Strickland and Kasich.

[jessie04]

7. I'm against the death penalty

but in this case I would make an exception.

[bitchkitty]

8. Then you are not against the death penalty. n/t

[davidpdx]

9. I think it's perfectly acceptable to hate him

given what he is done, but actually whether I was for or against the death penalty I think it wouldn't matter much. I would really rather see him rot in jail. The only two possibilities are going to be life without the possibility of parole or the death penalty. My guess is the prosecutors are going to go for the death penalty and force him to take a plea of life without parole.

[wickerwoman]

11. He's obviously a piece of shit

but I don't like the precedent of charging him with murder for terminating a pregnancy. A fetus is not a person and charging him with murder gives anti-abortion groups a massive foot in the door.

He should get life in prison for kidnapping, aggravated assault and rape. He's not a murderer (unless they dig another girl up).

I think the real issue is that the penalties for rape under these kinds of circumstances are not strict enough.

[colorado_ufo]

12. The way the two pregnancies (at least two) were terminated

were due to aggravated battery and starvation. He could have killed the mother. He injured her many times with grave injuries. This is at least attempted murder of the mother.

What is the charge to bring, then, against terminating a pregnancy against the mother's will, and in a manner that endangers her life and causes great suffering? Is there a statute for that? Did he "steal" the fetus from her, which would relegate a potential life to the status of a material thing? At what point did the termination occur? Could the fetus have survived outside the mother?

We are all aware that a fetus is not an independent person, just as an embryo is not a fetus. But at some point, the embryo then fetus then premature infant becomes a baby. It is a progression with an indefinite timeline but with a presumed outcome. What of the abortion "doctor" who was recently charged with killing fetuses (premature babies?) that were moving, breathing, and perhaps crying after his aborting (forcibly delivering?) them? Is it only murder after a natural birth? If a baby (perhaps mistakenly premature at the time) is delivered by C-section, does the doctor or mother then have the right to terminate the baby's life?

Perhaps what we need is an entire section of law devoted to the unborn child, with appropriate applications for the stages of that child's development. We can't apply adult law to children in any reasonable fashion, and we cannot reasonably apply adult law or juvenile law to fetuses. We cannot simplify the complexity of this issue: The fetus is dependent upon the mother, and the mother should not be compelled to carry an unwanted child, especially if that pregnancy endangers her life. At some point, though, during the timeline of the pregnancy, the unborn fetus/potential child's welfare and assumed rights as a person, and the mother's rights of decision, become more closely aligned. However, no mother should be forced to endanger her life for the sake of a pregnancy. Not only is her life valuable, but ultimately, that potential child need a mother, as do any other children she might have.

In the case against this man, just as there are exacerabating circumstances in the commission of a crime, such as armed robbery versus simple robbery, there are so many factors involved here - including kidnapping, battery, imprisonment, repeated rapes, and more - along with the violent, depraved nature of the pregnancy's termination, along with his gross indifference to human life - to my way of thinking, these elevated the termination of prenancy in this case to the status of murder. Had the mother died during this ordeal, the charge of first degree murder of the mother would not have been questioned.

[wickerwoman]

14. It's aggravated assault and reckless endangerment.

Grievous bodily harm. Kidnapping (is there a category of aggravated kidnapping?). I think we already have statutes that cover what he did without granting personhood to the fetus.

I also think it would be hard to prove attempted murder of the mother as intent in this case would be impossible to establish. Had the mother died, yes it would have been murder because she died. She didn't die. No "person" died. Therefore it's not murder.

In a perverse way, the way he did it argues against attempted murder. If he wanted to kill a girl chained in his basement that nobody was looking for and who had no way to defend herself, he had a million better options than starving her and punching her in the stomach. It was clear that his intent was to terminate the pregnancy without killing the mother.

I'm not willing to make unnecessary concessions to the anti-abortion lobby. If it's inside the mother, it's not a person. Once it's outside the mother, if it's capable of surviving, it's a person.

[rebecca_herman]

15. In my state (Connecticut) it's a more severe assault charge

It's considered a more serious assault against a woman if it terminates a pregnancy against her wishes. The main thing is that the woman and not the fetus is considered the victim for her loss. The death penalty was not an option for that charge back when we still had the death penalty here. I agree with how my state handles it, for the most part.

[davidpdx]

13. Good point, I don't like that either

I think it will be very hard to get a conviction on that one. But if they did, it could set a precedent for some vicious prosecutor down the road of accusing a woman of terminating her pregnancy and charging her with murder.

I have no idea what the penalties are in California are for rape. I'm not sure the penalties will matter in the end in this case as it is likely the sentences will be consecutive making prison his home for the rest of his life as it should be.

[Auntie Bush]

16. If a man batters his pregnant wife and she loses the baby...should he be charged with murder?

[davidpdx]

18. Honestly that is a tough one

I do think he should pay for murdering his own child, but at the same time look at it the other way. Would you want a woman who was in an accident that through no fault of her own lost her child charged with murder? The answer for that one is much more simple, but at the same time how can you have it both ways? Yes there is a big difference in intent. If the woman in the second scenario were in a deep red state that passed an ultraconservative abortion restriction (which we know has happened) with inadequate counsel and was indited her for killing her unborn child, she could face time behind bars. I think there are enough overzealous prosecutors who are holier than now who would take a shot at trying to put her away. It doesn't say much for my faith in the system I guess.

[obama2terms]

10. What a sick man

Lock em up and throw away the key!

[Travelman]

17. 329 counts?

Surely the prosecution is hoping for a plea deal. I can't imagine finding out that you're on a jury that has to decide 329 freaking counts of an indictment. Leaving aside everything else (e.g. a trial that would probably take a year or more in court), just reading of the verdict would take hours:

On the first count of the indictment, how do you find?
Guilty.
On the second count of the indictment, how do you find?
Guilty.
On the third count of the indictment, how do you find?
Guilty.
On the fourth count of the indictment, how do you find?
Guilty.
On the fifth count of the indictment, how do you find?
Guilty.
On the sixth count of the indictment, how do you find?
Jesus Christ! How long is this going to take? I need a nap already just from dealing with this....

[bettyellen]

19. and those are only the charges for up to 2007, so expect a whole lot more.