CLEVELAND, Dec. 3 (UPI) -- A report issued by prison experts said Ariel Castro committed suicide in an Ohio prison and did not die performing the sex act of auto-erotic asphyxiation.
Additionally, a journal he began writing when he was first sent to prison reveals a manic personality and a tone that suggests Castro thought he deserved better treatment from prison guards and fellow inmates, The Columbus (Ohio) Dispatch reported Tuesday.
The journal shows an obsession with the quality of meals in the prison and fellow inmates interviewed for the report said guards regularly harassed Castro, taunting him about what they might have done to his food.
The report also states Castro rarely came out of his cell for recreation and was disciplined multiple times for refusing to put clothes on in the presence of female corrections officers.
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The report, filed by independent consultants Lindsay M. Hayes and Fred Cohen, was commissioned by the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction. Castro, 53, a Cleveland bus driver, pleaded guilty to nearly 1,000 charges after he was found holding three women captive as sex slaves for a decade.
He hanged himself Sept. 3 in his cell at the Correctional Reception Center in Orient.
Some had suggested Castro was attempting to perform a sex act by choking himself with a bed sheet while masturbating, but Hayes and Cohen said evidence suggests otherwise, the Los Angeles Times reported. Castro left a Bible open on his bunk to verses in the Book of John, along with family photos and references to other Bible verses laid out on the desk in his cell.
Ultimately, the report concludes, Castro's suicide was probably not preventable.
"In conclusion, based upon the fact that this inmate was going to remain in prison for the rest of his natural life under the probability of continued perceived harassment and threats to his safety, his death was not predictable on Sept. 3, 2013, but his suicide was not surprising and perhaps inevitable," the report states.
The report also debunked initial allegations that a failure to complete assigned rounds by guards could have prevented Castro's suicide. The report states a guard last saw Castro just 26 minutes before he was found hanging in his cell.
