Castro's son wants all of his father's belongings taken from cell

COLUMBUS, Ohio, Dec. 5 (UPI) -- The son of the Ohio man sentenced to life in prison for holding three women for years says he wants items taken from his father's cell when he killed himself.

Ariel Anthony Castro said he wants the personal items that were taken from the cell of his father, Ariel Castro, including a diary the son said he didn't know existed until this week when it was mentioned notably in a suicide consultants' report by the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction, the Columbus Dispatch reported Thursday.

In an interview with the Dispatch, Castro said he was concerned by information contained in two reports released this week about his father's suicide that suggested he could have been mistreated or neglected by prison workers.

While not expecting sympathy for his father, the younger Castro, 32, of Columbus, said his dad was a "human being and the guards shouldn't be allowed to treat him like anything other than a human being."

The elder Castro, a 53-year-old former Cleveland bus driver, was sentenced to life in prison plus 1,000 years after pleading guilty to more than 900 counts in his imprisonment of three women in his home for about 10 years. The women -- Amanda Berry, Gina DeJesus and Michelle Knight -- eventually were freed after Berry escaped and sought help.

"My father was definitely a monster just like people describe him for doing what he did," Castro said. "The life in prison sentence he received was appropriate."

Castro said he only received his father's glasses from authorities.

Castro said he did not know his father had written a diary until he read it in the report by Lindsay Hayes and Fred Cohen, experts the state hired to study a rash of prison suicides.

"I was never made aware there were more items that I'd never been given. I've never been given the opportunity to see them," Castro said.

The Hayes-Cohen report also mentioned a "placard" of photos found in the cell. However, photos weren't on the property list included in an Ohio Highway Patrol investigative report released Wednesday.

"If there were family pictures, I want to know where those pictures are," Castro said.

The Highway Patrol investigation, while providing new details, reached the same conclusion as the consultants -- Castro hanged himself.