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US kidnap victims describe their torment in diaries

Ariel Castro is arraigned at Cleveland Municipal Court for the kidnapping of three women May 9, 2013 in Cleveland/AFP

Ariel Castro is arraigned at Cleveland Municipal Court for the kidnapping of three women May 9, 2013 in Cleveland/AFP

CHICAGO, Illinois- Diaries kept by three young women held captive for a decade in an Ohio home helped US prosecutors describe their suffering in a memo released ahead of their tormentor’s sentencing hearing Thursday.

The entries spoke of rape, vicious beatings, of being chained to a wall and locked in a dark room, of “being treated like an animal,” of “anticipating the next session of abuse,” and of “his threats to kill,” prosecutors said.

The women also wrote of “dreams of some day escaping and being reunited with family,” of “missing the lives they once enjoyed” and of their overwhelming desire for freedom.

Their tormentor, Ariel Castro, last week agreed to plead guilty and spend the rest of his life in prison with no chance of parole in exchange for prosecutors taking the death penalty off the table.

The former school bus driver, 53, is expected to speak about his catalogue of crimes when he is formally sentenced Thursday.

“Although he admits his disgusting and inhuman conduct, the defendant remains remorseless for his actions,” Cuyahoga county prosecutor Timothy McGinty wrote in the sentencing memo released late Wednesday.

At least one of Castro’s victims Michelle Knight, 32 may also deliver a statement by video or even in person, CNN reported.

Knight was the first to be snatched off the street in 2002 when she was 20. Next came Amanda Berry, kidnapped the night before her 17th birthday in 2003. Then came Gina DeJesus who was just 14 and a friend of Castro’s daughter when she was abducted in 2004.

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