Hope: A Memoir of Survival

by Amanda Berry

Judge Russo asked if Castro had anything to say before sentencing. For the next sixteen minutes Castro stood at the defense table, rambling in a soft voice, without notes, appearing to voice thoughts as they came to him, in no particular order. He had pleaded guilty to almost a thousand counts of horrendous crimes. But he sounded, for all the world, like a man whose feelings had been hurt by all the mean things being said about him. He described being abused and said he was addicted to sex. He said that pornography had pushed him into “the art of masturbation,” which he would engage in for “two or three hours a day nonstop.” He claimed he had never been abusive until he met Nilda, whom he beat because “I couldn’t get her to quiet down.” Castro insisted that Jocelyn had had a “normal life” and would probably describe him as “the best dad in the world.”

On the bench Russo could barely conceal his disgust. He accepted the sentencing agreement and asked Castro to rise as he issued the court’s final word on his case: “Sir, there is no place in this city, there is no place in this country, indeed there is no place in this world for those who enslave others, those who sexually assault others, and those who brutalize others.

“For more than ten years you have preyed upon three young women. You subjected them to harsh and violent conduct. You felt you were dominating them, but you were incorrect. You did not take away their dignity. “Although they suffered terribly, Miss Knight, Miss DeJesus, and Miss Berry did not give up hope. They have persevered. In fact, they prevailed. These remarkable women again have their freedom, which is the most precious aspect of being an American.

“Mr. Castro, you forfeited that right. You now become a number with the Department of Rehabilitation and Correction. You will be confined for the remainder of your days. You are hereby remanded for transport to Lorain Correctional Institution. “Now for Miss Knight, Miss DeJesus, and Miss Berry, as well as your young daughter, we celebrate your futures. We acknowledge the faithfulness of your families, your friends, and all others in this community who so fervently believed that you were alive. On behalf of the judges and the staff of this court, we wish you continued succ...

I’m glad I didn’t go down to the courtroom. I didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of seeing me again.

He’s telling so many lies, it’s hard not to get angry. He keeps talking about the “harmony” on Seymour Avenue. Does he think people are stupid? He tied us up and forced all of us to say how much we wanted sex with him. He really is crazy if he actually believes we did.

My mom is there watching, and my aunt Peggy is actually climbing into the big crane. She takes the controls and smashes the claw straight into the second floor of the house, right into the bedroom where he held me. When the house starts crumbling, I can hear people cheering. I don’t make a sound, but nobody is cheering louder than me.

Castro also wrote an essay called “A Day in the Life of a Prisoner.” I eat, brush, and go back to bed, get up, lay down, get up, lay down. This goes on all day…. I pace in my cell, meditate, stare at the walls as I daydream a lot. I will never see light at the end of the tunnel, but that’s all right, it’s what I chose…. I’ve lots of time on my hands now to think and read, write, exercise. I want to make a bigger effort to try to commit to God. I also get depressed and don’t want to do anything but just lay here … Most of the guards here are okay, but the younger ones don’t take the job seriously or they are rude to me for no apparent reason…. Sometimes I drift into a negative thought, I check myself and try harder not to go there.

Her only unusual finding was an inch-high cross, in blue ballpoint pen ink, that Castro had drawn on the left side of his chest, directly over his heart, which looked like a small plea to God from a man who knew his Judgment Day had arrived.

Memories come from nowhere, unsettle me, and have a way of keeping me on edge, close to tears.

The officials noted that an increasing number of long-term missing children were being found alive, including in recent years Jaycee Dugard and Elizabeth Smart. But they also observed that none of those cases had been solved directly because of traditional police investigations into their disappearances. Amanda, Gina, and Michelle escaped on their own. Dugard was found when police became suspicious of her abductor for a completely unrelated matter. Smart was found when a viewer of America’s Most Wanted recognized her abductor from a suspect composite made by Smart’s sister.

That means that every three or four days a child is kidnapped somewhere in America.

The Prison Angel: Mother Antonia’s Journey from Beverly Hills to a Life of Service in a Mexican Jail.