The guy who had abducted and imprisoned the three women, as well as raped Berry's daughter, was 52-year-old Ariel Castro, who had a lengthy history of domestic abuse. On August 22, 2002, at the age of 21, he had kidnapped Lee. Castro, a customer, offered to assist her when she stopped at a business to seek for directions because she was running late for a meeting over her son's custody. Castro had four children, none of whom lived with Lee, thus Lee was only passingly acquainted with him.
Along with celebrating these achievements, the women also had to deal with the challenging process of reintegrating into their families and communities. Similar to Jaycee Dugard, who spent eighteen years abducted in California,Lee also discovered that taking part in an equine-therapy program was beneficial.
Berry has been able to provide her daughter with a secure and wholesome upbringing. On May 6, 2016, which was the third anniversary of her escape from Castro's mansion, Lee tied the knot.
There were many first-time experiences that Lee, Berry, and DeJesus were eager to have when they were at last set free. Learning to drive was one of DeJesus's top priorities when she made her escape at the age of 23. She is returning to school and has obtained her driver's license. DeJesus was set to attend John Marshall High School, where Berry also went, and both she and Berry were awarded honorary high school degrees.
On the day the women absconded, Castro was taken into custody. In order to avoid the death penalty, he entered a guilty plea to 937 of the 977 charges against which he had later been accused. On July 27, 2013, he was sentenced to life in prison plus an additional 1,000 years. On September 3, that year, less than two months later, he was discovered dead in his prison cell, appearing to have committed himself.
Castro sexually assaulted and tormented the three of them for ten more years. To prevent them from escaping, he boarded up the windows, closed the doors, and chained them inside their rooms. During her five years of captivity, Lee fell pregnant five times, and each time he violently terminated her pregnancy against her consent.
Additionally, he used psychological manipulation on them by occasionally "pretending" to leave the house and then surreptitiously returning to make sure they remained. He threatened to kill them if he discovered them attempting to escape.
One year later, on April 2, 2004, 14-year-old Gina DeJesus, who was in the seventh grade, was kidnapped by Castro, one of his daughter's closest friends.
On April 21, 2003, Berry was stolen by Castro while she was walking home from her employment at Burger King. Berry was only one day away from turning seventeen. Castro utilized the fact that she knew some of his children just like Lee did to disarm her when he offered to give her a ride home.
Castro offered Lee a ride, taking advantage of the fact that Lee knew his daughter and that she was anxious to go to the custody hearing. He drove her back to his house, where he raped and tied her, rather than taking her to the meeting location her son's foster home.
TV news teams descended at a Cleveland, Ohio residence on May 6, 2013, to cover a terrifying story: three women and a girl had just broken free from the house after ten years of captivity. Amanda Berry had called for assistance from her neighbor Charles Ramsey that day by sticking her arm out from behind a barred storm door. Berry and her 6-year-old daughter Jocelyn were freed with his assistance. Two other women, Michelle Knight, now known as Lily Rose Lee, and Georgina "Gina" DeJesus, appeared when police arrived.
Under her own name, Lee has written and published two books: Life After Darkness in 2018 and Finding Me in 2014. Joy and DeJesus co-wrote their own book, Hope, with Pulitzer Prize-winning reporters Kevin Sullivan and Mary Jordan, which was published in 2015.
It still seems odd to DeJesus to watch the impact she has on individuals. "I still get excited about it, but I'm still Gina," she adds. "I'm just an everyday person,"
Colon observes that families searching for a missing loved one are greatly impacted by even simply meeting DeJesus, a missing person who did eventually make it home. She claims that "her presence alone lets them breathe." "It merely offers them hope."
"We wanted to bring [something] positive to the street, which is why our space is on West 25th and Seymour, right on the corner where I was held captive for nine years," adds DeJesus. "Anybody can be on that street too if I am allowed to be there."
The center's main office is set to open in November 2020 on the same block as the residence at 2207 Seymour Avenue, where Castro held DeJesus captive for almost ten years. (The actual house has been destroyed).
For instance, when DeJesus' mother contacted the police the first day Gina vanished, they didn't look into Gina's case right enough because they thought Gina had escaped. Colon, believes that teaching police personnel how to react compassionately to missing person reports is one aspect of the center's mission.
In an interview, DeJesus discusses her motivation for establishing a facility just for families. "I didn't like that when [my parents] told me a little bit [about] how they were treated when I came home," the woman claims.
DeJesus joined Northeast Ohio AMBER Alert as an ambassador at the beginning of 2018. She and her cousin Sylvia Colon declared later that year that they were going to establish the Cleveland Family Center for Missing Children and Adults. Serving the families of those who go missing is the organization's main goal. The center assists them in creating fliers, serves as a liaison between the police and the media, and follows up with families to ensure that they are receiving proper nutrition, rest, and self-care.
All three of the women also keep up their efforts to support survivors, bring attention to missing people, or assist the families of those who are missing. In order to aid other survivors, Lee established Lily's Ray of Hope, offering among other things shelter, clothes, and support for their education. Berry has been hosting a missing persons feature on FOX 8 News Cleveland since 2017.
Director of Case Western Reserve University's Begun Center for Violence Prevention Research and EducationDaniel J. Flannery says, "There's not 'one size fits all' for how someone comes out of these situations and figures out a way to cope and reintegrate."
"I think the young women have each done some of those things, sometimes that's by writing, sometimes that's by talking about it, and sometimes that's by taking an advocacy role."
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