Cleveland -
The three women held captive in a house for a decade were chained to the wall “like trophies”, police revealed on Wednesday night.
Investigators have found chains and ropes that were used to bind the women, bondage-style, at the neck and waist.
Neighbours also claimed they had seen naked women being led around the back yard of the house in Cleveland on all fours on the end of dog leashes.
Police chief Michael McGrath said the women - kidnapped as long ago as 2002 and only released after one of them broke out on Monday - spent most of their time bound in the house.
They were very occasionally allowed out into the small back garden, which was hidden from view behind a 2.5m fence made of chicken wire and tarpaulins.
Michelle Knight was abducted aged 20 in 2002, Amanda Berry was 16 when she vanished in 2003 and Gina DeJesus just 14 when she disappeared on her way home from school in 2004.
On Wednesday night, Chief McGrath said they were preparing to charge home-owner Ariel Castro, 52, and his brothers, Pedro, 54, and Onil, 50, with crimes including kidnap and rape.
According to a source, Ariel Castro - who lived alone in the house with the trio and kept the upstairs rooms and basement locked - would play a twisted game with his helpless hostages to “train” them not to escape.
“He would tell the women he was about to leave the home, and then he would wait and if one of them tried to open the door, he would go in and attack them,” said the source.
The theory that their captor conditioned the women through fear would explain why he managed to keep their presence secret in a street of closely-packed houses. Witnesses said Miss Berry was terrified that Castro would return any moment from a trip to a local McDonald’s when they helped her break out of the house’s front door and finally sound the alarm.
Officials face accusations that they did little over the years to find the missing trio.
But police on Wednesday rejected claims they had ignored a string of calls from locals about strange incidents at the house, insisting call centre logs showed no such warnings.
But Cleveland police has a poor track record in following up such cases. In 2011, local man Anthony Sowell was convicted of raping and killing 11 local women after police failed to act on a string of complaints made against him.
In the most disturbing of the alleged missed clues in the Castro case, local man Israel Lugo claimed women in a neighbouring apartment told him they had once called police after seeing three girls crawling on all fours with dog leashes around their necks.
Three men were controlling them in Castro’s back garden, they said. The women told Mr Lugo they waited for two hours but police never responded to their calls.
While Miss Knight remained in hospital, the other women on Wednesday returned home to their friends and family they haven’t seen for years. Miss Berry was joined by her six-year-old daughter, Jocelyn, fathered by one of her captors.
Gina DeJesus, now 23, gave a thumbs-up as she arrived at her mother’s home, which was surrounded by a media army and hundreds of well-wishers.
Her aunt Sandra Ruiz said: “There are not enough words to say or express the joy that we feel for the return of our family member Gina, and now Amanda Berry, her daughter and Michelle Knight who is our family also.
“I want to say thank you, but I’m also going to put my foot down as the mean one of the family. We are asking for your support to be patient with us. Give us time and privacy to heal. When we’re ready, I promise every single one of you guys that we’ll talk to you.”
Amanda Berry rushed into her sister’s home earlier in the day through a back door. Her sister, Beth Serrano, emerged from the house and said: “We are so happy to have Amanda home. We request privacy to recover.”
Earlier, Miss Berry’s grandmother, Fern Gentry, fought back tears as she spoke on the phone to her granddaughter from her home in Tennessee.
“I’m glad to have you back,” she told her, to which Miss Berry - struggling to speak - replied: “I’m glad to be back”. When her grandmother added: “I thought you were gone”, she replied simply: “Nope, I’m here.” On Wednesday night it also emerged that former school bus driver Ariel Castro comforted the mother of Gina DeJesus over her disappearance - while the missing girl was chained up in his basement nearby.
Castro was friends with Gina’s father, Felix, and appeared as shocked as everybody else in their neighbourhood when the 14-year-old vanished in 2004.
Incredibly, one of Castro’s daughters was the last person to see her on the day she disappeared. Her father handed out fliers with the girl’s photo and performed music at a fund-raiser held in her honour.
And when friends gathered for a candlelight vigil a year ago to remember Gina, he was there comforting the lost girl’s heartbroken mother.
Neighbours said Castro played bass guitar in salsa and merengue bands and gave local children rides on his motorcycle.
Gina’s uncle, Tito DeJesus, played in bands with Castro over the last 20 years. He recalled visiting the house but said he never noticed anything out of the ordinary.
Juan Perez, who lives two doors down from Castro, said he was always happy and respectful.
“He gained trust with the kids and with the parents. You can only do that if you’re nice,” he added.
Castro helped search for Gina after she disappeared, said Khalid Samad, a friend of the family.
“When we went out to look for Gina, he helped pass out fliers,” said Mr Samad, a community activist who was at the hospital with Gina and her family on Monday night. “You know, he was friends with the family.”
Antony Quiros said he was at the vigil about a year ago and saw Castro comforting Gina’s mother.
Another neighbour, Francisco Cruz, said he was with Castro the day investigators dug up a yard looking for the girls.
Castro told Mr Cruz, “They’re not going to find anyone there.”
A relative of the three brothers said their family was “totally shocked” after hearing about the missing women being found at the home.
Juan Alicea said the arrests of his wife’s brothers had left relatives “as blindsided as anyone else” in their Puerto Rican community.
He said he hadn’t been to the home of his brother-in-law Ariel Castro since the early 1990s but had eaten dinner with Castro at a different brother’s house shortly before the arrests were made on Monday. - Daily Mail