Six-year-old girl born in captivity is 'happy and healthy': Amanda reveals Jocelyn was her 'Christmas baby' and has spent years being home-schooled

  • Amanda Berry's daughter Jocelyn, 6, ate a popsicle while being examined and smiled when she saw her mother smile, authorities said
  • Police sources: Girl would leave the home to visit her captor's mother
  • Detectives believe one of the three suspects is her father and are now carrying out DNA tests to confirm their suspicions

By Louise Boyle, David Mccormack and Becky Evans

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A little girl born to one of three women as she was imprisoned in a Cleveland home for a decade is 'happy and healthy' despite being brought up in captivity, authorities have revealed.

After kidnap victim Amanda Berry, 27, courageously escaped the home on Monday, she told her grandmother that the child is her daughter Jocelyn, who was born on Christmas six years ago.

Authorities believe that Jocelyn's father is one of the three brothers arrested in connection with the kidnappings and they are now carrying out paternity tests to confirm their suspicions.

The six-year-old girl was home-schooled by her mother, possibly without the knowledge of the suspects, Ariel Castro, 52, and his two brothers Onil Castro, 50, and Pedro Castro, 54.

Jocelyn, who escaped the home with Amanda and two other missing women, Gina DeJesus, 23, and Michelle Knight, 32, was pictured grinning in hospital alongside her mother and her aunt Beth.

Amanda Berry (center) at the Cleveland Hospital alongside her emotional sister (left) and daughter Jocelyn

Reunited: Amanda Berry (center) at the Cleveland Hospital alongside her emotional sister (left) and daughter Jocelyn that she gave birth to during the 10 years she was held against her will

The little girl, who authorities said enjoyed popsicles while being examined by doctors, is photographed lying in a hospital bed and showing off her missing two front teeth.

'She looks great, happy, healthy and ate a popsicle last night,' Cleveland Police Deputy Chief Ed Tomba said. 'Seeing her mother smile made her smile.'

 

He added that it was 'a good possibility' that one of the three suspects was her father.

Police are now trying to determine what life was like for the little girl inside the house of horrors. They do not have a record of her birth and are trying to establish if she was born in the fortified home.

Police sources said Jocelyn was occasionally taken out of the house and would visit Ariel Castro's mother, Lillian Rodriguez, who she called 'grandmother'.

Grandmother: Jocelyn visited Lillian Rodriguez (pictured center), the mother of kidnapping suspects Ariel, Oneil and Pedro Castro, according to police sources. The little girl called her 'grandmother'

Grandmother: Jocelyn visited Lillian Rodriguez (pictured center), the mother of kidnapping suspects Ariel, Oneil and Pedro Castro, according to police sources. The little girl called her 'grandmother'

Rodriguez was pictured returning from police questioning on Tuesday, but it is not known if she knew of the sick crimes allegedly carried out by her sons.

She was also seen out recently at a playground with Castro. When he was asked who the young girl was he told neighbors she was his girlfriend's daughter.

It is feared other babies were born inside the Cleveland house. At least five children may have born at the house, police sources told NewsChannel5.

One victim suffered up to three miscarriages because she was so malnourished, while other sources told WKYC the captors would beat the pregnant women, so that the babies would not survive.

It is unknown what happened to any children who were born at the home.

FBI Special Agent Vicki Anderson told ABC TV that the three woman had spent time together at Metro Medical Center hospital, where they were taken after being freed.

Found: Amanda Berry (left) and Gina DeJesus (right) were found alive in Cleveland on Monday following a decade-long search
Found: Amanda Berry (left) and Gina DeJesus (right) were found alive in Cleveland on Monday following a decade-long search

Found: Amanda Berry (left) and Gina DeJesus (right) were found alive in Cleveland on Monday afternoon

Missing: Michelle Knight, now 32, was also found inside the home, nearly 11 years after she went missing

Missing: Michelle Knight, now 32, was also found inside the home, nearly 11 years after she went missing

She described them as being in very good spirits and said it was obvious that they were very close.

'You could see that they had a bond, that they had been through this together,’ she said.

All three women were abducted between 2002 and 2004, Berry and DeJesus were in their teens at the time of their kidnappings and Knight was 20 years old.

On Monday evening, Berry began screaming from behind the locked front door of the home and was helped out by a neighbor. She fled the home and called 911.

Authorities are now investigating how the horrors inside the home went undetected for so long.

Neighbour Israel Lugo said other neighbors had seen naked women crawling on all fours behind Castro's house. Three men were in the garden and were controlling the women, he said.

Brothers: From left, Ariel, Onil and Pedro have all been arrested in connection with the abduction of Gina DeJesus, Amanda Berry and Michele Knight almost ten years ago

Brothers: From left, Ariel, Onil and Pedro have all been arrested in connection with the abduction of Gina DeJesus, Amanda Berry and Michele Knight almost ten years ago

The house in Cleveland which the three women escaped from on Monday

The house in Cleveland which the three women escaped from on Monday

House of horrors: In a photograph taken in 2001, suspect Ariel Castro stands with a former girlfriend in front of a padlocked door, which led to the basement, at his home on Seymore Avenue, Cleveland

House of horrors: In a photograph taken in 2001, suspect Ariel Castro stands with a former girlfriend in front of a padlocked door, which led to the basement, at his home on Seymore Avenue, Cleveland

'We thought it was funny at first, and then we thought that was weird so we called the cops,' neighbor Nina Samoylicz told CNN. 'They thought we was playing, joking, they didn't believe us.'

Neighbors waited for police for two hours but no patrol cars showed up.

Cleveland police said that the department has no records of a call for service to that home.

But the claim is one of a number of stories to have emerged from neighbors who say they reported unusual goings-on at Castro's Seymour Avenue, Cleveland home to local police who either didn't respond or didn't enter the house when they did show up.

Lugo said he also called police after his sister saw a woman and a baby standing in a window at the home which was half covered by a plank.

Lugo also said his mother was puzzled when Castro would park outside the home in his yellow school bus. He would go inside clutching bags of McDonalds and sodas.

***LOCATOR MAP: Missing Girls Cleveland

This map shows the block, Lorain Avenue, in Cleveland where the three girls went missing, years apart. They were found Monday on Seymour Avenue, approximately three miles from where they were abducted

Michelle Knight
Louwana Miller - Amanda Berry mother and daughter

Solved: Michelle Knight, left, vanished in 2002. A year later, Amanda Berry, right, went missing a day before her 17th birthday. She is pictured with her mother, who died before knowing her daughter was alive

It has emerged that Ariel Castro would allegedly use a sick game to 'train' the three girls not to run away by pretending to leave the house, only to beat them if they tried to run free.

It is said to be just one of the manipulative tactics he used to keep the three young women in his house for up to ten years, in addition to frequent beatings and chains hanging from the ceiling.

But on Tuesday, Cleveland Police said: 'Every single lead was followed up on no matter how small. We dug up yards, canvassed neighborhoods. [The] real hero is Amanda Berry.'

Until now the search for the missing women had been fruitless, a series of false leads and bitter disappointment for the desperate families.

Michelle Knight, who was 20 years old when she went missing in August 2002, was last seen at a cousin's house near West 106th Street and Lorain Avenue.

Three years later, in April 2003, Amanda Berry, disappeared after leaving her job at a Burger King - at West 110th Street and Lorain. It was the day before her 17th birthday.

Probe: Members of the FBI evidence response team carry out evidence from the home on Tuesday

Probe: Members of the FBI evidence response team carry out evidence from the home on Tuesday

Investigation: A truck is pulled out the driveway from the home where the three women were found

Investigation: A truck is pulled out the driveway from the home where the three women were found

And a year later, Gina DeJesus, then 14 years old, was last seen leaving her middle school at West 105th Street and Lorain.

All three were found safe on Monday night after Berry bolted from a home on Seymour Avenue, about three miles from where they were last seen.

She told police that she and the other girls were being held prisoner by Ariel Castro, 52, who has been arrested along with his two brothers on suspicion of kidnapping.

The Berry family has expressed their joy at having Amanda home.

'I didn’t know what to say. Best thing that ever happened to me. Best feeling I’ve ever had,' Amanda’s dad Johnny Berry told Newsnet5.

Her grandmother, Fern Gentry, spoke to Amanda on the phone from her home in Elizabethton, Tennessee.

Overjoyed: Fern Gentry speaks with her granddaughter Amanda Berry on the phone after her escape

Overjoyed: Fern Gentry speaks with her granddaughter Amanda Berry on the phone after her escape

Relief: Ricky DeJesus, brother of Gina, holds his head in his hand outside his family's home in Cleveland

Relief: Ricky DeJesus, brother of Gina, holds his head in his hand outside his family's home in Cleveland

Relief: A sign outside the Burger King where Amanda Berry was last seen before her kidnap

Found: A sign outside the Burger King where Amanda Berry was last seen before her kidnap in 2003

'I'm glad to have you back,' Gentry told her, with Amanda responding: 'I'm glad to be back.'

But the discovery is also laced in sadness as Amanda's mother, Louwana Miller, who relentlessly searched for her missing daughter, passed away in 2006 without knowing she was still alive.

The exact circumstances of the abductions is currently unclear, and it is not known whether or not the kidnapper deliberately targeted the block where all three victims were taken.

The Castro brothers are awaiting their arraignment on Wednesday morning, as authorities told ABC News that they plan to start questioning the men today.

A judge gave police extra time to file charges against the brothers, extending the charging period from 36 hours to 48 hours.

 

The comments below have not been moderated.

Just don't kill or execute them, put them very heavy chain for very looooong time, till those iron chains start penetrate their skins and finally eat their bones, that is what these brothers deserve. On the other hand its amazed to see no comments about these brother religion or belief neither any mention of their religion in article. Well, at least they should mention that they are devoted Christian and regular to Church, a dear sonny Jesus boys.

Click to rate     Rating   6

The other crazy Castro family members, the brothers, the grandmother, et al, KNEW what was going on at that house. The remaining brothers and the matriarch should all be brought up on charges as accessories to crimes after the fact. Evil covers for evil. Evil was nurtured in the Castro household. The authorities aren't divulging everything. Just wait.

Click to rate     Rating   36

You can't convince me that nobody else in that crazy Castro family knew. The brothers and the matriarch grandmother should all be brought up on charges as accessories after the fact. The authorities aren't divulging everything. Just wait.

Click to rate     Rating   30

I am beyond words that there are individuals out there that actually believe that this poor little girl should be able to bond with her father. It is so astonishing that I am unable to comprehend. I am praying that she never has to be anywhere near that man again in her lifetime.

Click to rate     Rating   75

Many more details emerging here in the U.S. At least 2 of the girls got in the car willingly with the kidnapper, one trusting him because she knew his daughter, after he offered them a ride home. Ariel Castro is the only one being charged. The two brothers apparently had nothing to do with the whole situation. And the story of the women being outside; they have told police they only went outside like 2x and that was to the garage. They were never in the yard or the garden. Michelle Knight's mother is running her mouth and telling way too much info about her daughter, I think probably out of guilt that she had a bad relationship with her daughter and maybe believed her daughter ran away vs. being taken.

Click to rate     Rating   14

She is a credit to her mother and her mother ONLY! A little ray of light in an otherwise completely dark experience.

Click to rate     Rating   52

Thank heavens they are all now safe. I am no scientist but if the captors were brothers with the same parents, how will DNA show which one is Jocelyn's father? Surely their DNA will be the same? - Trendynan, Portsmouth, 8/5/2013 12:00 --------- Haha, are you serious with this question? It doesn't take a scientist to answer it for you, merely someone with a middle school education.

Click to rate     Rating   11

I just want to give Amanda a big hug. The fact that she is able to smile ( and a beautiful one that too) with her daughter in a hospital after enduring so much really speaks about her spirit. I'm sure she will get through this and will lead a long, happy life, filled with love and security from now on!

Click to rate     Rating   49

To the one's saying he went out of his way to homeschool the little girl... Did you even read the article?? "The six-year-old girl was home-schooled by her mother, possibly without the knowledge of the suspects, Ariel Castro, 52, and his two brothers Onil Castro, 50, and Pedro Castro, 54."

Click to rate     Rating   43

To the one's saying he went out of his way to homeschool the little girl... Did you even read the article?? "The six-year-old girl was home-schooled by her mother, possibly without the knowledge of the suspects, Ariel Castro, 52, and his two brothers Onil Castro, 50, and Pedro Castro, 54."

Click to rate     Rating   23

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