Three women who vanished as teenagers about a decade ago were discovered alive in a house in Cleveland, and the home's owner and his two brothers were arrested, police said on Tuesday. Authorities were alerted to their whereabouts on Monday evening by a frantic emergency call from one of them, Amanda Berry, moments after she was freed from the house by a neighbour who said he heard screaming and came to her aid.
"Help me! I'm Amanda Berry. ... I've been kidnapped and I've been missing for 10 years and I'm here. I'm free now," Berry, now 27, can be heard telling a 911 operator in a recording of the call released by police. Police descended upon the house within minutes to find Berry along with Gina DeJesus, who vanished in 2004, and Michelle Knight, who went missing in 2002 at age 20 and is now 32, police said at a news conference on Tuesday.
They also discovered a 6-year-old girl believed to be Berry's daughter, police said. The three women were taken to MetroHealth Medical Center, where they were reunited with family and friends, and released on Tuesday, a spokeswoman said. The owner of the house, Ariel Castro, 52, a school bus driver was arrested, as were his brothers Pedro, 54, and another brother, Onil, age 50, police said.