Gina DeJesus, Amanda Berry: Ariel Castro’s Victims Finally Graduate High School [Video]

Gina DeJeses and Amanda Berry, two of the girls who were kidnapped, held captive, and tortured, for years by Ariel Castro, have finally had their dreams of graduating high school come true.

Castro stole 10 years of the girls lives, keeping them from the major life events that most of us take for granted. One milestone they didn’t get to take part in was their high school graduation. However, on Wednesday, May 27, the girls finally got to put on their caps and gowns and were presented honorary diplomas from John Marshall High School, the school Amanda attended before she was abducted in 2003, according to Cleavland.com.

“It was awesome,” Amanda said following the ceremony. “I always wanted to grow up and be somebody and do something with my life, you know? I always planned to graduate, and my mom always wanted that for me, to see me cross the stage. So this means everything to me.”

Berry and DeJesus, who would have attended the high school the following year after she was kidnapped, joined the John Marshall Class of 2015 during its graduation ceremony at the Wolstein Center at Cleveland State University.

Before her nightmare started, Amanda had big dreams of becoming the first person in her family to graduate college, and she spoke of those dreams in her new book, co-wrote with Gina, Hope: A Memoir of Survival in Cleveland, which was published last month and is currently a New York Times best seller, HNGN reports.

“After I graduate from college I am going to earn enough money to buy my own house,” Berry wrote.

Now that they have received their diplomas, Amanda Berry and Gina DeJesus can finally go to college and celebrate other milestones in their lives. Ariel Castro no longer has the power to hold them back from anything they choose to do.

Congratulations Amanda and Gina!

[Photos via YouTube screenshots]