Kidnap Victim’s Mother Says She’d Hug Ariel Castro, Say ‘God Bless You’ (+video)

Photo Credit: ABC NewsThe mother of Gina DeJesus, whom Ariel Castro allegedly abducted and kept as a sex slave in his Cleveland home for a decade, had a surprising answer when asked what she would say to Castro.

“I would hug him and I would say, ‘God bless you.’ I would say, ‘God bless you,’ and I’d hug him. I did not hate him. I forgave him years ago. I said it: I forgive whoever done it, just let her go,” Nancy Ruiz told “20/20” anchor David Muir in an exclusive interview Thursday.

“Because you know what?” Ruiz added. “When you start to hate a person, that eats you up. I don’t have time for that. I have to be, you know, I want to be happy, like I am now.”

Ariel Castro’s cousin, Maria Castro Montes, had a different answer when Muir asked her the same question.

“I wouldn’t be able to look at him. I couldn’t say anything to him. Why? Shame on you? How could you do this? I don’t even want to ask him those questions. I don’t even want to look at him,” Montes said in an exclusive interview Thursday.

Read more from this story HERE.