A Rockville man drowned his three young children, one by one, in the bathtub of a Baltimore hotel room Saturday and then spent the night before confessing to hotel security the next day, police said Monday.

“Cases like this one are difficult," Baltimore City Police Commissioner Fred Bealefeld said this morning. “They have an incredible emotional impact on everyone involved.”

Mark Anthony Castillo, 41, of Rockville, was taken into police custody but has not been charged in connection with the deaths of his three children, Anthony, 6; Austin, 4; and Athena, 2.

“This tragedy not only makes one wonder and question why someone would do such an act, but it also emphasizes the fact that mental health and how we deal with mental health is a huge, huge problem,” Mayor Sheila Dixon said.

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Police plan to search Mark Castillo’s Rockville home and van and expect to charge him soon.

He took his children to the Inner Harbor on Saturday before checking into the hotel, police said.

Mark Castillo was separated, but not divorced, from his wife, Amy Castillo, police said.

The pair fought over custody of their children, court documents show.

When Mark Castillo didn’t return his three children to their mother when he was supposed to at 8:30 p.m. Saturday, Amy Castillo called Montgomery County police.

A man who sounded like he was crying declined to comment when he answered the phone today at Amy Castillo’s Silver Spring residence.

Mark Castillo called the front desk at Baltimore Marriott Inner Harbor at Camden Yards around 1:15 p.m. Sunday and said he had killed his three children and was about to hurt himself, police said.

Hotel security found three children dead in a 10th-floor room and discovered Mark Castillo with self-inflicted wounds that did not appear life-threatening, police said.

The sight of the dead children was so traumatic for the first responders to the scene that the fire department’s certified stress unit had to counsel them, city firefighters said.

kvolkmann@baltimoreexaminer.com