Austrian admits 24-year abuse of captive daughter
AMSTETTEN, Austria (Reuters) - A 73-year-old Austrian electrical engineer has confessed to holding his daughter captive in a secret, windowless cellar for 24 years and fathering seven children by her, police said on Monday.
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Josef Fritzl is seen in this Austrian police handout picture released April 28, 2008. (REUTERS/HO/Police) |
The case, centred on a nondescript two-storey building in the small industrial town of Amstetten, bears chilling similarities to that of Austrian Natascha Kampusch who spent eight years locked up in a basement before escaping in 2006.
Some parts of the 60 square metre basement in which the family were kept were no more than 1.70 metres (5 ft 6 in) high and officials said the basement even contained a padded cell.
"This is an appalling crime. I know of no comparable case in Austria," Franz Prucher, head of security for Lower Austria told a news conference.
Elisabeth Fritzl, 42, says her father, Josef Fritzl, lured her into the basement in 1984 and drugged and handcuffed her before imprisoning her.
Three of her children, aged 19, 18 and 5, had been locked up in the basement with her since birth and had never seen sunlight, police said, raising worries about their physical and mental state. The younger two were boys, the eldest a girl.
The victims are receiving medical treatment, said police.
Three other children -- two girls and one boy -- were adopted and brought up by Josef and his wife. Neighbours told police they had never heard the children locked in the cellar.
As well as confessing to locking up his daughter for 24 years and siring the seven children, Fritzl admitted to burning the body of the seventh child in a furnace used to heat the building when it died soon after birth, said Franz Polzer, head of criminal investigations in the state of Lower Austria.
Investigators combed through the cells where the victims had been held captive. Forensic experts in white uniforms and gloves carried out boxes of evidence from the building, which is home to several other families.
AUTHORITARIAN
Fritzl, whom police described as "dynamic, bossy and authoritarian", had hidden the entrance to the cell behind shelves and only he knew the secret code for the reinforced concrete door, said officials.
Photographs showed a narrow passageway leading into other rooms which included a cooking area, with children's drawings on the walls, a sleeping area and a small bathroom with a shower.
The victims' only sources of information from the outside world were a television and radio.
Authorities said there were still many questions hanging over the case, such as the conditions surrounding the births of the children and how those locked in the cellar were provided with food and clothes.
Amstetten, located in rolling hills about 130 km (80 miles) west of Vienna, is a town of about 22,000 people.
The case unfolded when the 19-year-old girl became seriously ill and was taken to hospital, where doctors appealed for her mother to come forward to give details of her medical history.
The girl was suffering cramping fits caused by oxygen deficiency, chief doctor Albert Reiter told journalists, and was currently in a "severe but stable condition" in hospital. The cellar had been fitted with a basic ventilation system.
Fritzl brought Elisabeth and her remaining two children out of the basement, telling his wife their "missing" daughter had chosen to return home, police said.
Elisabeth agreed to make a thorough statement to the police after receiving assurances she would have no further contact with her father, who she said abused her from the age of 11.
SHAME
The case has raised questions about how authorities and neighbours failed to notice anything unusual in the "house of horrors", on a busy street with shops, not least because over the years officials said Fritzl built extensions to the cellar.
"The community of Amstetten should drown in shame ... The neighbours are turning a blind eye," the Oesterreich newspaper wrote in an editorial.
Polzer said Fritzl had led a "double life" for 24 years.
"He deceived us all," he told reporters. "This man, who already had a family with seven children by his wife, had in this cellar seven more children by his own daughter."
Another puzzle is how Josef's wife Rosemarie could have remained ignorant.
Police have said they believe Rosemarie did not know what happened to her daughter when she disappeared in 1984. It was assumed Elisabeth had left voluntarily when her parents received a letter from her saying they should not search for her.
After Elisabeth disappeared, Fritzl said Elisabeth had joined a sect and that she had left the children on the doorstep. He forced Elisabeth to handwrite letters to prove his claims, said the police.
Psychiatrist Max Friedrich, who treated Kampusch, said the children who had been held in the cellar would need trauma therapy and were undergoing tests in hospital, in particular for problems with their eyes and skin due to the lack of daylight.
By contrast, the children raised by their grandparents were integrated into the community, said officials, noting they were members of the police sports club and voluntary fire brigade.
Copyright © 2008 ReutersSource from TheStar Online
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This news from Austria really shocks me, from the root of my hair to toe of my foot..
I have no idea what's going on. If all the reports are for real, I can only say this man is REALLY INSANE!
He has locked down his very own daughter for 24 years in a very small basement, without any light or sunlight; not only that, he also sexually abused her for so many years and have 7 children with his VERY OWN daughter!! What is he thinking ? That he is romantically in-love his daughter ?? And want to keep her close and making lover with her ?!?! That's disgusting, dirty, crazy!
What happen to this world? Where the pure love of a Father to the Daughter? What so "lovely" or "sexy" about her daughter that he will do such animal things to her.
Shame of him ! Uncivilized like an animal...
By the way, there are so many unanswered questions in this case..especially his wife..is she really so dumb and don't know what's going on? She should have miss her own daughter and will keep on asking his husband when he brought back 3 kids from her. Or she actually knows the whole thing, and cover up for her beloved husband? Or there are the other side of this story?
I feel very sorry for Elizabeth, her life was a truly sad story. Hope she can get a better life now, at least her children will live happilly.
Elizabeth, I'll pray for you. Hope you get well soon~
