Austrian Dad Threatened To Gas Family

Man Kept Daughter, Children In Basement For 24 Years

(AP)  An Austrian man who held his daughter captive for 24 years and fathered her seven children repeatedly warned his captives that they would be gassed if they tried to escape, a spokesman for investigators said Thursday.

The revelation came as authorities also said that Josef Fritzl forced his captive daughter to write a letter last year indicating he may have been planning to release her from the windowless dungeon where she lived with three of their children.

Police Col. Franz Polzer said Elisabeth Fritzl wrote in late 2007 to her family, who believed she had fled to a cult, that she wanted to return home but "it's not possible yet."

DNA testing on the letter proved that 42-year-old Elisabeth had written it, but she was forced to by her father, Polzer said.

"He may have had plans to end the captivity at some point," Polzer told The Associated Press. "It shows that he must have had a spark of humanity."

Fritzl's elaborate crime came to the attention of authorities April 19 when one of Elisabeth's daughters, 19-year-old Kerstin, was admitted to a hospital with an illness linked to an unidentified infection.

Baffled doctors appealed on television for Kerstin's mother to come forward because they needed information about her daughter's medical history. Fritzl then allowed Elisabeth to go to the hospital, and her story came to light.

A hospital spokesman said Thursday that Kerstin was in life-threatening condition. She was brought to the hospital unconscious and later suffered seizures. Now she remains in an induced coma and on a respirator, and is still undergoing dialysis because of the effects of a lack of oxygen, spokesman Klaus Schwertner said.

Meanwhile, Helmut Greiner, a spokesman for federal investigators, told the AP that officers were checking whether Fritzl had indeed set up a mechanism that could send gas into the dingy, windowless cellar as the suspect claimed during questioning.

Experts were also checking another Fritzl claim that the reinforced door leading to the enclosure had a timer that enabled it to be easily opened if he was gone for an unusually long period of time, said Greiner, spokesman for the Federal Bureau of Investigations.

Days before Elisabeth told police of her 24 years in captivity, law enforcement officials had become suspicious and started investigating Fritzl, according to a police statement.

It said police decided to compare DNA samples of the hospitalized Kerstin and of Fritzl, along with family members living with him, about 10 days before revealing the ordeal to the public. Fritzl and Elisabeth were detained April 26 near the hospital where Kerstin was being treated and Elisabeth then told her story to interrogators.

The letter is one piece of evidence helping authorities piece together Josef Fritzl's double life as both reputable citizen and "horror father" who allegedly held his own daughter and three of their children captive.

One of the children she bore him died as an infant, and Fritzl has confessed to tossing the corpse into a furnace. He managed to smuggle the other three out to be raised by him and his wife, who apparently was led to believe Elisabeth had given them up.

The case has shocked Austria, which is still scandalized by the 2006 case of Natascha Kampusch, who was kidnapped at age 10 and imprisoned in a basement outside Vienna for more than eight years.

Kampusch, who has started a charitable organization to help the Fritzl family, said she believed that Austria's Nazi past might have played some role.

"I think (abuse) exists worldwide, but I think it's also a ramification of the Second World War and its connection to education and so on," Kampusch said in an interview late Wednesday with the British Broadcasting Corp.

She said that during the Nazi era "the suppression of women was propagated. An authoritarian education was very important."

Police are also examining whether Fritzl was also responsible for an unsolved murder in the nearby lakeside village of Mondsee two decades ago, where he and his wife owned an inn and camping ground.

Compiling a complete profile of Fritzl has been difficult because he is refusing to undergo more questioning, police say.

The father faces up to 15 years in prison if convicted on rape charges, the most grave of his alleged offenses. However, prosecutors are investigating whether he can be charged with "murder through failure to act" in connection with the infant's death, a crime punishable by up to 20 years in prison.

[pdbarrick-2009]

15 years for 24+ years of hell and AT LEAST 7 rapes. pleaseeeeeee........this is NOTHING. He should FRY for that....and that it was his own daughter makes it even worse psychologically on her. This was a horrific crime and should be treated as such!

[juwboy]

gurusavant:

If I''m wrong, CBS News has my e-mail address, so they can set me right.

Perhaps you can enlighten me. Why do you think my Comment about this case was deleted?

[gurusavant]

who fed ''the downstairs family'' while he was on vacation in thailand? no one can tell me that some other folks didn''t know! there''s NO WAY!!! WTH is wrong with these people?

[gurusavant]

juwboy at 05:04 AM : May 02, 2008

omg. yer such an idiot.

[juwboy]

CBS NEWS HAS A NEONAZI EMPLOYEE

Several people have complained that pro-Israeli Comments are being deleted by a suspected Arab CBS employee.

Earlier this week, in another report about this incest case, I posted:

"Oesterreicher, the leading newspaper in Austria, the birthplace of Adolf Hitler, called this ''the greatest crime of all time''.

"Clearly a case of historical amnesia."

It was removed.

This would indicate that the culprit is far more likely to be a Neo-Nazi, rather than an Arab.

[minnick8-2009]

fibonacci

Don''t judge all Americans by the entries you see on this web site. People who work, have families, who are continuing education, don''t have much time to spend in here.

[b-easy63]

Politics have nothing to do with this. There are some policy differences between parties in the US, but making the other side out to be monsters like this guy is a cheap shot.

Posted by gwagener at 02:10 PM : May 01, 2008


go view www.armchairsubversive.com

(there is no comparable site for Dems yet--though the GOP has tried) after you read that neat little list of incest and child rape exploits--we can talk.

[b-easy63]

He may have had plans to end the captivity at some point," Polzer told The Associated Press. "It shows that he must have had a spark of humanity."


Not a spark of humanity--just that even with Viagra, he couldn''t keep the old rod propped up for the rapes anymore. After all, he is 73.

[gwagener]

True, but look at Sen. Craig, Foley from Florida and all the rightwing nutters who turn out to be sexual predators. If the shoe fits...
----------------------
Posted by wfbdem at 05:15 PM : May 01, 2008

This guy is a whole world of sick worse than those you cite. Craig is just a gay guy witha really bad case of denyal. The evidence is he was after consentual *** with adults. I''ll hand you Foley is a sick perv, but his crimes are tiny commpared to this guy. It is a horrible thing to say about anyone to compare to this kind of deviant. I would have said the same for Democrat, Catholic priest, member of the KKK, Nazi, etc.

[gaye5]

wfbdem, here in Australia it is the left wing who are the sexual problems.. they put in 6 pedophile judges, they make it so as although the laws are fairly good nothing is done if you do a crime unless you are one of the ones who has just made a mistake, if you are a know crim you get off..

[wfbdem]

Politics have nothing to do with this. There are some policy differences between parties in the US, but making the other side out to be monsters like this guy is a cheap shot.

Posted by gwagener

True, but look at Sen. Craig, Foley from Florida and all the rightwing nutters who turn out to be sexual predators. If the shoe fits...

[fibonacci_]

The lack of intelligence in America is really scary.

Posted by smiley676

ABSOLUTELY...WAY TOO MANY DUMMIES.

[gaye5]

FloydZepp, if the family lived in America he would get let off on some pretext

[gaye5]

DNA testing on the letter proved that 42-year-old Elisabeth had written it, but she was forced to by her father...
Or was he going to kill them all and use that later to show that she had been a long way away so as police wouldnt look for them there.

[renae2626]

That creep deserves alot more than 15 years he should sit there until he dies, the least of his punishment should be the time he held his daughter captive! What a wack job!

[honestabe8]

This guy is one sick puppy. I suppose the perfect punishment would be to chain him up to a toilet for the rest of his life and give large, violent diseased inmates a shot at him every day.

[fibonacci_]

loool Zepp

[pollroller1]

I bet he went to church every sunday.

[gurusavant]

just imagine if his wife had informed the authorities...he would have been released after a couple of years (if even imprisoned), and then...bye bye wifey...saionara! i couldn''t imagine being in a situation where my coming forward and providing information about a crime would put my life in danger, and no one would stop it. so it goes in a place like that. hate to say it like it is.