“The monster of Austria”: the father who kidnapped, locked up and raped his daughter for 24 years

This is a true life story that is stranger than fiction. In case of “The Austrian Monster” toured and shocked the whole world. For 24 years, Elisabeth Fritzl was held hostage in the basement of her house by her own father.

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The man he raped and tortured her for years, and as a result of her abuse seven children were born, however, in 2008 Elisabeth managed to escape from this hell. To this day, her father is paying her sentence, and although what she did to her deserves more years in prison, she could be free in 2024.

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Thirteen years later, in 2021, it was decided to bring the story on the big screen and the movie was releasedthe girl in the basement‘. This account and shows spooky details that the young woman lived at that time.

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Fritzl’s secrets

Joseph Fritzl, Elisabeth’s father, had it all planned before her kidnapping. he built during six years a basement in his own home, where not even his wife and six children were allowed to go near.

Fritzl was never an exemplary father, full of secrets, the man in 1967 had been denounced for rape to a woman, who in the future would become his wife. For this crime she spent a year and a half in jail. When she regained her freedom, she Rosemarie came back to accept him and she decided to create a life with him as if nothing had happened.

This union left six children and Elisabeth was the fourth baby to arrive at the home. From the beginning her father had abusive and violent behaviors. Fritzl was an expert in generating terror and concentrated most of his evil in his fourth daughter, who from a very young age controlled and prevented him from approaching other people.

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Josef Fritzl during a trip in Thailand in 1998. (Photo: Fritzl Family Album) (Fritzl Family Album/)

Elizabeth’s Hell

From the age of 11, Elisabeth was raped by her father. Tired of this situation, she started planning how she could escape of the house She started out working as a waitress in a restaurant to raise money and then fled to Vienna with a friend. Being away from her house didn’t last long as her father tracked her down and brought her back.

One afternoon when the house was empty, Fritzl asked Elisabeth for the favor of helping him with a task in the cellar. She, not knowing that this would be the last time she saw the outside, accepted. At that time, the young Austrian was 18 years old and was seen for the last time in 1984.

Her father already had it all planned out and told his wife and children that Elisabeth had decided to run away to join a religious community. At first his family doubted this story, but over time they gradually became convinced.

Photo of the kidnapped girl. (Photo: Fritzl Family Album) (Fritzl Family Album/)

locked in a airtight room 18 square meters under her house, was Elisabeth.

Fritzl had knowledge as an engineer and real estate developer, which was key to building this space that had a room, a small bathroom and a kitchen. Being under the house, not a single ray of light entered and no noise from outside was heard.

In that place she suffered violence and multiple sexual abuses that resulted in seven sons. Her first daughter was born in 1988 and named Kerstin, after her she was followed by Stefan, Lisa, Monika, Alexander, Michael, Felix and Michael, who died a few days after being born. Later it was learned that it was Josef who cremated the remains of the baby.

The basement room was very small and with the arrival of the children it represented a problem for her father, so she decided to devise a plan: she forced her daughter to write a letter saying that the religious community she was in did not accept babies, so she would leave them in the care of her grandparents.

This letter helped strengthen version that Fritzl gave when Elisabeth disappeared. In this way, three of his children lived in the upper part of the house.

One day, one of the girls in the basement broke down and Josef agreed to have her transferred to a hospital. Days later Elisabeth was able to go out to see her and that was the day her hell ended.

Back then it was 2008 and Elisabeth was no longer a teenager but a 42-year-old woman. She took advantage of the situation and told the doctors what she was experiencing, who took it upon themselves to call the police and arrested her father.

After a while the whole truth of what this man was doing to his daughter would be revealed. When the case became famous, the press baptized Joseph Fritzl What “The Austrian Monster”.

In the image Monika, Alexander and Lisa appear, the three children of Elisabeth who did not live in the basement. (Photo: Fritzl Family Album) (Fritzl Family Album/)

The story comes to the big screen

In February 2021, the film ‘The Girl in the Cellar’ was released, which tells the chilling story of what Elisabeth went through in her confinement. Clearly, the film has some differences as the story takes place in the United States and her name is not Elisabeth but Sara.

The protagonist is also kidnapped at the age of 18 and taken to the basement of her house, where she had four children. In the film you can see the love and dedication that she had as her mother, since she taught them to read, write and tried with a small television and a video player to have a ‘normal’ life.

As in real life, one of his daughters gets sick and is taken to the hospital. Sara is allowed to visit her and there she tells her story and she goes to freedom.

This story crudely shows the pain and horror that his family and his daughter, who was locked in the basement, had to experience.

The basement where Elisabeth lived for 24 years. (Photo: EFE) (EFE Agency/)

The not so happy ending of this story

When her father was arrested, both Elizabeth and her children have tried to rearrange their lives. They moved to another city, which is not revealed by the authorities to prevent the family from being re-victimized.

Josef Fritzl, who is currently 86 years old, was sentenced to life imprisonment on March 19, 2009. But at the beginning of this year 2022, the Krems Regional Court approved the transfer of the man to a special unit for the criminally insane in a normal prison.

This means that Fritzl could ask for freedom anticipated when serving 15 years of sentence, which will happen in 2024. The sad thing about this story is that the man will spend less time locked up than his daughter was, which has caused great social indignation.

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Source: Elcomercio