73 year old Josef Fritzl, from Amstetten in Austria, has today confessed to holding his 42 year old daughter captive in his basement for 24 years whilst he repeatedly abused her and fathered seven children with her.
Mr Fritzl also confessed to burning the body of one of the children he sired when it died in infancy.
Elisabeth Fritzl disappeared on 28 August 1984 aged 18. Her father reported the disappearance to the police making it look like she was a teenage runaway. In reality Mr Fritzl is alleged to have drugged Elisabeth, dragged her into the cellar and handcuffed her there.
Mr Fritzl, an electrical engineer, had a concealed entrance to his secret cellar which no one knew even existed. The entrance to the cellar, which was secured with a steel door and an electronic lock, was hidden behind a cupboard in the Fritzl’s garage.
The cramped conditions where Elisabeth Fritzl spent the last 24 years had no windows and no natural light. Three of Elisabeth’s children had never seen sunlight until the release from their prison, the eldest is 19 years old.
The case came to light when 19 year old Kerstin became ill and was taken to hospital, she remains in a coma.
Her brothers, Stefan (18) and Felix (5), had also spent their entire lives living in the “dungeon”.
Elisabeth’s other children were taken from her by her father, he forced her to write notes saying she couldn’t care for them and then dumped the babies on his own doorstep. He then reported “finding” them abandoned to the authorities and he and his allegedly oblivious wife adopted them.
These are the first pictures that have emerged showing the inside of the Fritzl cellar.
