It was late August 2006, and Austria's biggest missing persons case had miraculously been resolved. Eight years previously Natascha Kampusch, a girl of 10, had disappeared one day on her way to school. Despite an extensive media campaign to find her, and sightings of a girl who fitted Natascha's description getting into a white van, there had been no sign of Kampusch for years and she was presumed dead. Then, suddenly, there she was aged 18, having fled the home-made dungeon in which an antisocial technician, Wolfgang Priklopil, had held her captive in the interim.
Shocking as it was then, the Kampusch case no longer holds a unique place in Austrian criminal history. Not two years have passed and the kidnapping has been overshadowed by two unsettlingly similar cases, both involving children held in captivity for long periods. In the mind's eye of non-Austrians, the land of powder skiing, avid recycling and Glühwein has morphed into the kind of place - like Belgium - in which sordid things happen to children.
Less than a year after the Kampusch scandal shocked the world, details of a second case of long-term child abuse emerged. Three girls had been imprisoned by their mother for seven years. The girls, aged 7, 11 and 13 when their mother won custody of them, were eventually discovered living in filth. The mother, a middle-class lawyer, had suffered a nervous breakdown, taken the girls out of school and shut them away from the outside world, where they lived in total darkness among mouse droppings and urine. Psychiatrists have predicted that the eldest of the girls will never fully recover.
Then, this weekend, we find out that a seemingly respectable former engineer in his seventies has kept his 42-year-old daughter locked in his cellar since she was 19. The woman, who bore her father seven children during her captivity, was discovered only after one of the children she had with her father fell into a coma in hospital.
It is useful in this context to mention some other things going on in Austria that have been overlooked by the international press - including a series of investigations that threaten to envelop the Austrian police. These suggest a force so allegedly riddled with corruption and incompetence that even those responsible for handling the Kampusch case have been implicated.
There is also the country's apparent problem with institutional racism. There is concern over a number of deaths and injuries in police custody of foreign nationals. (There have been no convictions; Amnesty International has made a formal complaint.)
Then there are the controversial photographs that have surfaced of Jörg Haider, the former leader of Austria's far-right Freedom Party; the increasing tendency of Austrian politicians to sue journalists who dare to look into their affairs; the BAWAG banking scandal - which resulted in the loss of billions of euros in questionable investments - and the revelation in 2006 that this well-to-do Alpine country had slipped five places in Transparency International's corruption index.
There is a theory that Austrian culture is somehow to blame for the cases of child imprisonment that have come to light. Certainly it is true that in two of these cases, neighbours admitted to reporters that they knew the perpetrators and victims of the crimes only by their surnames.
There is a petit bourgeous formality in Austria, a hangover from imperial times, an assumption that a respectable member of the community - a lawyer or engineer, for example - could never be the author of a serious crime. It explains why a mother of three can take her children out of school without generating much suspicion, for instance. And, conversely, why foreigners - especially foreigners of non-Austrian appearance - tend to be treated with, at best, scepticism. A native of Ghana or Turkey travelling on a Vienna tram can expect to have his or her ticket scrutinised by inspectors far more often than white, German-speaking passengers.
Furthermore, Austrian privacy laws ensure that the private lives of prominent people are rarely exposed. Roman Abramovich retreated to Austria after his divorce.
Data protection means that it is virtually impossible to find out simple things: why a person has received planning permission, for example, or who put the advertisement in the newspaper for which only whites needed to apply.
But there is another reason why such crimes can happen in an otherwise affluent and civilised society. When neighbours of the middle-class lawyer noticed that she took meals only in her car, for example, the authorities were promptly and repeatedly informed. But, for reasons we may never know, they refused to act. No police officer or social worker was forced to answer for having failed to intervene.
Now The Times has been told that the 73-year-old father who is accused of repeatedly having raped his imprisoned daughter - an accusation that he denies - has a previous conviction for rape. Which raises the question of why the authorities deemed him fit to adopt the three children he claimed his daughter had left on his doorstep. And what are the details of this initial conviction? The police now fear that they may have either lost or destroyed his criminal record.
What links these three cases is not just the theme of child abuse and/or neglect, but the almost total lack of accountability by the authorities involved.
You seem to see the same trend with allegations of police brutality: in 1999, when Marcus Omofuma from Nigeria died while being deported from Austria by air - police had allegedly suffocated him by taping his mouth and nose; four years later, when Seibani Wague from Mauritius died after apparently being pinned to the ground by Austrian police officers; in April 2006, when Bakary J. from The Gambia was seriously injured, also apparently by the police. No officer has yet been sentenced.
Further alarming questions have been raised by the current investigations into the Austrian police force. It is alleged that the Friends of the Austrian Police, a society where police could network with powerful figures in politics and business - and, allegedly, crime - was deeply corrupt.
And the Kampusch story won't die. The girl-in-the-cellar tale had holes in it from the start. We had been told since the outset that she had been locked underground for eight years, yet it later emerged that Kampusch had accompanied her kidnapper on a skiing trip - and that Priklopil's colleague of 25 years, Ernst Holzapfel, had been introduced to Natascha but told police that he simply assumed that his otherwise strange and celibate friend had found himself a girlfriend. There were other loose ends too: persistent rumours of a sadomasochistic club scene frequented by Priklopil, unconfirmed reports of inappropriate photographs, conflicting statements by neighbours. And the white van. Why was it never traced to Priklopil?
In February this year, Herwig Haidinger, former head of the Federal Criminal Police Office, the Austrian equivalent of Scotland Yard, exposed the scandal that led to the current investigation of the work of the police, after revealing that Priklopil had been identified as a key suspect within weeks of the kidnapping but nothing had been done. The Interior Minister at the time, Liese Prokop, who has since died, appears to have suppressed the news, and officials apparently misled the press on her behalf.
Police are now being investigated by an independent committee after a former top-ranking official broke his silence to claim that detectives botched the inquiry by neglecting decisive evidence that would have led to the kidnapper, then covered up their mistakes to avoid a scandal.
A newspaper investigation sparked a public outcry this month when it was alleged that police held back evidence including photographs and videos, as well as Kampusch's diary and notes by her abductor that could indicate his involvement with an unknown number of accomplices. The leads were not analysed by police and had been sealed by prosecutors in 2006.
Some of the items, including the diaries, were even handed over to Kampusch, while one photograph was reportedly destroyed. Other evidence, including a reported hint by Kampusch that Priklopil had accomplices, as well as the testimony of witnesses who claimed that he was well-known on the local sadomasochistic scene for his brutality and proclivity for sex slaves in school uniforms, was apparently disregarded by investigators.
Two years ago in Vienna we went to see one of the senior officers in charge of the case. It was a bizarre experience. The man, a high-ranking general in the Austrian police force, agreed to meet us in his office, where he offered us coffee and biscuits and made polite, irrelevant small talk. He clearly saw himself as a sort of mediator or soother of brows rather than a man in charge of the facts. When pressed, he didn't seem to know any facts.
Could he tell us whether Priklopil, who had thrown himself in front of a train after Kampusch's escape, had a criminal record? No, that would be contravening Austria's data protection laws. How about Kampusch's family and Priklopil's friends - had they ever been in trouble with the law? No can do, he said - data protection. What about rumours concerning video and photographic evidence found in Priklopil's home? The general told us that the police had decided that such evidence had no relevance to the case: it was, he said, “private”.
He made it clear that from Kampusch's point of view - and, therefore, his - Priklopil was dead, therefore the case was more or less solved: an unusual interpretation of events by a policeman, even if Kampusch was the undisputed victim of this crime.
What about the truth? What happened during those missing eight years? He and Natascha Kampusch, said the general, got on very well. She was a lovely girl, really. She had been in this very office. And finally: “I consider her a friend.”
ppl say that one shouldn't hate Austrians becuz crimes like these aren't isolated to just Austria -they happen all over the world. Yes,the latter is true. But, should Austrians be patted on the back? I hope not. The world is watching. I wouldn't want America to follow Austria's steps of dismiveness.
Holley, Pinole, USA
Austria has built many Women's Concentration Camps before and now it's time to build Shelters for Abused mothers and their Children. How can a woman live in the same house for 24 years and never suspect anything?? I guess, when you have no place to go and get help, you simply choose not to suspect
YP, Istanbul, Turkey
My thoughts are that Natascha doesn't want the grisly details of her 8 years splattered all over the media. Society is sick...it is evidence to me of a world that has REJECTED God. You cannot say that a remedy not taken is a remedy that does not exist. The Bible says that things will get worse!
Heather, Okinawa, Japan
there must be law that protects children`s right, also covers women`s right.law that provides the welfare of women and children.must take care children`s right for they are the Austria`s bright future.let the children laughter,let them voice out their feelings,beliefs.
beck, calamba city, philippines
I totally agree with Celia Bright, Bedford: this is by far the best-researched insight article in the world press so far. Congratulations and thanks for giving us the hope there is still posibloe serious journalism.
Expat, Madrid,
What all this is doing, is encouraging more abuse on children because there is no law that protects them and on the long run this will be our future for our next generation because abused children will abuse there own like a chain thats never broken.
nana, phx, arizona, USA
I lived in Britain for four years and went to school there. During my first day at school I was greeted by the "Hitler sign" (risen arm) while the teacher ignored it. Jokes about Indian and Hong Kong people were not uncommon. Racism really is not restricted to Austria.
Anna, Cologne, Germany
I agree with Moss Eli! How could there be a God that would let this occur?
Nicole Thomson, Melbourne, Australia
I am getting completely sickened by the concentrated character assassination of Austria and the Austrians with regard to the Fritzl case. This is really rich coming from the press in a country that has had numerous child and other abuse cases and has always seemed to value the principle of privacy.
Christine Taylor, Stoke-on-Trent, England
This conclusively proves once and for all that there is no God.
Let's hold a vigil for all of the millions of silent sufferers denied of their autonomy world-wide!
Moss Eli, Jerusalem, Israel
well, i don´t think this is an austrian problem - in fact the austrian police actually discovered those crimes. I don´t want to know what happens in some cellars in the u.k or anywhere else.
mex, st.johann, austria
Sunlight always has been and always will be the best disinfectant.
chris, San Francisco, United States
No, Dulcie. It is not just people. This monster, Fritzl, had previous convictions and they were wiped away. Who plays a role? The police who overlooked things? What about the judge? Does Fritzl have connections with authorities who helped him to be free and to continue being a criminal?
Gabriel, New York, USA
"Everywhere in the world has their share of evil". I agree, but with a gruesome crime like this, tolerance of evil for the sake of "privacy" is unjustifiable.
The Kampusch crime was worse. Could there be any worse than Fritzl's? I hope there aren't any more dungeons there still to be discovered
Denise, Singapore,
I think a private and formal society is better than one in which the law and the state poke their noses into every private thing. Of course awful things have happened in Austria. They happen elsewhere in Europe and America too. Serial killers, racist killings, the list is endless. It's people.
dulcie, London, UK
I have been reading news and commentary about this case for days now and this is by far the most intelligent and best-researched article in the world press so far. It expresses all the feelings I have ever had about Austria. Thank you very much for it.
Celia Bright, Bedford, UK
A polite & discreet society ignores, then denies, evil in its midst order to preserve the order they wish to achieve, just as bigotry & persecution of the "other" helps them to protect the "ideal". Holocaust denial is a reminder of the denial of evidence at the time that enabled evil to flourish.
Patricia Jing, Bakersfield, USA
When does one take notice, when does one start to care, when does one become less self centered and speak up, help someone else?
Cheryl Roeske, Washington D.C., USA
What about the French case that has come to light after this 1 (Lydia Gouardo, tortured and raped for 28 years by her adoptive father, who fathered her six children)? She claims she escaped several times only to be brought back to her torturer by the Police. Are Austrians also to be blamed for this?
Paula Telo Alves, Luxembourg, Luxembourg
Noting that this crime was perpetrated in Austria, where the father (make that monster) threatened to GAS his children if they tried to escape, and who BURNT HIS DEAD CHILD IN AN OVEN, (am I ringing any bells yet?) I for one find it quite easy to equate this crime with Austra specifically!
Martin Ferguson, london,
I've just recently moved to London after living in Vienna for 6.5 years. It's truly one of the most wonderful countries on earth. Crimes like these could (and do) happen anywhere. I've read about more sick and horrific crimes on the streets here that i ever read about in my entire 6yrs in Vienna!!
Anne, London, United Kingdom
Eliz ran away while a teenager, and police took her back to her home. Did they investigate why she ran away? Why should a criminal record be erased while the criminal is still alive? The monster installed a 300 Kg door without help? Austria seems to care more about her image than people's safety!
Rajiv, Bombay, India
What I've read about the "privacy" laws in Austria is disturbing. Yes, privacy is important, but protection of citizens, especially young people, is more important.
Sherri, London,
I wonder who Josef Fritzl's father and grandfather was?
I also wonder if it's legal to punish children physical in Austria...and in UK? In that case the laws of childrens rights must be changed. It only scares and damadge the children who grows up with violence.
UK: where is Madeleine?
Linda, Uppsala, Sweden
The police and social workers really did a bad job. The social workers didn't even met Josef F. when they did their visits. He stayed away. How could the police neglect searching the mother of 3 babys who wasn't born in a hospital with no identities, "living in a cult" who was obviously alive??
Linda, Uppsala, Sweden
Having lived in Austria for four years, and having covered the Austrian financial services sector as a journalist subsequent to that, I have to say none of this surprises me. It takes a major crime like this to really expose some major institutional flaws in the Austrian system.
Stuart Fieldhouse, Brighton, UK
I agree that this is certainly a crime against humanity. It is unimaginable and gruesome that such attrocities happen anywhere in the world, be it Austria or not. Being a lawyer myself, I have never in my entire career heard of a worse crime.
Lana, London, England
In relation to comments on racism, I have to admit that I have not been treated worse anywhere than in Austria. I have lived in Austria for almost 4 years and I felt the racism at every step (although I am white). My brother and I were afraid to speak our native language due to offensive remarks.
Lana, London, England
As someone who knows Austria and will be moving their shortly with my family, I find this piece laughable. How can the press with UK drunken yob culture, criticise a country that is in the main a very pleasant place to live? Everywhere in the world has their share of evil.
Jude, London, UK
My impression of Austria is that there is less equality of treatment of women thanin other European countries and this culture may be a contributing factor in these cases
Tony, London, UK
how in gods name could so called professional police officers be so dumb??? girl goes missing joins a cult three children left on doorstep when even the dogs on street in his town knew he was a sex offender !shame on the police they should be sacked!did anyone ask which cult? where?
bernard fitzgerald, london, england
So sick of privacy laws. They only seem to protect sex offenders. (And we know these people, especially ones like this who have personality disorders, go on and on and on and on...)
The one thing the Americans do right is long sentences for sex offenders. In my country (Canada), the courts fail us.
Emma, Toronto, Canada
Austria is an amazing place and most Austrians are decent , God-fearing and hard working people.I have interacted with several wonderful families during my stay there in April 2007.These shocking tales keep happening in every corner of the world - some people are just so evil .
Ketan Shah, Calicut, India
Austrian police/authorities apparently have made grave mistakes. The article also refers, justifiedly, to issues like petit-bourgois-like acting, nepotism, privileges and over-protection of higher ranked persons. But let's be fair, Austria is not more xenophobe or inhibited than most other nations!
Dietmar, Hartberg, Austria
I think there is somehing to this analysis. If Austrian laws protect criminals those laws should be changed. Accountability is important. The fact that crimes happen elsewhere is no reason for not doing everything in our power to prevent such horrific crimes.
Joni, Phuket,
austria is not the place where people of different physical appearance are hated, where men abduct children and young adults and hide them in their basement, where mothers let their children live in dirt - the whole world is.
austria isn't better or worse than any other country in this world
Kerstin, Vienna, Austria
This horrific crime would have to fall under a crime against humanity. How else to measure? There are no redeeming facts, all neighbors are complicit, if only for looking the other way. Respecting privacy is not a valid excuse,period. Shame on all of us really, doesn't matter where, just that it did
mark, costa mesa, US
Staggering to see the British press wallowing in this, when so much nasty stuff is going on in the UK. Schadenfreude, one suspects... My solution? Austria needs to reform its lazy bureaucracy quickly.
Kate, Vienna, Austria
Mark Jones, I think the message sent across by Sam Keating's post has more to do with Lynn Cresswell's comment than what you inferred. All in all,this is a gender crime.Again.
Louis Smythe-Silva, Sintra, Portugal
This article is a rather random mix-up of some of our problems (institutional racism!) but it completely lacks a stringent argumentation and some facts are just plain wrong.
And please spare us with further attacks on data protection.
M.F, Vienna, Austria
Anymore monsters lurking around in Austria?
The local police should pursue every reported case of missing children, and check suspects' homes for hidden rooms.
Owen, SG,
Laurence I think you missed the point...we have cases of child abuse in the UK that the authorities have missed but none that have gone on for 7-24 years...instead of taking it as a personal attack on Austria perhaps you should pointing the finger closer to home
Jay, London, UK
This article is nothing but a generalisation of Austrians! And actually really badly discriminating all Austrians for that matter. These cases can be found anywhere in the world, and I suggest to search in other counrties and you will guaranteed find the equivalents there as well!!!!
Elisabeth, Vienna, Austria
what a sad case, the victims need to be supported and rehabilitated so they can lead a free life. Austrian policing may need scrutinising rather than Austrian society as a whole - as in any nation there must be good and bad Austrians but I am sure the average Austrian is horrified by this event too.
Maya, Wolverhampton , England
I have lived in Austria for a couple years and am glad to see that finally people are starting to notice that there is indeed a problem with the Austrian society. It's a place of appearance, foreigners are hated, and if you are white and speak German, you must be good, so no interference there.
Guta, London,
I live in Austria and I am shocked at my country. The police and social workers ignored so many signs that something was wrong. Half the town knew this man was a convicted rapist and still they let him adopt three children that magically appeared on his doorstep. Police here are incompetent.
Jessica, Vienna,
Crimes of this nature are not limited to culture, they are gender based. This man gave himself permission to deny his daughter her human rights. Men in all societies give themselves entitlement, they justify their actions. It is only the culture that dictates which methods they use to abuse women
Lynn Cresswell, Adelaide, Australia
Sam Keeting said: "'Are the police letting the nation down?' No, men are."
However, this isn't the whole truth. The minister who has been accused of covering up evidence in the Kampusch case was a woman!
Mark Jones, Cardiff, wales
Austria does indeed have an identity problem as Andrew Milner suggests. Another historian, Bernard Lewis denied the Armenian holocaust had taken place - but he was fined one franc by a Paris court. The Austrian court's decision reflects the problem, which is the overriding need for respectability.
Phil, Bishop's Stortford,
Patrick Cambridge USA, i couldn't said it better. As a Belgian living in Scotland i feel as i am re-reading the news articles from 1996 when the Dutroux scandal erupted. Amazing, this truly feels like copy-paste work. As wil other articles who wil apear when another scandal of these sorts erupts
Delphine Verhaeghe, Scotland,
When scandals of these sorts erupt IN ANY COUNTRY IN THE WORLD, the news articles all look alike, incompetend police, why did nobody notice, ... and as a Belgian, trust me, I know. As for all the Austrians, this does not change my view of your country
Delphine Verhaeghe, Scotland,
So this Austrian chap's been naughty; forgive and forget. That's what I say. That's what Jesus said too.
Sarah Pearce, Nottingham, UK
I'm not one to condone extremely painful and prolonged punishment (possibly with the aid of doctors) but in these cases...
This man displayed unbelievable cruelty and no respect for human life - there is no suitable punishment in a civilised society.
Mark, London, England, UK
What does that particular case have to do with Austrian culture? What about the numerous other cases, such as the abuse scandal on Jersey, an island in the possession of the British crown, for instance? It is primitive to make generalizing comments on the population and culture of an entire country!
Patrick, Cambridge , USA
I have spent time in Austria. It's a lovely place. It is a polite society that turns away from what it doesn't want to see. Yes, pedophilia happens everywhere, but this trend of girls losing out on their childhood because of some depraved individual. Austria must look into this!
Andrea, San Francisco, USA
We should not be blaming these unbelievable crimes on Austria. We have had equally obscene crimes reported in other countries. Instead of trying to place blame on the people in one country or it's legal system, we should be trying to discover the reason these people became such evil and sick.
Doris, Bozeman, Montana
Now....not one but 2 or better say 3 cases of children being encarceraded by people in basements.......it's time to get old files of kidnapping and God forbbiden new cases and check out at the planning board of Austria cities for all the buildings with basement.....poilice may be able to find more..
Elena, NYC, USA
Hello? Why is no one asking what the motivations were for this crime? It does not suffice to say that this man was unhinged, this took meticulous planning and he was an engineer! There is something more sinister at play and what criteria determined which children got to live "upstairs"?
Biliana, St Petersburg, FL, USA
As in Bavaria - too much inbreeding of the population in small, secluded cantons.
Jock, London.,
Are the criticisms of Austria based on these incidents, aimed at deflecting attention from the UK where the meaning of "Britishness" seems to be regular youth stabbings, incomptent police shooting an innocent man on a tube train, a doctor murdering hundreds of patients, serial killers etc.
Laurence Warren, Embach, Austria
First of all how can the grand parents of the children born in the cellar be allowed to adopt them when there is no record of their birth nor is there authorization from the mother? 2nd- after 24 yrs why now did the father let the daughter out of the cellar? Perplexing as well as tragic...
Frank, walnut creek, USA
I have lived all over and found each country plagued by everything from police corruption to serial killers. If we are ever going to improve this we must demand comprehensive training, as well as psych evaluations, before we hand someone a badge and a gun.
J. Danis, Lexington, MA, USA
The developed world always points the " BE ACCOUNTABLE" finger at developing world.
Austria should be accountable and assure the Austrian people such horrific crimes will be delt with honestly and stringently.
DL , London, UK
Austria is not alone in these sort of scandals - Belgium has a "good" (bad) record too. But paedophiles and psychopaths exist in every inhabited country on the planet. Police forces have been also found wanting in many countries, including the UK and USA, the so-called bastions of democracy.
tone, belfast, UK
Austrian society is more private than the UK or France where there is a strong culture of dressing down the prominent. Austria has less of this, public figures appear to be protected by a more sycophantic media. So less public accountability and the wrong people stay in their jobs...
Mark Surridge, Baden, Austria
An Austrian problem? Hardly. No mention of serial killlers Fred and Rose West. Both came from families where incest was considered normal. Fred allowed his father-in-law to come round to have sex with his daughter. The 12 girls the couple murdered also slipped under the radar of the British police.
Paul Oscar, Sydney, Australia
I think once you've abducted your daughter, subjected her to 24 years of incest and abuse, and denied her and her children the right to any semblance of a normal life, you've possibly moved past the 'fruitcake' stage.
Steven, Sydney,
Chloe-provided opportunity:
If I said the Moon landings were a hoax, I wouldn't be facing slammer time. Noticed how the number of Holocaust victims has been quietly reduced over the years? Usually it’s the victim that calls for investigation. The truth doesn't need laws to protect it, lies however..
Andrew Milner, Karuizawa, Japan
Many countries have had sex scandals, people dying in police custody, children going missing in care, groups being mistreated (Aborigines - Austrialia, American Indians etc). Hitler was nothing more than a failed artist and tramp while in Vienna, Austria. Don't judge a country by a few fruitcakes
Expat, Vienna, Austria
Why not engaging police force from other country "a slap to the faces of police authorities in Austria" since they can't do their own job and just ignoring serious cases like Kampusch scandal.
A. A., GVA, CH
Shame on you, Andrew Milner. David Irving wasn't jailed for suggesting "the Holocaust was slightly exaggerated". What your motives and standpoint are, I can't humanly imagine; but Irving had previously asserted that Hitler knew nothing about the Holocaust and that gas chambers were a hoax.
Chloe, London,
it's really sad that this has to go on. People dying and suffering for years because of police brutality and a lack of anything being done by some officers and civilians. I hope that Austria cleans up its act. I don't want someone else to suffer.
Ann, Melbourne, Australia
Welcome to Austria. Birthplace of Adolph Hitler. The country that will jail an elderly historian for Holocaust revision, calling it Holocaust denial. Announce God doesn’t exist; no problem. But suggest that perhaps the Holocaust was slightly exaggerated and slammer time beckons. Identity crisis?
Andrew Milner, Karuizawa, Japan
Perhaps the international scrutiny will add needed pressure on the Austrian authorities to deal with the police and investigators who have process, credibility and ethical issues.
The horrific nature of the crimes addressed in this article demands effective change and action. Shameful...
Ann M., New Jersey, USA
These Austrian polices should be prosecuted for taking everything lightly. It is strange very much that a woman of 19 went missing and they trust on her parents about the interpretation of her missing and the police didn't do anything. I never heard of this kind of irresponsible police on earth.
Rahil, London,
'Are the police letting the nation down?' No, men are.
Sam Keating, London, UK