Daughter in cellar for 24 years

[AlphaCentauri]

A woman has told police that she was held prisoner in a cellar for almost 24 years by her father, who repeatedly raped her and fathered her seven children.

Lower Austria police said in a statement that the 42-year-old woman had been missing since August 29, 1984 and was found by police in the town of Amstetten following a tip-off.

Franz Polzer, head of the Lower Austrian Bureau of Criminal Affairs, said the 73-year-old father had been taken into custody.

In a chronology of events outlined in a statement, police said the woman had apparently sent a letter a month after her disappearance asking her parents not to search for her.

During police questioning, she told police her father began sexually abusing her when she was 11 and locked her in a room in the cellar on August 28, 1984.

During the 24 years that followed, she said she was continually abused by her father and gave birth to seven children, the statement said. In 1996, she gave birth to twins but one died several days later because it was not appropriately cared for. Her father had then apparently removed the corpse from the cellar and burned it, the statement said.

http://ukpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5itGABLuzBmjpPLPwO74ie0sk0RXA

[Breeze54]

1. This is disgusting !

Gheeze! :grr:

[0007]

2. Gee whiz!! This poor woman. Who took care of all her children while be

held prisoner?

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

4. If her father did, I can't help but wonder if he abused the girls

as well. Wonder if he kept them in another part of the cellar.

[LisaL]

25. How big was that cellar that no one knew of it, supposedly,

except for "grandpa?"
Boggles the mind.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

3. How could the father have kept this secret?

I read the article, but only found that the remaining six kids are still alive--how did he explain them to people in town? Did they go to school? This wasn't talked about in the article.

[riverdeep]

8. Yeah, it'll be interesting to hear how he came up with stories.

And what the people in the town had to say. So many questions.

Maybe they lived on the outskirts somewhere, where no one could hear. Twenty four years in a cellar? Not getting out at ALL? Seeing the sunshine, feeling the wind. No schooling, no friends? And being abused sexually on top of that. This woman is amazing just for not committing suicide.

[alfredo]

15. Abusers first isolate their victims through physical isolation or emotional

isolation.

[LisaL]

17. But there were six kids.

Apparently three were left with the mother, and three were taken outside.
Did they go to school? Did they know the mother was living in the cellar with other three kids?
No one ever looked in that cellar except for "grandpa?"
The wife of the father also said to not know.
I wonder how that is possible.

[alfredo]

18. I'm sure the kids at the FLDS compound will keep secrets.

[LisaL]

19. It's a ridiculous comparison.

The FLDS children were not kept in cellars.
In fact they look quite healthy and clean.
The FLDS kids probably spend more time outside than most mainstream kids did, considering that they wouldn't be stuck in front of a TV all day.

[alfredo]

21. Especially if they are told their mommy will die if they talked.

[Marrah_G]

27. No, they were locked within walls of a compound and denied education

Then at puberty the girls are sent to be the 5,6,7th wives of some old man and the boys are toseed out unless they find special favor with the church leaders.

[Bluebear]

34. The FLDS fathers SHOULD have been the ones in the cellar!

[LanternWaste]

44. It's an apt and valid comparison. Sorry to prick your Sacred Cow.

It's an apt and valid comparison. Sorry to prick your Sacred Cow.

[liberal N proud]

5. Sounds like something that could only happen in the USA

[riverdeep]

7. Apparently we don't have the market cornered on freaks,

since this occurred in Austria.

[BigDaddy44]

9. What a ridiculously stupid post

Honestly. Truthfully. First of all, it didn't happen here. Have you ever even BEEN outside of the US? You really do think the rest of the world is a utopian paradise where everyone skips through the flower-laden fields singing in joyous harmony and chasing butterflies, don't you.

There are freaks all over the world. Sorry to burst your bubble.

[KeineAhnung]

10. Ugh...

Its already been said but.... Duhhhhh...

As someone who has traveled extensively I'll be the first to tell you that the rest of the world is just as, if not more, screwed up as the US.

Pretty ignorant.

[woo me with science]

11. LOL

I can guess how old you are.

[LisaL]

16. Did you even read the article? It happened in Austria, not US.

Not the first story similar to this coming from Europe, by the way.

[liberal N proud]

26. Well, uh Yeah

My point was that we hear so much of this where freaks to bazaar things to people. The stories are always in the US.

My point was that American is full of crazies and this sounds like something that would happen here. I am well aware that there are crazies all over the world.

Obviously the point was missed by all who read my post. Sorry to tee everyone off.

[LisaL]

28. There've been some freaky stories coming out of Europe.

Although this one probably takes the cake.

[JI7]

46. in the USA , they would have searched the father's home

it seems it's mostly in the USA where the closest family and friends are first looked to .

[varkam]

6. Ee-freaking-gads.

That's got to be one of the most horrific things that I have ever heard of.

[muriel_volestrangler]

12. A few more details in the BBC story:

The existence of the woman, believed missing since 1984 and now 42, emerged after a teenage child fell ill and had to be taken to hospital.
...
Three children, including the 19-year-old, were allegedly kept in the cellar with their mother while the other three reportedly grew up with their grandparents.
...
The three children who grew up with their grandparents were left at birth outside the house, the first accompanied by a note from Elisabeth in which she said she could not care for the baby herself.

All three were taken in by Josef and his wife as foster or adopted children, police said.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7369851.stm

[malaise]

14. What grandparents?

If her father is her children's father then the children's father is their grandfather. So this poor woman's mother and her disgusting father brought up three children and left her and three children in the basement.
Am I supposed to believe that her own mother knew nothing about this?

This is one very strange story and he is one sick fuck.

[muriel_volestrangler]

22. It does seem hard to think her husband could keep a family in the cellar

for many years, and she could never realise it was going on. Exceeding strange.

[LisaL]

24. 24 years. He also apparently took 3 children out of the cellar and

raised them.
Meanwhile four people (the mother and three other kids) were living in the cellar and no one knew except for grandpa?
Almost incomprehensible.

[InkAddict]

30. That's one Desperate Housewife. n/t

Sounds like the pre-story for Bree's old-age-back-story, after the Van de Kamps allegedly move away to the country-side and then return to Magnolia Drive for the 25th season. Maybe Danielle's kid isn't really Edie's nephew. Watch out for Grandpa Orson, Danielle.


This story is heinous beyond words, but some sickos are very adept in hiding their natures. I'd bet the wife was also brutally psychologically and emotionally abused, perhaps by Gramps long-term rejection of Gramma's conjugal "rights"... and she decided to settle for the bare brutal maintenance, food, shelter, a bit of domestic housework and God (gotta keep that purely elective vow doncha know - until death do us part), along with the extraction of a promise from him not to kill her child (whose nature, not her, perhaps seduced Daddy) and grandchildren, born in original sin anyway (murder being just wrong, hostage taking not so much).

See what happens when individual privacy is respected and protected unquestioned by those that need to MTOB -- Government can better prevent things like this from happening here, as opposed to there, when we put in place measures that spy into the private lives and bedrooms of our citizens. We can identify the sickos and press the justice of consequences on all.

BLECH!

[EOTE]

40. I agree with the bulk of your post.

But I'm a bit confused as to how you chose to end it. You say:


See what happens when individual privacy is respected and protected unquestioned by those that need to MTOB -- Government can better prevent things like this from happening here, as opposed to there, when we put in place measures that spy into the private lives and bedrooms of our citizens. We can identify the sickos and press the justice of consequences on all.

I may be reading this incorrectly, but are you condoning government spying on its citizens to prevent things like this? I agree that measures need to be taken to prevent tragedies like this from occurring, but how does spying on innocent citizens help to prevent anything like that?

[AlphaCentauri]

37. strange like that old book "Flowers in the Attic"

[Liberal_in_LA]

23. How was the wife of the abuser not aware? WTF?

[applegrove]

13. Hard to believe such criminal activity goes on these days. How awful.

[Stuart G]

20. On any given day, if you look carefully..you will find the most awful human behavior.

As ugly as the mind can come up with.

There are 5 Billion of us living here on this planet. Most are ok. I sure only know a few. But some on this planet, well..the don't deserve to live. Just look hard enough, in the holes and under some shit pile, you will find them treating others in ways that are , as seen here... unbelievable. But it is not as odd as one thinks. Abused people abuse others and those close to them.

[LeftishBrit]

29. This is one of the sickest stories I've ever heard.

Poor woman - and her poor kids.

[CJCRANE]

31. Amstetten

The town has an unpleasant history...

"During World War II Amstetten was a seat of two sub-camps of the Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amstetten%2C_Lower_Austria

[Annces]

36. Wonder if there is any connection there

I mean I wonder if this demented person was affected by those camps.

Somebody already updated the Wiki.

[Punkcow]

39. "I mean I wonder if this demented person was affected by those camps. "

There were plenty of sub-camps in Austria so, sorry, your question is just plain stupid.

[EOTE]

41. No need to be rude, and I don't see how it's a stupid question at all.

Just because camps existed elsewhere means that this sicko couldn't have been affected by one? That's hardly logical, so your criticism seems unfounded.

[Punkcow]

43. Affected in which way? These sub-camps were almost in every parts of the country, why should every w

[CJCRANE]

45. It's hard to say.

There probably isn't a connection except for a metaphorical one - man's inhumanity to man and how it can occur while others turn a blind eye, one on a small scale, one on a mass scale.

[nomorenomore08]

32. Stories like this one remind me of a horror film come to life. Absolutely repulsive.

:puke::puke::puke: And a few :scared: for good measure.

[bdamomma]

there are alot sick sick people out there.

[bdamomma]

33. there are alot sick sick people out there.

[Catherine Vincent]

35. What a horrible story!

That poor woman!

[Punkcow]

38. Lower Austria is a wasteland...

... no wonder such things happen there - I am sure there are a lot more people imprisoned.

[LanternWaste]

42. This makes me weep

This makes me weep. Between this and the FLDS, I've finally realized that I will never understand people...