Josef Fritzl convinced himself that imprisoning and raping his daughter for 24 years was a normal relationship, writes DEREK SCALLYin Berlin
JOSEF FRITZL tormented his daughter Elisabeth for 24 years in a damp, rat-infested secreted cellar under their home for 24 years.
Through it all, he convinced himself that the relationship, based on imprisonment and rape and bearing seven incestuous children, was like any other.
It took an unexpected encounter with his prematurely aged daughter in an Austrian courtroom on Tuesday to throw him off guard and cause his facade to crack.
“He didn’t feel any empathy until he came face-to-face with his daughter,” said Rudolf Mayer, Fritzl’s defence attorney, yesterday.
Discarding the final shreds of resistance, the retired engineer walked into court 119 in St Pölten yesterday for the first and last time without the blue folder he had used all week to shield his face from cameras.
With eight charges to choose from, it was always certain that the Fritzl case, dubbed Austria’s “trial of the century”, would end in a conviction of some kind.
Fritzl had given a lengthy confession, Elisabeth had sat for 11 hours of detailed testimony and her brother Harald had confirmed her claims that their tyrannical father had sexually abused her as a child.
DNA evidence taken from the Fritzls had already confirmed the paternity of the six children – three raised in the cellar, three upstairs with Fritzl and his wife Rosemarie.
The jury was always almost certain to find him guilty of incest and false imprisonment after he accepted the charges when the trial opened on Monday.
But there was uncertainty among legal experts about whether the jury could deliver a guilty verdict on the two most serious counts.
The charge of enslavement was before an Austrian court for the first time, while the murder by neglect count related to an event 13 years ago – for which the body had been destroyed.
In addition, Fritzl queried part of the charges of rape and coercion, telling the court that, after a time, Elisabeth no longer refused his advances.
“He made himself believe it was a mutual relationship that it was like any relationship between two grownups living together,” said Dr Adelheid Kramer, the court psychiatrist.
“He liked the way he made himself see it. It was like some kind of second marriage.” In the end, the jury delivered a unanimous verdict: guilty on all eight counts. In her final remarks on the case, Judge Andrea Humer said life imprisonment was a justified sentence for this “particularly treacherous crime”.
Outside the court, Mayer said the life sentence for murder was due to his client’s decision to plead guilty on all counts.
“He was collected and didn’t show any emotion because he is of the opinion that the victims are more important to him now than himself,” said Mr Mayer.
Authorities in St. Pölten confirmed the verdict yesterday and returned Fritzl to prison while they decide what to do with him. “The question now is whether he is motivated and willing to undergo therapy, how dangerous he is and whether, through therapy, this danger can be reduced,” said spokesman Franz Cutka.
He confirmed that the 11 months Fritzl (73) has already served in prison will count towards his final 15-year sentence (the minimum for a life sentence). In Austrian law, sentences are not cumulative but based on the most serious conviction.
Elisabeth Fritzl’s surprise appearance in the empty public gallery has returned attention to the 42-year-old and her six children.
For the duration of the trial, the family returned to the clinic where they were reunited last April. They are expected to return to their new identities and new home in an undisclosed location.
Elisabeth is attending weekly therapy sessions and is believed to be writing a book.
Her mother Rosemarie now lives in Linz and has begun divorce proceedings against her husband. She maintains she knew nothing about her husband’s double life and worked hard to raise the three children he removed from the basement.
Now aged 12, 15 and 16, they have had to adjust to the realisation that their absent mother did not in fact abandon them.
The three “cellar” children – aged 6, 19 and 20, are taking intensive speech lessons and school tutoring.