AMSTETTEN, Austria (CNN) -- DNA testing has
confirmed that Josef Fritzl, who police say confessed to holding
his daughter hostage in underground rooms for more than two
decades, fathered seven children with her, an Austrian law
enforcement official said Tuesday.
"It is clear now (that) the six children of Elisabeth Fritzl,
that she bore ... that this is the father, who is now 73 years old,
something that we, from a criminal point of view, we have never met
such a case. Astonishing," said Franz Polzer, director of the Lower
Austrian Bureau of Criminal Affairs.
The seventh child died shortly after birth, and Fritzl told
police he burned the infant's body in an oven, authorities said.
Though its body was not available for DNA testing, police said it
was a twin to one of the six tested.
Fritzl's DNA also was found on a letter sent to the Fritzl
family that was made to look like it was from his daughter,
Elisabeth, Polzer said.
Authorities said Fritzl sent other such letters over the years,
leading the family to believe that Elisabeth was a runaway who had
abandoned three of her children on the Fritzls' doorstep.
Those three children lived in the home above the cellar prison
-- in which the three other children remained -- with Fritzl and
his wife, Elisabeth's mother, Rosemarie.
Authorities said it doesn't appear that Rosemarie Fritzl was
involved in or knew about her husband's activities.
She had talked to her friend Gertrude Baumgarten about one of
the infants left on her doorstep.
"She said she believed her daughter had had the child with
someone from the cult and couldn't take care of it. That's why
Elisabeth laid it in front of the door.
"And [Rosemarie] said, 'Well, what can we do? We have to take
the child in,' " Baumgarten said.
"She never knew that something was so very wrong there," she
said, adding, "I believe it would be fitting to get a rope and hang
him. Such a pig!"
Reports have surfaced in The Times of London and Austria's
Presse that Fritzl was convicted of sexual assault in the 1960s,
but there is nothing in his record to confirm this, District
Governor Hans Heinz Lenze said. He added, however, that records are
expunged after a certain number of years.
Prosecutors are checking back records to try to find this
information, said Gerhard Sedlacek, prosecutor for the state of
Poelten.
The Times of London quotes a 50-year-old neighbor who said that
when he was 10, he remembered "how we children were afraid to play
near Mr. F's house because of the rumors that he had raped a woman
and spent some time in jail for it."
Fritzl led police to the cellar, which has about 100 square
feet, on Sunday. A day later, he confessed to raping Elisabeth, now
42, and keeping her and their children in captivity in the cellar
for years, police said.
Josef Fritzl was able to convince social service workers,
friends and family that Elisabeth had run away in 1984, when she
was about 18. Police describe him as an authoritarian figure,
forbidding anyone in the family from entering the cellar.
In the cellar with Elisabeth were a daughter, Kerstin, 19; and
two sons, Stefan, 18; and Felix, 5.
The three children held in the cellar in the town of Amstetten
were still in the hospital Tuesday after their horrific ordeal.
The eldest of the children, Kerstin Fritzl, was in an induced
coma.
Stefan and Felix are said to be doing "surprisingly well and in
good health," considering that they had never been exposed to
sunlight, CNN's Phil Black said. The boys are still undergoing
medical treatment, he added.
Police said Tuesday that they have searched other properties
belonging to Fritzl to make sure there are no other similar
situations. Nothing has been found, they said.
Also Tuesday, a judge ordered Fritzl to remain in custody. He
appeared calm and showed no emotion in court, according to an
Austrian reporter present.
Some neighbors have lived in the area for 30 years and not only
knew Josef Fritzl but also knew Elisabeth as a youngster, said
Maria Otto Pries, who has lived in the area only three years and
did not know the family.
"Many people have shaken his hand and said hello and gone to the
same bakery with him and had a coffee with him at the coffee shop,"
she said. "The scarier fact is that it happened just around the
corner."
Thomas Birgfellner, a reporter with Austrian broadcaster ORF,
said there was a strong belief that, with his expertise as a former
electrical engineer, Fritzl -- who installed an electronic security
door in the cellar -- must have had help from other people.
"Everyone has said he could not do it alone. He could not
install it alone, and now they have to investigate if there were
some other people who assisted him," Birgfellner said.
It was Kerstin's serious condition that led to the unraveling of
the case over the weekend, forcing Josef Fritzl -- who she thought
was her grandfather -- to take her to the hospital in Amstetten,
west of Vienna.
Kerstin's mother, Elisabeth, begged Josef Fritzl to take the
teen to the hospital.
Josef told his wife that their missing daughter had dropped off
ailing Kerstin on the doorstep with a note asking that they get her
medical care.
Josef took her to the town's clinic with the note, but doctors
needed more information to determine why the young woman was
unconscious and having violent convulsions.
So they contacted police, who asked the local media to report on
Kerstin's situation in an effort to find the missing mother.
Elisabeth and her two sons saw the reports on the television
provided to them in their living quarters, Polzer said, and "they
desperately pleaded with their father so they could be taken [to
the hospital] ... [and] do something for the 19-year-old."
Josef Fritzl agreed and took all three of the remaining captives
out of the basement, explaining to Rosemarie and the rest of the
family that Elisabeth had reappeared with her two children after 24
years.
He took them to the hospital, and authorities there realized
that something was wrong. Police picked up both Josef and Elisabeth
on Saturday near the hospital and brought them into the station for
questioning.
Josef would not talk to police, but Elisabeth began to tell her
story once she was convinced that she would never have to see her
father again and that her children would be safe.
She told police that her father began sexually abusing her at
age 11.
On August 8, 1984, weeks before she was reported missing, her
father enticed her into the basement, where he drugged her, put her
in handcuffs and locked her in a room, she told
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source: http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/04/29/austria.cellar/<!--
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