Josef Fritzl

Beginning in 1984, Josef Fritzl imprisoned his daughter, Elisabeth, in a hidden basement beneath the family home in Amstetten, Austria, holding her captive for 24 years. During that time, he fathered seven children with her, some of whom were also kept in the basement while others were raised upstairs by Fritzl and his wife, who was told the children had been left on their doorstep.

Discovery

The case came to light in 2008 when one of the children required hospital treatment, and doctors' questions eventually led to Elisabeth being freed and the full extent of the imprisonment being uncovered.

Trial

Fritzl was charged with rape, incest, coercion, false imprisonment, and murder by negligence, related to the death of one infant shortly after birth. He was convicted in 2009 and sentenced to life imprisonment, with a designation allowing for indefinite detention in an institution for mentally abnormal offenders.

Current status

Fritzl remains in an Austrian institutional facility. He was moved to a regular prison for elderly offenders in 2019 after psychiatric assessments found he no longer required specialized detention, though he remains incarcerated.