daughter in celler for 24 years!!!

Cellar Father To Appear In Court

Updated:18:21, Monday April 28, 2008

Prosecutors say the Austrian man who admits imprisoning his daughter for 24 years - and fathering her seven children - has committed one of the country's worst-ever crimes.

At a news conference, investigators said 73-year old Josef Fritzl had "deceived everybody" and that his treatment of his daughter was beyond the belief of the officers she spoke to.

Elisabeth Fritzl, now aged 42, had been missing since August 29, 1984.

Elisabeth told police how she was drugged and handcuffedand imprisoned.

One of the children she gave birth to - a twin - died. Police official Franz Polzer said the suspect told investigators he tossed the body into an incinerator.

The two oldest children, aged 18 and 19, and the youngest aged five, are said to have been locked up with their mother since birth in three cramped basement rooms.

Police told reporters that these children had never seen sunlight.

They are now receiving psychiatric care.

The others lived a relatively normal life above ground with the man who is their father AND grandfather.

Authorities got access to the area, comprising a narrow hallway and several rooms, after Mr Fritzl told them how to unlock a hidden door using a code only he han known.

Speaking from outside the house, Sky's Europe correspondent Greg Milam said: "There are so many questions about why more wasn't done to follow up on this case.

"One newspaper here is saying the country needs to look at what had fundamentally gone wrong, as it put it - that's how seriously it views this."

The case follows that of Natascha Kampusch, the girl who was held in the basement of a house on the outskirts of Vienna for more than eight years.

The Fritzl storycame to light after one of the children was taken to a local hospital.

The girl, 19-year-old Kerstin, was said by police to be "gravely ill".

Elisabeth told police her father began sexually abusing her when she was 11 and locked her in a room in the cellar several years later.

Mr Fritzl's wife, Rosemarie, had been unaware of what happened to her daughter.

Three of her younger children were each left on her parents' doorstep, the first accompanied by a letter saying she could not look after the baby herself.

All were taken in by Mr Fritzl and his wife as foster or adopted children and went to school as normal.

Police said Elisabeth only agreed to talk after the authorities promised she would not have to see her father again and the children would be taken care of.

The mother and children are now being treated in hospital by a team of psychologists.

DNA tests are being carried out to determine whether Mr Fritzl is the father.

Austrian papers asked on Monday how the local community could have been unaware of what was going on in the basement of the housing block.

note to mods: rlyy very sorry if im not allowed to post something like this.