Elisabeth Fritzl: The girl in the basement

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This is a case of a teenage girl who went missing & wasn’t seen for twenty-four years.

Elisabeth Fritzl was born on April 6, 1966 to parents Josef & Rosemarie Fritzl in Amstetten, Lower Austria; she had three brothers & three sisters. At age 15, after Elisabeth had completed her required education, she started a course to become a waitress. In January of 1983, she ran away from home & went to Vienna where she lived in hiding with a friend from work. Within three weeks, she was found by police & returned to her parents. Once home, she finished her waitressing course in mid-1984 & was offered a job in nearby Linz. This was a beacon of light that would allow her to escape the home that she shared with her abusive father. 

Elisabeth’s father, Josef, had been working in the bowels of the home’s cellar in the garden beneath the family home. The house dated as far back as 1890 & Josef had been given official permission to begin construction on an extension as far back as the late 1970s. He had even been given a grant for a couple thousand pounds toward the building cost by the local council. In 1983, building inspectors verified that the new extension had been built to code, however, Josef then went on to illegally enlarge the room by excavating space for a much larger basement.

Josef, who was an electrical engineer, rented a digger which sat in the garden of his home & neighbors watched as he removed wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow of dirt to make way for the rooms he was building. He planned each detail, securing the supplies he needed through construction companies he had previously worked for. Initially there were two access points, a heavy hinged door & a metal door that was reinforced with concrete that was operable via a remote-control device. A total of eight doors needed to be opened in order to reach the cellar that Josef had built.

On August 28, 1984 Elisabeth was 18-years-old when her father asked her to help him carry a new door that he was re-fitting into the newly renovated cellar. As Elisabeth held the door, Josef began to fix it into place. The moment the door was secure on its hinges, he swung it open & forced Elisabeth into the room & rendered her unconscious with an ether-soaked rag. This was the final door of the eight that led into a dark, tomb-like cellar; two of these eight doors were additionally secured by electronic locking devices on a remote control that Josef carried with him at all times.

When Elisabeth was nowhere to be found later that day, her mother Rosemarie became frantic & filed a missing-persons report. When police responded to the home, Josef told them that he suspected that his daughter ran off to join a cult since this was something she’d previously threatened & reinforced the fact that she’d previously ran away. As the officer stood taking the report, he had no idea that only twenty feet beneath his feet, Elisabeth was being held prisoner by her own father. 

Around 1981 or 1982, Josef began to secretly morph his hidden cellar into a prison cell & installed a restroom, bed, hot plate & refrigerator. In 1983, he added on to the space by creating a passageway to a pre-existing basement area under the old part of the property, a detail only he was aware of. The rest of the family was forbidden to ever go into the cellar. Areas of their home had been sublet to renters who recall being forbidden to enter the cellar as well & were told that if they did, they would be given immediate notice. The home was three stories & the bottom floor was split into a number of flats which allowed as many as 8 tenants while Josef & his wife lived on the top two floors.

The hidden cellar consisted of a 16 foot corridor, a storage area & three small open cells that connected through narrow passageways that included a basic cooking area, two sleeping areas with two beds each & a bathroom. Of the two access points, one hinged door weighed 1,100# which was thought to have eventually become unusable as time went on because of the extreme weight as well a metal door that was reinforced with concrete & steel rails that weighed 660# & measured 3.3 feet high & 2 feet wide. It was located behind a shelf in Josef’s basement workshop & protected by an electronic code.

Even before Josef imprisoned Elisabeth, he had kept his ailing mother locked in an attic room with bricked up windows until the time of her death in 1980. If anyone asked about her, he told them she had died. He claimed he did this as revenge for the abuse she inflicted upon him & blamed her for his actions. He indicated that she never showed him any love & beat him until he was on the floor & bleeding. He was an only child & his mother raised him alone after a bitter divorce & claimed that the only reason his mother had him was to prove to her husband that she wasn’t sterile. After their divorce, he had no contact with his father. Josef moved to their current house in 1959, soon after he married Rosemarie & his mother then moved in with them. As his mother aged, their roles slowly reversed & she began to fear her son. It’s not clear how long his mother was kept in her attic room without sunlight, but it’s been speculated that it was up to 20 years.

Josef had a history of violence & rape & began to form his plan about imprisoning his daughter while he was incarcerated for rape. In 1967, he broke into the home of a 24-year-old nurse while her husband was out & brutally raped her at knifepoint; was sentenced to 18 months in prison & served only 12 months. He said it was during this sentence that he decided to lock Elisabeth up so he could live out his evil side while leading a seemingly normal life from an outside perspective.  He was also a suspect in a case of attempted rape of a 21-year-old woman & was known for indecent exposure. 

When Josef was sent to prison for rape, Elisabeth was only 2-years-old & her mother told her that her father had gone to work abroad.

There had been no word from Elisabeth for weeks & her mother had grown sick with worry, fearing the worst until a letter arrived from Elisabeth. In it, she wrote that she had grown tired of life with her family & made the decision to run away.

As far as the rest of the family understood, each morning, when Josef headed down to the basement at 9 am, he was simply drawing up plans for the machines he sold. Sometimes he would spend the night down there, but Rosemarie only saw a hard-working man who was dedicated to his career. Most of the time, Josef was visiting his daughter daily, sometimes three times a week at minimum. Soon, he began to rape her, picking back up on the nightly visits he started when Elisabeth was 11-years-old. 

When Elisabeth first woke up in captivity, her arms were restrained behind her back with an iron chain which was secured to metal posts behind her bed. She was only able to move about a foot & a half of each side of the bed. After two days, Elisabeth was given more freedom as the chains were moved from her wrists & instead, attached to her waist. Six to nine months into her captivity, Josef removed the metal chains altogether. Not out of kindness, but because it was “hindering his sexual activity with his daughter”, according to the indictment. He sometimes raped his own daughter multiple times a day starting from day two of her imprisonment until the time she was released.

Two years into her captivity Elisabeth discovered that she was pregnant, but ten weeks into the pregnancy, she miscarried in November of 1986. Two years later, she became pregnant for a second time & carried to term. She gave birth to a baby girl on August 30, 1988, almost four years to the day that her imprisonment began & named her Kerstin. About a year & a half later, in February of 1990, she gave birth to a baby boy named Stefan. 

Elisabeth’s pregnancies were terrifying; there was absolutely no medical care though after their births, she did welcome the company of another human. She had contemplated suicide many times before her children were born. When Elisabeth was nearing the end of her pregnancies, her father provided her with disinfectant, a dirty pair of scissors, a blanket, diapers & a book on childbirth from the 1960s. She had given birth to Kerstin completely on her own & Josef didn’t check on them until Kerstin was ten days old.

Kerstin & Stefan stayed in the cellar with their mother throughout what would end up turning into 24 years of imprisonment. The trio were brought weekly rations of food & water by Josef & Elisabeth did her best in providing them with an education. She tried to give some semblance of normalcy under the horrific circumstances they were forced into. 

In August of 1992, Elisabeth gave birth to a third child, a girl she named Lisa. Because of cramped quarters, Josef made the decision to take Lisa from the cellar. He forced Elisabeth to write a letter, “Dear parents, I am leaving you my little daughter Lisa. Take good care of my little girl… I breastfed her for about 6 ½ months & now she drinks her milk from the bottle. She is a good girl, & she eats everything else from the spoon.” He placed Lisa in a cardboard box outside the Fritzl home in May of 1993, about nine months after she was born. Around his time, Josef allowed the enlargement of the prison after repeated requests from Elisabeth. For years, she & her children dug soil out with their hands & enlarged the area from 380 to 590 square feet with absolutely no windows to the outside.

The letters were enough to convince both Rosemarie & social services who wrote, “The Fritzl family is taking loving care of Lisa & wishes to continue caring for her.” Despite the fact that Josef had been a convicted rapist, he was allowed to adopt Elisabeth’s children because in accordance to Austrian law, his criminal record was expunged after 15 years & by this time at least 25 years had gone by.

In December of 1994, no one batted an eye when another nine month old baby, a girl named Monika who was born in February of 1994, showed up on the Fritzl doorstep just as Lisa had. 10-month-old Monika was found in a stroller outside the home. Shortly after her arrival, Rosemarie received a call from someone who sounded like Elisabeth, asking her to take care of her child. It’s assumed that Josef used a recording of her voice. Two years later, in April 1996, Elisabeth gave birth to twin boys, Alexander & Michael. 

Tragically, Michael was having respiratory issues & died in his mother’s arms when he was only 66 hours old as Josef stood by, saying, “What will be, will be.” Josef later admitted that he had burned the baby’s body in an incinerator & scattered his ashes in the family garden & denied that he was responsible for murder through negligence. When Alexander was 15 months old, he was taken upstairs & “discovered” in a similar manner as his two older sisters.

The last of Elisabeth’s children was born in December 2002, a boy named Felix, who stayed in the basement with his mother, Kerstin & Stefan while Lisa, Monika & Alexander were raised upstairs by Josef & Rosemarie. Josef later explained that the reason he allowed Felix to stay with his mother was because Rosemary wouldn’t have been able to care for another child.

The three children in the basement were never for a moment exposed to sunlight or fresh air & never visited a doctor. They didn’t know what fresh air felt like, what the moon glowing in the night sky was or the sound of birds chirping in the trees. Instead, they were forced to watch the abuse that their mother was subjected to & during her captivity, Elisabeth had been raped about 3,000 times. On the other hand, the three children allowed upstairs enjoyed music lessons, sunshine & freedom. Elisabeth was torn about being away from her three children that were taken from her, but also grateful that they weren’t subjected to the horrific conditions, abuse & captivity.

As the underground dungeon expanded in size, Josef built a swimming pool upstairs in order to cover up for the amount of earth he was dragging up. As the family splashed in the pool, they did so above Elisabeth’s & her children’s prison. Meanwhile, Elisabeth, Kerstin, Stefan & Felix were living amongst the cold, damp & rats that she was sometimes forced to catch with her bare hands. The water that seeped down the walls was so constant that she had to use towels to soak it up. During the summer months, the cave of captivity turned into a sweltering sauna which made for the worst time of the year, something Elisabeth wrote in her calendar. As the world was moving on & technology & times were evolving, Elisabeth’s life remained frozen in time, each day a repeat of the next. 

No one knows how long Josef planned to continue this situation, holding four people prisoner in the basement of their unassuming house. In April of 2008, Kerstin, who was now 19-years-old, fell gravely ill. Kerstin had always been sickly, but she developed cramps that got so severe that she started biting her lips until they bled. Elisabeth was beside herself & insisted that she desperately needed medical attention. Josef relented & on April 19, 2008, he agreed to take her to the hospital. He brought Kerstin out of the cellar & drove her to the hospital. Before he left, Elisabeth, who was now 42-years-old,  slipped a note in Kerstin’s pocket, “Please, please help her. Kerstin is really terrified of other people. She was never in a hospital.” In her note, she suggested that doctors treat her daughter with aspirin & cough medicine.

When she arrived at the hospital, it  was clear to the medical staff that Kerstin had suffered severe neglect which made the doctors very suspicious. They asked the public for any information & asked her mother to come forward to help save Kerstin’s life. Of course, no one came forward as the family that she had was being held captive in the cellar. Eventually, the police became suspicious of 73-year-old Josef & made the decision to re-open the case of missing Elisabeth Fritzl. Investigators read through the letters that Elisabeth had supposedly left for her parents & started to notice inconsistencies. 

Kerstin’s pale appearance & poorly cared for teeth also made the medical staff & police suspicious that something sinister led to her arrival. A specific diagnosis for Kerstin’s illness wasn’t made public, but it was reported that she suffered from respiratory issues & stomach cramps, likely a result of poor air quality, lack of sunshine & an adequate diet.

Elisabeth & her two boys, Stefan & Felix, viewed the appeals on the TV in their cellar & Elisabeth pleaded with Josef to let her out.

It’s unknown what led to Josef’s next action, but he decided to release Elisabeth from the cellar on April 26, 2008, one week after Kerstin was taken to the hospital. It was the first time she had left the dark, dank space in twenty-four years. It’s possibly because he had a change of heart about his daughter’s captivity, but more likely, it was the mounting pressure from the police. On her release, Elisabeth went straight to the hospital so she could be with her daughter. Hospital staff notified the police of her sudden & suspicious arrival as Josef tried to explain it away, saying that she had appeared on his doorstep with her two children, after finally breaking away from her cult.

Elisabeth was taken into a room for questioning, away from her father & police threatened to charge her with child abuse because of the horrific state that Kerstin arrived in. They asked about her daughter’s illness & her father’s story. She begged the police to promise that she would never see her father again & if they did, she would tell them everything. With that, she went on to detail her twenty-four years of captivity & that during those years, she gave birth to seven children & Josef was the father of each. She explained that he would come down each night, force her to watch pornographic films with him & then rape her. This abuse had been going on since she was eleven. Josef was arrested that same night.

When police arrived at the Fritzl home, the secret location was so hidden that when they searched, they failed to find the cellar until Josef showed them where it was. They found the rooms neat & tidy with children’s paintings & posters hanging on the walls. There was a TV with a video player & a radio but absolutely no room  for exercise or to run around.

After the arrest, the two children remaining in the cellar, Stefan & Felix, were also released & Rosemarie Fritzel fled the home. She explained that she had no idea what was happening beneath her feet & Josef backed this same story. The other tenants who lived in the apartment on the first floor were also unaware. If there were any unexpected noises, Josef would explain them away as faulty pipes or a noisy heater. It’s unclear how Josef managed to consistently bring food, clothing & additional supplies to the imprisoned family without anyone taking notice. The owner of the bakery next door to the Fritzl home said he would see Josef & Rosemarie sporadically with the kids & never suspected that anything was amiss. He said that before this was revealed, Josef was a well-known & respected man around town. The children were well looked after in appearance.

The lives of Elisabeth’s six living children would never be the same; as Kerstin was being treated in the hospital, the three “upstairs” siblings, 16-year-old Lisa, 14-year-old Monika & 12-year-old Alexander, met their two “downstairs” siblings, 18-year-old Stefan & 5-year-old Felix, for the first time since they were babies. It was obvious that the road to recovery was going to be long.

Kerstin was critically ill & she nearly died from her illness. She was reunited with her family on June 8, 2008 after waking from a seven-week long medically induced coma. The trauma she had suffered during her captivity was extensive & throughout her life in the cellar, she had torn out her hair in clumps. Stefan was unable to walk properly since he was forced to stoop over due to the confining space in the cellar as he grew.

During the trial which began in March 2009, Josef’s lawyer, Rudolf Mayer, denied enslavement & explained that Josef was only trying to protect his daughter by locking her in the cellar away from the outside world, away from the temptations of drugs, alcohol & bad influences that the world would surely tempt her with. His lawyer tried to portray Josef as a caring man who spent time & money to maintain both families. He was even kind enough to bring a Christmas tree down to the cellar where he held his four prisoners during the holidays. He had provided them with books, an aquarium & a canary. He pointed out that it was clear that the air quality in the cellar was not bad as the canary had been able to survive. 

The prosecutor asked for life in prison in an institution for the criminally insane & demonstrated to the jurors just how low the ceiling height was in the cellar dungeon by making a mark on the door of the courtroom at about 5 feet, 6 inches. She passed around a box of musty objects that had been removed from the cellar in order to demonstrate just how moldy & musty the space was. As the jurors sniffed the items, they flinched due to the stench.

On the first day of the trial, the jurors listened to eleven hours of testimony that were recorded of Elisabeth as she spoke to police & psychologists in July 2008. The details were so disturbing that they could listen in only two hour intervals. Elisabeth’s brother Harald testified regarding the abuse he also suffered at the hands of his father when he was a child, but Rosemarie & Elisabeth’s children refused to testify.

The trial lasted four days & during that time, Josef tried to hide his face from cameras behind a blue folder, which was allowed under Austrian law. When the opening comments began, all journalists & spectators were asked to leave & this was when he lowered the folder from his face. Josef eventually pleaded guilty to rape, enslavement, coercion & causing the death of his child Michael by negligence was given a life sentence without the possibility of parole for fifteen years per Austrian law. While Josef faced justice in court, Elisabeth secretly took Kerstin so she could witness this as part of her healing. 

A psychiatrist who deemed Josef fit for trial indicated that he suffered from severe combined personality disorder, also known as mixed personality disorder as well as a sexual disorder. He distanced himself from his actions by never looking his victim in the face while he raped her. He was easily able to lead a double life & played down the gravity of his actions in his mind. In his warped mind, he was a good father, even while keeping his family imprisoned because he brought them games & celebrated birthdays & holidays with them while they were in captivity. He said that he decided to imprison Elisabeth when she became a teenager & no longer wanted to abide by his rules in order to keep her from the outside world. He indicated that he grew up during the Nazi era which may have influenced his behaviors.

Throughout the time Elisabeth was held captive, Josef continuously threatened that if she didn’t do everything that he said, her treatment would only get worse. He repeatedly kicked & beat her, he humiliated her, forcing her to re-enact scenes from violent pornographic films. The abuse she was subjected to left her with long lasting physical & emotional injuries. During the first four years of her captivity, she was completely alone; Josef rarely, if ever, spoke to her.

He warned Elisabeth & the children that he’d installed a system to the cellar so that if they tried to escape through the doors, they would be jolted by an electric shock & poison would be released into the cellar, killing them all instantly. If he grew angry, Josef would leave them in absolute darkness, switching the power off to the cellar for days at a time.  He later installed a freezer so they could stockpile food during times that he would go away on holiday. During times that the power would be shut off, the freezer would defrost & leak its contents all over the already damp prison.

Upon her release from the cellar, Elisabeth’s teeth were terribly decayed & her children had medical issues that included vitamin D deficiency & anemia. Vitamin D deficiency from the lack of sunlight can cause rickets which weakens & deforms bones. They likely suffer from mobility issues due to the low ceilings which affected their posture as well as their inability to exercise. Elisabeth emerged with white hair, looking far older than her age of 42 due to the stress, nutritional deficiencies & lack of fresh air & sunshine. Lisa, Monika & Alexander had enjoyed a typical childhood with their grandparents while Kerstin, Stefan & Felix emerged from the cellar pale, postures stooped, having never seen sunlight or breathed fresh air.

Today, Elisabeth lives under a new identity in a secret Austrian village known as “Village X.” The location is surrounded by steel fencing, video cameras, CCTV-operated gate & trees that shield the windows as the family attempts to recover from their house of horror. This house has no cellar. Doctors indicate that the Fritzls are gradually coming to terms with their ordeal & beginning to bond as a family. The local community includes 22,000 people who are aware of their presence, but as an act of sympathy, they leave them in peace. Shortly after leaving the cellar, the family shared their time between their new home & the hospital.

Elisabeth suffered from hypervigilance which is a state of increased alertness due to a fear of hidden dangers that are often not real, which makes a person very sensitive to their surroundings. She felt the constant need to check on her children & attended regular therapy sessions. Her six children were taken on weekly trips to the Amstetten Mauer Psychiatric Clinic for therapy. Doctors were especially concerned with how the three “downstairs” children, Kerstin, Stefan & Felix would cope in their new home because of the damage done to their immune systems. In 2009, Kerstin was 20, Stefan was 18 & Felix was six & they had gone their whole lives, never being exposed to sunlight.

Elisabeth insisted on having as much time as possible to spend time with all six of her children in order to help them bond. In 2009, Lisa was 16, Monika 14 & Alexander 12 & were able to attend normal schools, Elisabeth feeling secure enough in their village to drive them to school herself. Felix played in the garden each day, wearing dark glasses to adapt to the bright sunlight.

Kerstin & Stefan, being older, have taken longer to adjust to their new life, continuing to suffer from panic attacks, nightmares & obsessive-compulsive disorders. They are unable to sleep in rooms where the doors are closed. Kerstin enjoys listening to music TV while Stefan watches TV, plays on the computer & tends to the fish in the aquarium. Both were tutored at home to make up for the education they missed while in captivity.

Elisabeth cut all ties with her mom, Rosemarie, indicating she was upset by her mother’s passiveness during her childhood. Her mother may not have known she was locked in the cellar, but she was aware of the rape that her husband committed in 1967. Those caring for Elisabeth have been amazed by the strength she’s shown in coping with her ordeal. After their release, the family spent 196 days at a clinic & regardless if the children were held upstairs or downstairs, their worlds collapsed in April of 2008 & they began the process of rebuilding their lives & healing their wounds. The “upstairs” children suffered from guilt & the “downstairs” children found it challenging to bond with their siblings.

Following the trial, the children were given new identities & Elisabeth went on to marry her bodyguard, Thomas Wagner, who is 23 years younger. He gave her the ‘renewed strength’ in her journey toward normalcy. 

In 2016, the Fritzl home was converted into ten flats & much of the cellar has been filled in with concrete though the stairs & a single room remain.

In May 2017 Josef changed his name to Josef Mayrhoff, likely due to the prison beatings he was receiving, once, resulting in several of his teeth being knocked out. Mark Perry, a British journalist, interviewed Josef in his cell & Josef indicated that he has zero remorse for what he did, adding, “just look into the cellars of other people, you might find other families & girls down there.”

In April 2019, it was reported that Josef’s health began to decline & he made statements that he no longer wanted to live. In September 2021, based on a psychiatric report that he no longer posed any danger, a decision was made to release him from a psychiatric detention center to a regular prison where he will continue to serve his life sentence. This decision was overturned two months later in November 2021. In late April 2022, it was then decided that he could be moved based on a supplementary psychiatric report. However, until an appeal to the Higher Regional Court of Krems was heard, he would remain in the psychiatric facility. 

On January 25, 2024, it was approved for Josef to move to a regular prison & If this happens, he will be eligible for parole this year.

The now 89-year-old man who became known as the “Monster of Amstetten” now has dementia & is physically frail & walks with the assistance of a walker. 

Josef issued a statement through his lawyer & said, “I miss my family very, very much. I am always thinking of them, & how I would like to see my grandchildren. But I definitely believe I am going to see them again one day. I am sure that we are going to be reunited & I think they are going to forgive me for what I have done. I’m sure of it.” He claims to be very sorry & then follows by saying, “I would just add though, that I didn’t murder anyone or anything like that, so I do reject some of the ways I am sometimes referred to.”

Three years after his imprisonment, Josef is reported to have divorce his wife of 52 years, Rosemarie, who was cleared of any involvement in his crimes, for failing to visit him in jail.

This horrific story inspired a Hollywood movie, Girl in the Basement. 

Elisabeth’s family searched for her above ground for decades after she suddenly disappeared while she remained in the one place they never thought to look, her own home. Elizabeth is now 58-years-old & her children range in age from 21-35 & are able to be free to live the life that they choose.

References:

1. Josef Fritzl trial: ‘She spent the first five years entirely alone. He hardly ever spoke to her’
2. Mirror: Exclusive: Remote village where victims of Josef Fritzl are rebuilding their lives
3. Ati: The horrific story of Elisabeth Fritzl’s children, who were fathered by their own grandpa
4. Ati: How Elisabeth Fritzl was imprisoned for 24 years by her father Josef
5. Daily Mail: Inside the new life of Josef Fritzl’s daughter
6. Independent: Josef Fritzl says he is ‘sure’ his family will forgive him in rare statement
7. The Washington Post: Austrian who was imprisoned , raped daughter for decades to go to general prison
8. The Guardian: Josef Fritzl applies for release from prison into nursing home
9. CBS News: Josef Fritzl, sex offender who locked up his daughter for 24 years, could be eligible for parole
10. Wikipedia: Fritzl case
11. The Guardian: Josef Fritzl kept sick mother locked in attic, leaked papers reveal
12. BBC: Inside Josef Fritzl’s cellar dungeon
13. Mirror: Inside Josef Fritzl’s dungeon 10 years on: House of horrors cellar where daughter was kept as sex slave for decades
14. The Guardian: Josef Fritzl case: Daughter wakes from coma
15. Healthline: What is hypervigilance 
16. Express: What did Josef Fritzl’s wife Rosemarie know about the monster’s crimes?