Man ‘kept daughter in dungeon for 24 years’
By Andreas Sam in Amstetten
Last Updated: 7:36am BST?28/04/2008
An Austrian woman has told police how she was held captive in a cellar for 24 years and abused by her father, falling pregnant six times.
The 42-year-old – named yesterday only as Elisabeth F – said she was drugged, handcuffed and dragged into the adapted cellar beneath the family home in 1984 and there since.
Her 73-year-old father, “Josef F”, has been arrested on suspicion of incest and keeping his daughter in captivity.
Of her six children, a 19-year-old woman and two sons, aged five and 18, were said to have been kept with her in the cellar and to have never seen daylight until rescued. Three others – a boy and two girls aged 12 to 16 – were allowed to attend school after being “adopted” by Miss F’s father and his wife who live in Amstetten, central Austria.
