Josef Fritzl raped his daughter Elisabeth and fathered children with her (Picture: Getty)
Rapist Josef Fritzl could soon be released from prison after an expert ruled he is no longer a danger to the public.
Fritzl, 88, was jailed for life in 2009 after admitting he had kept his daughter Elisabeth locked in the cellar of the family home as his sex slave for 24 years.
During her ordeal in Amstetten, Austria, Elisabeth had seven children by her disturbed father.
Local media reported that he now seems confused, regularly talks to the television, thinks he is a pop star and speaks of visits from relatives that never happened.
But under the terms of his sentence, Frizl will be eligible for parole this year – and that seems likely now after a new psychiatric report into the state of his mind says that the monster is ‘no longer dangerous.’
The report says he can barely walk and needs a walking frame to get around, meaning he could not pose a serious threat.
Elisabeth and her children were held hostage in this room (Picture: Getty)
Josef Fritzl has been in Sankt Poelten Prison serving a life sentence (Picture: CEN)
The house where Elisabeth was held for 24 years is now a block of flats (Picture: AFP)
But his horrific crimes still haunt many who know the case – Fritzl lured his daughter down in the basement when she was 18 years old.
His wife, Rosemarie, filed a missing persons report, but Fritzl handed over a letter to the police from Elisabeth, stating that she said she was staying with a friend and didn’t want to be found.
The Fritzl case emerged in April 2008 after Elisabeth told police she had been held captive for 24 years when she was allowed out of the cell and taken to a hospital.
Despite his horrific crimes, if Fritzl’s parole is granted, he would most likely released into a nursing home to live out his days in comfort.
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Heidi Kastner, one of Austria’s leading forensic psychiatric experts from Linz University, has reportedly spent a year preparing her new study of Fritzl.
She concluded that the country’s most notorious prisoner no longer poses any danger and could be transferred through the normal prison system at the Krems-Stein jail, as part of a first step towards being released.
He can now only get around with the help of a walker after a number of falls while behind bars and Kastner argues that there is no longer any risk of him carrying out any criminal activity.
But just last year, Fritzl’s bid for freedom was dashed when Austrian High Court judges blocked his parole appeal.
In 2023, Fritzl shared his thoughts on the new king, climate activists and more in a book written in conjunction with his lawyer, based on a series of letters from prison.
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