Where are the other children? How could no one have known?

His wife, her mother, knew about it the whole time. This is disgusting. What is Austria's highest punishment? This sick bleep deserves it.

I believe in ultimate judgement. Killing him here won't solve anything.

He needs to suffer...

@ siguros
Th highest punishment in our country would be a life-long prison sentence.

This is a face that I never wanted to see again.

What a disgusting human being.

Witchy -- that's not necessarily true -- the laws vary by state.

I hope this guy spends the rest of his years rotting in jail for the sick things he did.

runningesq - not for him anyway. since it's the court of St. Pölten, the highest punishment for murder is a life-long sentence. All other charges are between 10 and 20 years I think.

I apologize, Witchy -- I read "our country" as the U.S. :embarresed: -- I hope he's maxed out.

I was reading about this story last spring. Once I was in public library and I was reading a newspaper - I had to stop because I was starting to cry so bad.

How could someone do something like this? This is so sick, sick, sick!

He has ruined so many lives.

I second that he should suffer, nursekimberly.

This guy is so sick. I hope to never see his face again! yuck.

I would prefer him to be thrown in jail rather then be killed. Rapist and child molesters are not looked upon very kindly by other inmates. I'm not going to say hope, because that stoops down to his level, but I wouldn't complain if his fellow inmates had a little "fun" with him everyday while the guards looked the other way.

Just sick and saddening, the girl must be broken by now and nothing we can do to him will ever make her the same.

I am surprised she was capable of carrying the babies to term. You would think depression our insanity would have interfered.

I think just punishment would be for him to be raped and beaten regularly by his inmakes and live in constant fear for his life. Let him see how it feels.

Yeah, I have no rational thoughts for how this guy should be punished. I keep imagining the worst punishment possible and it still doesn't seem good enough.

He needs to spend to remainder of his pathetic years in a windowless, dark 2x4 cell, so small that he is unable to sit nor stand and think about how many lives he has ruined. Death is the easy way out and I think that too good for him. Foul beast!

I hope for a punishment that would be a combination of Jessibanana's and Black Velveteen's views.

That beast is truly disgusting.

I remember reading this story when it happened. It was sick and disgusting then... it is sick and disgusting now. Austria doesn't have the death penalty, so he'll be in jail for a long time. I'm just glad they finally charged him with murder on the baby that died so that he can get an even longer sentence.

Hard to even find the words. This is beyond horrible, I can't comprehend it. The man has evil written all over him.

Heh. Chained and sexually abused his own daughter. I don't know if you guys have seen the Hills Have Eyes 2 but that situation just reminds me of the monster at the beginning of the movie who impregnated a girl and kept her chained throughout the pregnancy. And there I was thinking "thank god that sh*t wouldn't happen irl".

He shouldn't have been released from jail after his first rape conviction in the 1960s. After reading the Wiki entry on the Fritzl case and various news articles, I'm even more repulsed by this sick creep. He's been quoted saying, "I was born to rape." and claimed he enslaved his daughter as an outlet to prevent him from doing worse to strangers. The children show signs of intense psychological trauma and fearful behavior in daily life. No mortal punishment is enough for all the damage he's done.

He blames everyone but himself.

There's a lot about Austrian culture in these small towns which points to a "don't question your husband" mentality. I hope that isn't true, but if it is, it explains why the wife seems to be in utter, complete denial about having any awareness of it at all.

I can't judge her though. This family is so screwed up, so utterly unlike anything we could possibly understand, and the psychological scars run very, very deep. From what I understand he was verbally abusive to her as she aged, and she was somewhat cowed by him. Is it an excuse - not really - but then women with husbands like this, sadly and classically, are often muted by the psychological (and sometimes physical/emotional) manipulation of their partners.

I can't find a punishment fitting enough for this man.... I don't even know if killing him is enough, unless that gave the victims some sense of relief that he is gone forever.

Me, given my attitude towards this ...(and here is a GOOD use for the word EVIL) evil man...I think I would want him punished in the same way he punished his daughter and family.

But then I saw a bunch of the SAW movies this week so this is a bad time to start wondering how to punish people, brings out my mean side.

Actually every woman that is horrified and hurt by this story should be allowed to line up, walk up and punch him once in the face...hard.

I reckon the first few thousand women will be the only ones he would feel.

THEN he spends the rest of his life in a prison being someone's pet.

Ok, I need to go look at pictures of unicorns and bunnies to calm back down.

Shadowdamage, what you're saying is only partially true. While there certainly is something about the Austrian mentality that seems to forbid women to question their husbands, this is only true for the older generations, to which these two certainly belong.
And secondly, the lived in a fairly large town (compared the rest of Austria), only 45 minutes away from our nation's capital. So it's not really rural Austria. Basically, what I'm saying is that even with all the traditional values that many families (especially in rural, mountain areas) still hold, would not have applied to where they lived and all in all, nothing about this story makes sense...

Thanks for the insights, I appreciate it!

I think this man is the devil incarnate. My heart bleeds to even think what that poor woman and her children have gone through, and how they will spend the rest of their lives recuperating...God, why would you let these things happen? Are you even there?

i truly have NO words for this piece of sh*t.

GOD BLESS ELIZABETH AND HER KIDS!

disgusting. that guy is sick. like how could you do that to another person, terrible

I read about this in the papers a few months ago and I was so shocked. I thought something this awful only happens in movies. It is such a sad sad thing.

I read that the daughter and her children are in a mental institute learning to adjust to being in the outside world. Sadly I also read that the doctors fear the abused daughter and her eldest children may never be able to live on their own outside because they have been confined and abused for far too long.

This is unimaginably appalling. He is evil.

i think that we were ALL in shock about this case when we first heard about it last year, and i'm so happy to hear that they are finding him to be guilty of so many horrid things. it's a shame that there are people out there who do this, and sadly i'm sure that he's not alone (seeing as how we heard of another similar case). i just hope that all these people who suffered are some how managing to re-acclimate themselves into life...

I think he should be castrated. Then, as someone else said, he should be left at the mercy of the other inmates while the guards look the other way. His cell should be dirty, dark and very small and he should only get the amount of sustenance needed to keep him alive to live out his prison sentence. Essentially, he should get exactly what he did to his daugher.

I think all proven sexual predators (rapists, molesters, pedophiles, etc.) should be castrated. By proven I mean solid DNA evidence, video, confession, etc.

An EYE for an EYE. What he did to those children and his daughter needs to be done to him. Sorry if that sounds sadistic, but just putting him in prison isn't good enough.

GS, he will be judged by the Maker, but I'm all for letting that happen sooner rather than later.

As in chemical castration GS? Or the whole kit n caboodle?

Im for whole kit n caboodle. What he did was sick.

actually the mother did not know what was going on as he lead her to believe the daughter was a rebel and ran away he made the daughter write a letter to her mother saying she was running away that's why the mother is in utter shock, i still think she had to have known something when random children with letters would show up on her door step, all step up by Fritzl

I was absolutely astonished when I first heart this. No punishment is bad enough for this monster, I just hope he spends the rest of his life rotting in jail.

Blue, I mean the real deal.

Ah. I think it's a fitting punishment, but I doubt it would curb the behavior.

It reminds me of the Genie case where the girl was chained to a potty training potty for 13 years of her life.. a chilling story and one of psychologies greatest cases... I just don't understand how people can be so damn sick.