Girls Rescued From Dark Hell

[Rasputin]

AUSTRIA is reeling from a new child abuse scandal involving three girls who were imprisoned by their mother for seven years.

The girls were locked in a house of indescribable filth, existing in almost complete darkness and communicating in their own language.
Experts told the Times newspaper the girls may never recover.

The case, uncovered by authorities in 2005 but which has only just come to light, stunned Austria, still reeling from the Natascha Kampusch kidnapping.

Ms Kampusch was held in a tiny underground room for eight years before escaping last year.

The girls belonged to an upper middle-class family -- their mother was a lawyer and their father a judge.

When they were discovered, their home had no running water and was filled with waste and excrement 1m high.

The girls' ordeal was apparently sparked by their parents' divorce, after which their mother, 53, had a breakdown.

But she won custody of the girls, then aged 7, 11 and 13, and withdrew them from school, claiming that she would give them home tuition.

Despite legal action, her husband was not allowed to see them.

The girls, Viktoria, Katharina and Elisabeth, were rescued only when police broke into the house after a neighbour, who had reported his suspicions several times, threatened a local council official with a lawsuit, the Times reported.

The three have been in a specialised therapy centre since. The mother is now being held in a special remand prison branch for the mentally unstable.

She will appear in court in a few weeks on charges of grievous bodily harm and torture.

She had ensured the blinds were constantly shut, and that all but one light bulb had been removed in the house.

When they were released, the three victims had white skin and could not endure exposure to natural light.

Authorities are now under fire for failing to intervene sooner.

Waltraud Kubelka, a therapist who is now treating the three girls, said that their psycho-social and physical development was catastrophic.

"The oldest is doing very badly and has no prospects of recovery," Dr Kubelka said. "She was severely undernourished and practically anorexic after her release.

"The younger ones will need years to come to terms with their childhood."
News has emerged of an alleged case of severe child neglect in the Austrian town of Linz. It is claimed a woman kept her three daughters cut off from the outside world for seven years following her divorce in 1998. The girls were taken into local authority care in 2005, but details of the case were only made public at the weekend.

"The accusations are that the mother harmed the social development of the children by not allowing them to go to school and also by a lack of hygiene." said prosecution lawyer Dr Gottfried Kranza.

According to reports, the sisters lived in darkness amid human filth and developed their own language. They are now receiving counselling. The authorities have denied prosecution claims that they underestimated the situation.

The case has drawn comparisons with that of teenager Natascha Kampusch. She was held hostage for eight years in a basement before escaping recently.

[Rasputin]

Girls imprisoned for seven years

THREE girls imprisoned by their mother in a house of indescribable filth for seven years might never recover from the ordeal, experts said yesterday.

The girls were shut away from the outside world, existing in almost complete darkness, playing only with mice and communicating in their own language.

When they were discovered, their home in a smart, upper middle-class suburb had no running water and was filled with waste and excrement a metre high. The floor was corroded by mice urine.

The case has stunned Austria, still reeling from the Natascha Kampusch kidnapping. Authorities are struggling to explain how such a horror story could have gone unnoticed.

The girls' ordeal was apparently sparked by their parents' divorce, after which their mother, a 53-year-old lawyer, suffered a breakdown. But she won custody of the girls - then aged 7, 11 and 13 - and withdrew them from school, claiming she would give them private tuition at home.

Her husband, a judge in Linz, Upper Austria, named only as Andreas M, was not allowed to see them, despite his claims for access reaching court nine times.

The girls - Viktoria, Katharina and Elisabeth - were rescued only when police broke into the house after a neighbour, who had reported his suspicions several times, threatened a council official with a lawsuit.

That was in October 2005, and the three have been in a specialised therapy centre since, but the scandal was only revealed at the weekend. The mother is now being held in a remand prison branch for the mentally unstable. She will appear in court in a few weeks on charges of grievous bodily harm and torture. She is facing between five months and five years in prison.

She had ensured that the blinds were constantly shut and that all but one light bulb had been removed in the house. When they were released, the three victims had white skin and could not endure natural light.

Authorities are now under fire for failing to have intervened sooner, given the repeated complaints by neighbours in the well-to-do Poestlingberg.

The mother was said to have been summoned to court nine times during the seven years after complaints by the father and neighbours, but officials never closely investigated.

Waltraud Kubelka, a therapist treating the three girls, said their psycho-social and physical development was "catastrophic".

"The oldest one is doing very badly and has no prospects of recovery. She was severely undernourished after her release. The two younger ones will need years to come to terms with their horrific childhood.

"In the first weeks after their release they were hiding under a bench in the (therapy centre) kitchen because that was the darkest spot."

It is believed the children had contact only with their mother during their captivity and, as a consequence, developed an almost unintelligible language.

Even after a year of therapy, the oldest daughter, Elisabeth, now 21, is said to be so disturbed that she stands only on one foot for long periods, staring at the floor. She often bursts into tears.

But according to carers, the youngest of the three, Viktoria, could soon be discharged from therapy to join her father, who is now in constant contact with his daughters.

Natascha Kampusch was held for eight years by Wolfgang Priklopil, before escaping. Priklopil snatched her on her way to school when she was 10 and kept her captive in a subterranean dungeon under his house near Vienna for eight years.

Max Friedrich, a child psychiatrist who treated Ms Kampusch, said the two cases should not be compared. "This is entirely different, when the mother herself is the captor," Professor Kampusch said. "It is tragic that the one person that commands full trust is misguided in that way. I do not envy their therapists."