Austrian father 'jailed for rape'

The Austrian father who held his daughter captive in a cellar for 24 years was reportedly jailed for rape around the time she was born.Josef Fritzl's sister-in-law, identified as Christine R, told the Austrian Oesterreich newspaper she was 16 when he was caged for breaking into the apartment of a 24-year-old nurse and forcing himself on her in the city of Linz.She said she believed Fritzl had spent a year and a half in jail, but the authorities are unable to confirm the crime took place.Under Austrian law, if Fritzl had such a conviction it would have been purged from the records after 15 years at the latest.The reported conviction dates from shortly after the birth of Fritzl's daughter Elisabeth, now 42, who was released just over a week ago from the cellar where he had fathered seven children with her.Christine R also said Elisabeth had made an attempt to run away from home only a few months before police say Fritzl incarcerated her.The head of the investigation, Franz Polzer, confirmed a report that Elisabeth had been restrained on a leash for the early months of her captivity.Investigators are looking at whether Fritzl would have been able to carry out threats to kill his victims with gas if they tried to escape, as he claimed.Mr Polzer said: "He said he made the threats. I don't believe they were true, but we are examining the claim."Mr Polzer said Fritzl was a classic tyrant personality, adding: "This man, all of whose crimes were driven by his sexual energy, never once tolerated being asked about his holidays, his absences."Elisabeth was kept imprisoned in a cellar complex beneath Fritzl's apartment with her three other surviving children - a daughter, now 19, and two sons aged 18 and 5.Fritzl is being held in a cell in the Lower Austria provincial capital of St Poelten while detectives continue to search the cellar complex.Elisabeth and her surviving children are all being cared for in hospital. One child died shortly after birth.Doctors say the eldest daughter, whom Fritzl took to hospital from the cellar two weeks ago, remains critically ill but stable.

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ITN | May 4, 2008

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