‘CRIMINAL ENERGY’

Incestuous Rapist Packs Bags for Move From High Security Prison

Judges ruled that Josef Fritzl no longer posed a threat, but still could never be released.

Josef Fritzl, an Austrian man who is spending life in prison for kidnapping his own daughter and keeping her as a sex slave, was approved to move to a lower security prison last month, but denied the possibility of ever being released. In January, a court ordered that Fritzl could be moved, but the decision was overturned a few months later. In a new ruling from April, judges wrote that, “the prisoner’s dangerousness has been reduced and no criminal offense with serious consequences is to be expected any more.” The judge also ruled that Fritzl, who is 89 and suffers from Alzheimer’s, could not be released from prison due to his “unprecedented criminal energy.” Fritzl kept his daughter locked in his basement for 24 years, and sired several children with her. In 2009, he pleaded guilty to counts of rape, false imprisonment, manslaughter by negligence, and incest. According to the The Sun, Fritzl’s bags were packed to go before the ruling had even been released, and is expected to be moved from the secure psychiatric unit at Stein prison as soon as possible.