One night in high school, wandering as teenagers are wont to do in the strange, far corners of the internet, I happened upon the case of an Austrian electrician named Josef Fritzl. One article turned into five, and then I was on a full-blown information binge--the more I read about Fritzl's life and lies, the more questions I had. Fritzl was a criminal of the worst order. He was an incestuous rapist, a kidnapper, and a consummate liar. Here's an article about the case. Be warned--it's not an easy read.
In sum, Fritzl--a well-respected professional with a wife children--kidnapped his daughter on her 18th birthday and took her to a secret apartment he had excavated beneath his basement. He told his wife and neighbors that she had run away to join a cult somewhere, and that was that--she had disappeared. He began systematically raping her, siring several children over the years. Most of these [grand]children he also kept in the apartment, though he adopted one boy as his own, inventing a story to explain the boy's origins.
This went on for 24 years, with no one in the town or house any the wiser. He was found out when his oldest [grand]daughter developed a severe case of pneumonia and had to be taken to the hospital. Her mother smuggled a note to the doctors in the girl's clothing, and down tumbled the facade.
What fascinated me most about Fritzl was not his crimes against his daughter. Though disgusting, they seemed within standard limits of human depravity. The detail I found most concerning was the fact that he maintained the charade for twenty-four years. No one--not his wife, not the son he freed at birth, not his friends and neighbors--had any inkling of his secret life.
We have to wonder, as the article does, whether Fritzl was a superb liar or whether his dupes were particularly willing to believe him and to lie to themselves.
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