After Joseph Fritzl was granted conditional release from a mental health prison by an Austrian court, many will be asking whether his wife was aware of his shocking crimes and what she is doing to this day.
Fritzl, 88, is currently serving a life sentence for crimes of rape, enslavement, and the murder by neglect, of his newborn son, but was spotted outside of prison for the first time in 15 years this morning.
He locked his daughter Elisabeth, who he had abused since the age of 11, in his basement in Amstetten, Austria, for 24 years in 1984, fathering seven children as a result of raping her, telling his wife, Rosemarie, she had run away to join a cult.
Three of the children were raised upstairs with his wife, while another three were held captive with his daughter and one died days after birth.
He convinced his wife to look after the children by telling her they had been left on the doorstep by Elisabeth who did not want to raise them in her “sect”.
Who is Rosemarie and where is she now?
Rosemarie is Fritzl’s 82-year-old ex-wife after they married in 1956 and had seven children together.
It is believed she lives in a small flat in Linz 30 miles away from her previous home where the abuse took place.
She has a small pension and sells homemade handbags and paper flowers.
Did she know about her husband’s crimes?
Shortly after the true horror of what happened came to light there was speculation over Rosemarie’s involvement, however she was never charged and quickly cleared following a police interview.
She was never allowed in the basement and Fritzl told her Elisabeth had run off to join a cult, forcing her to write letters to her mother in order to make her believe his lies.
He even managed to trick her into believing the children who were not kept captive with Elisabeth were left on their doorstep.
But she was aware of a rape committed by Fritzl in 1967, which saw him break into the home of a sleeping nurse in nearby Linz and rape her at knifepoint, telling her he would kill her if she went to the police.
Elisabeth was only two years old at the time and Rosemarie told her he went to work abroad, however he had been jailed for the rape.
Shortly after the revelations came out 15 years ago, Rosemarie was taken into care.
After being jailed in 2009, Fritzl attempted to reconnect with his family trying to convince Rosemarie not to divorce him.
Her carer who helped write a book on the crimes, wrote of Rosemarie: “Rosemarie is a weak character who was as much a victim of Fritzl as everyone else.”
Is Rosemarie in contact with her daughter?
Following her release from the basement, Elisabeth had a tense relationship with her mother as she was upset that she had believed Fritzl’s lies.
Directly after Elisabeth’s release, the pair lived together in a specially built apartment close to a psychiatric clinic where psychiatrists attempted to bring the family back together, according to a Guardian report from 2008.
Some of the tension is said to stem from the fact Rosemarie brought Fritzl back into her home in the 1960s despite knowing he was a rapist.
The pair are now said to be reunited however some tension still remains. In 2013, it was reported that Rosemarie was visiting her grandchildren once a week.
