the cellar, specialists combed the area, looking for traces of my DNA or tiny pieces of fabric from my clothing. But, above ground, things were different; the police did none of that. They apologized to Priklopil and left without ever having examined the car or the house any more closely.
I didn’t find out until after I had escaped how close the kidnapper had come to being arrested if only the police had truly taken the matter seriously. However, only two days later it became clear to me that I would never go free.
In 1998 Easter Sunday fell on 12 April. The kidnapper brought me a small basket with colourful chocolate eggs and a chocolate Easter bunny. We ‘celebrated’ Christ’s resurrection in the light of the bare light bulb, sitting at a small patio table in my airless dungeon. I was happy to receive the goodies and tried with all my might to push aside my thoughts of the outside world, of Eastercelebrations in previous years. Grass. Light. Sun. Trees. Air. People. My parents.
That day the kidnapper told me that he had given up hope of ransoming me, because my parents had still not got in touch with him. ‘Obviously they don’t care about you enough,’ he said. Then came the judgement. A life sentence. ‘You’ve seen my face and you know me already too well. Now I can no longer let you go. I will never take you back to your parents, but I will take care of you here as well as I can.’
All my hopes were dashed at a stroke that Easter Sunday. I cried and begged him to let me go. ‘But I have my whole life ahead of me. You can’t just lock me up here! What about school, what about my parents?’ I swore to God and everything that I held sacred that I wouldn’t betray him. But he didn’t believe me, saying that once free I would forget my oath only too quickly, or give in to pressure from the police. I tried to make it clear to him that he didn’t want to spend the rest of his life with a crime victim in the cellar, and begged him to blindfold me and take me far away. I would never find the house again and I had no name that would lead the police to him. I even made plans for him to escape. He could go abroad; after all, life in another country would be much better than locking me away forever in a dungeon and having to take care of me.
I whimpered, begged and at some point I began to scream, ‘The police will find me! And then they will lock you up. Or shoot you dead! And if not, then my parents will find me!’ My voice cracked.
Priklopil remained completely calm. ‘They don’t care about you, have you already forgotten? And if they come to the house, I will kill them.’ Then he left the dungeon backwards, closing the door from the outside.
I was alone.
It wasn’t until ten years later, two long years after my escape and in the wake of a police scandal centring on the errors in theinvestigation and their cover-up that I found out I had come close to being rescued a second time that Easter holiday without even knowing it. On 14 April, the Tuesday after Easter, the police made public yet another tip. Witnesses had told them that they had seen a delivery van with darkened windows in the vicinity of my council estate the morning of my abduction. The number plate read ‘Gänserndorf’, the administrative district where Strasshof was located.
However, the police did not make public a second tip. A member of the Vienna police’s canine unit had called the police station. The officer on duty recorded the following report from him verbatim:
On 14 April 1998 at 2.45 p.m. an unknown person called and reported the following information:
Regarding the search for a white delivery vehicle with darkened windows in the district of Gänserndorf and with regards to the disappearance of Kampusch, Natasche [
sic!
], there is a person in Strasshof/Nordbahn who could be connected to her disappearance and owns a white delivery van, model Mercedes, with darkened windows. This man is known as a ‘loner’ who has
I didn’t find out until after I had escaped how close the kidnapper had come to being arrested if only the police had truly taken the matter seriously. However, only two days later it became clear to me that I would never go free.
In 1998 Easter Sunday fell on 12 April. The kidnapper brought me a small basket with colourful chocolate eggs and a chocolate Easter bunny. We ‘celebrated’ Christ’s resurrection in the light of the bare light bulb, sitting at a small patio table in my airless dungeon. I was happy to receive the goodies and tried with all my might to push aside my thoughts of the outside world, of Eastercelebrations in previous years. Grass. Light. Sun. Trees. Air. People. My parents.
That day the kidnapper told me that he had given up hope of ransoming me, because my parents had still not got in touch with him. ‘Obviously they don’t care about you enough,’ he said. Then came the judgement. A life sentence. ‘You’ve seen my face and you know me already too well. Now I can no longer let you go. I will never take you back to your parents, but I will take care of you here as well as I can.’
All my hopes were dashed at a stroke that Easter Sunday. I cried and begged him to let me go. ‘But I have my whole life ahead of me. You can’t just lock me up here! What about school, what about my parents?’ I swore to God and everything that I held sacred that I wouldn’t betray him. But he didn’t believe me, saying that once free I would forget my oath only too quickly, or give in to pressure from the police. I tried to make it clear to him that he didn’t want to spend the rest of his life with a crime victim in the cellar, and begged him to blindfold me and take me far away. I would never find the house again and I had no name that would lead the police to him. I even made plans for him to escape. He could go abroad; after all, life in another country would be much better than locking me away forever in a dungeon and having to take care of me.
I whimpered, begged and at some point I began to scream, ‘The police will find me! And then they will lock you up. Or shoot you dead! And if not, then my parents will find me!’ My voice cracked.
Priklopil remained completely calm. ‘They don’t care about you, have you already forgotten? And if they come to the house, I will kill them.’ Then he left the dungeon backwards, closing the door from the outside.
I was alone.
It wasn’t until ten years later, two long years after my escape and in the wake of a police scandal centring on the errors in theinvestigation and their cover-up that I found out I had come close to being rescued a second time that Easter holiday without even knowing it. On 14 April, the Tuesday after Easter, the police made public yet another tip. Witnesses had told them that they had seen a delivery van with darkened windows in the vicinity of my council estate the morning of my abduction. The number plate read ‘Gänserndorf’, the administrative district where Strasshof was located.
However, the police did not make public a second tip. A member of the Vienna police’s canine unit had called the police station. The officer on duty recorded the following report from him verbatim:
On 14 April 1998 at 2.45 p.m. an unknown person called and reported the following information:
Regarding the search for a white delivery vehicle with darkened windows in the district of Gänserndorf and with regards to the disappearance of Kampusch, Natasche [
sic!
], there is a person in Strasshof/Nordbahn who could be connected to her disappearance and owns a white delivery van, model Mercedes, with darkened windows. This man is known as a ‘loner’ who has
Similar Books
Deadly Affair: SCVC Taskforce World Novella (SCVC Taskforce Romantic Suspense Series Book 5)
Misty Evans, Amy Manemann
