Josef Fritzl, the Austrian who imprisoned his daughter for 24 years, repeatedly raped her and was the father of her seven children, is to be moved from a maximum-security psychiatric unit to a regular prison and in time to a nursing home.
Now 88 and having changed his name to Josef Mayrhoff, he is reportedly suffering from dementia and was seeking early release after serving 15 years of a life sentence in a high-security unit at Stein prison in northeast Austria.
Fritzl was "close to tears" when a three-person panel ruled he could be moved to a nursing home, said The Guardian. However, the "decision was not yet final and requires a further decision to be made by public prosecutors". This is expected to be a "formality", the paper said, but there are still 14 days for the prosecutors to appeal the decision.
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The ruling comes after a similar appeal by Fritzl in 2022 was dismissed. He will have to continue to "attend regular psychotherapy and undergo psychiatric evaluations" over a 10-year probation period, said Sky News.
Fritzl's lawyer, Astrid Wagner, said she would seek to make a further request next year that he "be released from prison altogether". The court had "come to the conclusion that it is indeed the case that he is no longer dangerous", she said, adding that she would "not be frightened of moving in with him".
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