Girl in the Cellar

by Allan Hall

  She likes music and movies, but one of her choices caused a few eyebrows to raise. It was Perfume, the story of a man born with no smell of his own, but endowed with a super-sensitive olfactory sense. He goes in search of the ultimate perfume, one made from dead women’s bodies. Natascha said: ‘It’s quite a strange idea, making a perfume out of women. But the deeds of the man in this movie are not judged. On the whole they actually all love him. He plays the innocent, and everyone believes him to be an angel.’ That last line describes her kidnapper’s facade of normality, perfectly.

  One of her inner circle told the authors on condition of anonymity:

  One must always bear in mind how ambivalent her position is. At times she might look and sound like a mature, adult woman, whereas at other times she appears to be a ten-year-old girl. And I have no doubt that in some aspects of her personality she really is a ten-year-old girl. She did not go through the normal development phases like everyone else. She had no puberty or adolescence and, more importantly, she had no chance of interaction with other people. Except for that monstrous man who kept her imprisoned.

  That is why she sometimes has infantile notions about the things around her, about her future development in the media world and so on. Now that she has made enough money to secure her future, it would be best for her to withdraw from the public and to dedicate herself to the healing process and the completing of her education. She will definitely need therapy for years to come.

  I just hope her lawyers will not go out of their depth and will manage the whole thing with success. I, however, believe that this branding of Natascha, the packaging of her into a marketable commodity for Hollywood, to sell a glossed-over version of life in the house, is totally the wrong path to take. It is a road that will not lead her anywhere. In my opinion she needs to recuperate and heal, and to stay away from the public eye.

  There is a real danger that the opportunities to earn money could cloud the judgement of those around her. The task of her advisers should be to explain to her the consequences and the gravity of the decisions she makes, rather than simply to agree with whatever she says or even to encourage her in certain things.

  One must not idealise her too much, however intelligent and exceptional she might be, for she is still a fragile young woman who has endured an ordeal that none of us can even comprehend. Not even the most experienced psychiatrists, including the ones around her, have the instruments to deal with, or to even envisage the full spectrum of consequences from those eight and a half years of her life that were taken away from her.

  The concern for Natascha’s mental and physical well-being is genuine, and it is shared by her family and by psychiatrists, who fear that she is placing material success above the very necessary step of finding her feet in a world that, until recently, she only knew of through radio and television. She speaks eloquently and plans grandly—slowing, say some of her inner circle, the healing process. Part of that is discussing the precise nature of her relationship with Wolfgang Priklopil with her carers, something she steadfastly refuses to do. She pledges that the secret will remain locked within her.

  This question of secrecy, or privacy, depending on your point of view, is absolutely crucial to how the ending of Natascha’s extraordinary story unfolds. It affects not only how the ongoing police investigation progresses and how Natascha herself develops, but also how the rest of world comes to understand what has become a huge, intense, public interest story. Peculiar privacy laws in Austria dictate that newspapers and magazines in her homeland are intimidated by her lawyers into not speculating about what took place in No. 60 Heinestrasse or on their outings from it. They forbid people in her homeland from questioning the precise nature of her victimhood.

  They also make the police sometimes look comical in their acceptance of a situation that raises serious questions about the efficacy of their investigation. In the first week of October 2006 the German magazine Stern published an article that claimed that Priklopil was ‘well known’ in the sado-masochistic scene in the Austrian capital. One might think this was a pertinent lead in any investigation. A police detective in, say, London or New York, might think that a trail worth following. Did this S&M hobby involve minors? Did it involve pictures? Did it involve others? Did it involve Natascha Kampusch, either willingly or unwillingly?

  The quote from the local police in Vienna was priceless: ‘This was his private life and has nothing to do with the case.’

  How can this be? If Wolfgang Priklopil was involved in some tawdry ring of S&M perverts who got their kicks luring children into their sphere, how can this be so easily dismissed? We know he was a loner—but we also know that he put on many faces to suit different situations. Perhaps he did have a coterie of friends that few knew about. Perhaps they were all like him. And yet this private life has ‘nothing to do with the case’? What kind of ‘private life’ can a child snatcher, control freak and now deceased Wolfgang Priklopil be entitled to anyway? A private afterlife, perhaps?

  Despite the seeming reluctance on the part of the police to investigate the Stern S&M allegations—allegations the magazine stands by—the investigation is still ongoing, although at a much slower pace. Hardened officers in the case refuse to accept that she wasn’t the victim of some kind of sexual molestation. She likes to say that nothing took place that was not of her own free will.

  This has outraged some. One family in Germany whose own child was snatched and raped at the age of five told us: ‘Perhaps the mothers and fathers of little children who have been abused, parents like us, who now have to work patiently and slowly to rebuild their shattered minds, might like to hear something more condemning of Priklopil and his actions coming from her lips.’

  Stern magazine said it stands by its story. It went on: ‘There are more and more indications that Priklopil was involved in Vienna’s sado-masochistic scene and that he forced Natascha to participate in it. Even outside the house.’ According to Stern’s information, she was handcuffed, beaten and humiliated. Other individuals may been involved. ‘Who? She was blindfolded. No one can say when and how often such treatment occurred. Because of her trauma and captivity, Natascha Kampusch does not have an exact perception of time and place.’ The story was dismissed by her lawyers as profiteering garbage.

  Natascha herself said that the S&M pictures stuff was ‘far-fetched’ and she could ‘definitely rule it out’. Not yes, nor no, but ‘rule it out’. Like she could rule out a skiing trip with her captor, before her lawyers were forced to admit its truth?

  She also said she believed her mother ‘100 per cent’ when Frau Sirny denied knowing Priklopil. And she refuses to talk about what really went on between her and the kidnapper, saying: ‘I don’t ask other people what happened to them in the last eight years. Those people can’t change anything and can’t help me anyway—so maybe they are just asking out of curiosity.’

  Early in October 2006, the police sent a preliminary report to the public prosecutor’s office; the keys to kidnapper Wolfgang Priklopil’s house in Strasshof were handed over to the district court; and police spokesman Gerhard Lang said: ‘The searches of the house have ended.’

  Traces of DNA were secured, but there are hardly any useful fingerprints. Priklopil was fanatical about order; everything had to be clean. No sooner had Natascha Kampusch placed her hands on the table than he fastidiously wiped everything—surfaces, glasses and dishes. The police are still examining the network of relationships among the kidnapper, his business partner, Natascha’s mother Brigitta Sirny, and her former partner, Husek, as we detailed earlier in this work.

  Whatever kind of ‘normality’ Natascha Kampusch hopes to achieve will never be reached if she denies the truth to herself and, in turn, the world. But, for the moment, she seems content to drink in the atmosphere of fame.

  There was speculation among her supporters about the international ‘Woman of the Year Award’ ceremony in the States, in October, which she was said to be in contention for. But she
announced that she would not be going: she preferred to stay at home and keep in touch with friends and family. And lawyers. A new media adviser will represent her entire family in the future: father, mother and child.

  The two new interviews she gave in October to Austrian papers were seen as attempts at spin-control following the Stern allegations. Her top lawyer, Gerald Ganzger, said readers should not look for answers to the conundrums in the Natascha case. He added with finality: ‘In any case, Frau Kampusch will not again address the past.’ He was right—she didn’t.

  Back in the driveway of No. 60 Heinestrasse, parked in a neat manner that Priklopil would have approved of, are the vehicles which came to symbolise the two greatest events in his life: the same model white Mercedes van that he used to kidnap Natascha (he sold the original and bought a new one some years ago) and the super-fast red BMW that he drove for his appointment with suicide.

  Christa Stefan, the old lady who saw him in the garden and saw Natascha too, kicks herself now for something long ago forgotten, something now remembered—something undone that could have shortened Natascha’s time in captivity. ‘I remember my old father back then,’ she said, referring to 1998, ‘looking at [Priklopil’s] white van and being bemused by the black foil he put in the windows. “Shall I call the police?” my father said. “Look what he has done to his car. He’s a bit strange.” But I replied, “Don’t be stupid”…and now I go to my father’s grave and say, “Father, you were right”—but who would have thought that anybody could keep such a thing secret for such a long time?’

  Just as the home where Natascha grew up is now a magnet for tourists, so has Strasshof put itself on the must-see map in a way it never wanted. Mayor Herbert Farthofer said: ‘I have heard that people are coming here. They go to restaurants and casually ask the waiter if they can tell them where “the house”—Priklopil’s—is. Business people speak of a difference, a different sort of tourist. They are not coming by the busload just yet, but who knows? As for the people in this town, we are just glad it had the ending it did. Everybody just says: thank God the girl is alive. If the case had ended differently, perhaps people would react differently.’

  One thing the mayor must struggle with is whether the town coat of arms should be changed in the wake of the death of its most infamous citizen. It contains a railway train wheel, symbolising the town’s industrial past. Given the manner in which Priklopil died, there is a debate ongoing about whether it is time to abandon it altogether.

  What is certain is that there will continue to be revelations in the case that will keep Natascha’s story in the public eye for some time to come. Only Natascha can answer all the questions, but is it all getting to be too much for her?

  ‘She needs time to be a child again,’ says her father. ‘All this responsibility is just too much for her. She told me: “I don’t want any of this on my shoulders. I just want to be a young girl.” ’

  That does not gel with Natascha the Controller, the image that comes across from the lawyers and media advisers. And, however much Natascha may say she wants to live the life of a normal teenager, her world now is far from normal—it’s shadowed by her horrific experiences and controlled by the media. Unsurprisingly, she has recognised that since she must live with this reality, she might as well get used to it.

  ‘She’s looking to do worldwide deals now,’ confirms her father. ‘She’s lost eight years and she wants those eight years to have a purpose. She also wants to use her fame to help other people.’ He went on:

  She’s not happy about the way certain things have happened. It was all too fast to start off with. She had just escaped, and suddenly she was doing this interview. People took advantage of her and they rushed her into it. My theory is they wanted to cash in and make themselves famous.

  Natascha was manipulated by these others. I am totally convinced that she was just putting up with them, then she sized them up and told them to get lost. We have these regular family meetings now, where everyone talks about everything together.

  We have been trying to decide on Natascha’s future plans together. In the end Natascha will make the final decision. She does hope to have a normal life at some stage. She is living alone in her flat, although with help nearby. She says she wants to get married and have children but it’s hard to see how that could happen. Even if she met a nice young man, how would he cope with the interest it would create? People would be asking, and she would probably be asking herself, if he was really a nice man or someone who just wanted something from her.

  He stops, staring, trying to block images, he says, of what Priklopil might have done to his little girl.

  For eight years, I prepared myself to receive some news: either that she had been found or her body had been found. I had mentally rehearsed it. So when the news came that she had been found I just went into autopilot. I was completely composed. I just got in my car and drove to the police station. Recently, while sitting in our garden she so loved as a child, she told me, ‘When I am 60 and you are 90 and walking with a stick, I will still be your little girl.’

  But the truth is no one can bring me back my little girl. I miss her and I am proud of the woman Natascha has become, but I will never get my little girl back.

  Meanwhile, despite the renewed contact with her family and the attempts to claw back some kind of normal life, she remains under psychiatric observation, albeit as an outpatient. The flat that she has been given temporarily by the Viennese city authorities is just a short distance from the hospital where she was treated. Dr Haller hopes there will be a normalisation in the relationship with her parents: ‘That is very important because, exaggeratedly speaking, she has been kidnapped a second time. It is difficult for Natascha to respond to a 180-degree swing from total isolation to 1,000 per cent attention.’

  The police at one time discussed putting Natascha into some kind of witness protection programme of the sort afforded to supergrasses in organised crime, but dropped the idea when legal experts said it was not appropriate since she was not a criminal. But changing her name at some time in the future remains an option, and would only cost her the equivalent of nine pounds sterling.

  Professor Berger acknowledges that the police investigation, in terms of dealing with Natascha, is finite. ‘It’s clear that the police interrogation is coming to an end. Fraulein Kampusch is a victim not a perpetrator. The police are not used to working with victims.’

  Both he and Professor Friedrich warn there could be some delayed effects on Natascha, like the kind of posttraumatic stress syndrome suffered by soldiers long after the shooting has stopped. They warn Natascha she can expect to suffer headaches, nausea, vomiting, sleeping disorders and panic attacks. The care and support team only sees ‘the tip of a dramatic iceberg’ in Natascha Kampusch’s reaction so far.

  Natascha continues to be a magnet for those who praise her courage and unbreakable spirit. Fans worldwide have bombarded her with messages, letters, flowers and cuddly stuffed toys. At the height of her fame, in the days immediately following her escape, she was receiving 100 packages, letters and bouquets every 24 hours. To cope with the deluge, personnel at the hospital were reassigned from their normal duties to play postman. It has eased off a little now, but mail continues to arrive. Many of the toys have been donated to orphanages and wards for sick children. There have also been the inevitable marriage proposals, but she isn’t taking them seriously.

  ‘Natascha reads every letter and will answer each and every one,’ promises the lawyer Ganzger.

  One girl with whom she has bonded in a unique way is a Russian teenager called Elena Simakhine. The reason is that, as a young girl, Elena was also kidnapped from the street and held in a purpose-built secret room under a garage. Like Natascha, she was held for years in a tiny cell, although she was held for four years instead of eight, and was older when seized. However, Elena’s kidnapper had repeatedly raped and tortured her throughout her ordeal.

  When Elena saw the pictures of Nata
scha’s legs under the blanket as she was led to safety by police she did not need any more confirmation that the awful story was true. Lena’s own skin turned the same milky white with a slight tinge of green after four years without sunlight.

  Elena was just 17 when she and her 14-year-old friend Katya Martynova were drugged by former army officer Viktor Mokhov and locked in a purpose-built garage cellar. Elena gave birth twice in the underground dungeon, with only her young friend to help her, and both babies were taken away by Mokhov and abandoned on doorsteps in the small town of Skopin, from where they were later adopted.

  When she finally escaped in May 2004, she was eight months pregnant, this time with a baby that would eventually be stillborn, and the young woman told the world she would never trust a man again. But now she is married to her new love Dima and has earned a place at university where she is studying journalism. She is even thinking of having children with her husband. ‘I would like two or three,’ she said.

  Speaking from Russia, she said: ‘My message to Natascha is private, for her only. I hope it will help her with what lies ahead. Back then I never would have thought that I could have a normal life ahead of me. I thought I would never love or even trust a man, so when my family and friends toasted us at our wedding last year it felt like a miracle. But when I had been locked in the cellar, I had given up all hope and stopped dreaming. It was all I could do to survive.

  The man who kidnapped Natascha committed suicide when she escaped, while Mokhov, who kidnapped Elena, was caught and sentenced to seventeen years in jail.