Fritzl Case

Provide writing to justify your diagnosis. In other words, why do you think this

person/patient has the diagnosis you are making? Do NOT just summarize the case. Instead,
identify symptoms that meet the criteria for the DSM-5 diagnosis. For example, if you think
the person/patient in the case study suffers from schizophrenia, give examples of his/her
symptoms and explains how those symptoms match the DSM-5’s criteria for schizophrenia.
Be thorough, convincing and use the DSM-5 to back up your diagnosis.

-A personality disorder is an enduring pattern of inner experience and behavior that deviates markedly
from the expectations of the in dividual's culture, is pervasive and inflexible, has an onset in
adolescence or early adult hood, is stable over time, and leads to distress or impairment.

-Schizoid personality disorder is a pattern of detachment from social relationships and a restricted
range of emotional expression.

Diagnostic Criteria / Features

A pervasive pattern of detachment from social relationships and a restricted range of

expression of emotions in interpersonal settings, beginning by early adulthood and present in
a variety of contexts, as indicated by four (or more) of the following:

1.Neither desires nor enjoys close relationships, including being part of a family.

lack a desire for intimacy, seem indifferent to opportunities to develop close relationships, and do not
seem to derive much satisfaction from being part of a family or other social group (Criterion Al).

A:
-In a low voice he said: "I plead guilty."
"Your daughter told you the baby was suffering from breathing problems," the judge
said. "You had time to get first aid."
Fritzl said: "I was hoping the little one would survive but I should have done something.
I don't know why I didn't help. I just lost sight [of the issue]."
He then said he was "sorry".
Speaking later outside the court, Mr Mayer said the testimony given by his client's
daughter had allowed Fritzl to see for the first time the impact of his actions.
Describing his client, Mr Mayer said Fritzl was "a person who had only one idea - 'I must
always be full of power'".
Mr Mayer said he was "very, very surprised" by Fritzl's plea reversal, but that Fritzl
hoped his change of plea would help his victims.
-Describing his client, Mr Mayer said Fritzl was "a person who had only one idea - 'I must
always be full of power'".-
-Franz, who still lives in Amstetten, said he remembered Fritzl as someone "really very
strange" who would never let his wife speak whenever they met.
-B: was easy enough to instigate. Elisabeth had threatened to run away many
times. More than once she had been hauled back to the family home by the
police, or her father, once getting as far as the big city, Vienna, with a
girlfriend.
-"He will remain the same person, and the ways to exercise this control will change and
change with his physical abilities, but his needs will remain the same," she told the BBC
outside the court.
"So he will be a danger and he has to be kept in prison until he is no danger for others."
-F: His explanations, including bizarre claims that the Nazis were responsible for
fostering his twisted morality, have been detailed by his lawyer after Fritzl wrote
notes from his cell.

The 73-year-old said Hitler's Germany had instilled control and the respect of
authority in him, which pushed him to imprison his daughter Elisabeth under his
family home in Amstetten, west of Vienna, and father her seven children, one of
whom died.

He said his daughter, then 19, had cried. "I knew that Elisabeth did not want it,
what I did with her. The pressure to do the forbidden thing was just too big to
withstand."
-G: She never showed me any love, she beat me and kicked me until I was on the
floor and bleeding," he said. "I felt so weak and humiliated. I never got a kiss from
her or even a hug although I tried very hard to please her. The only thing she did with
me was go to church.

"She beat me and kicked me until I was lying on the floor bleeding. I had a horrible
fear from her. She kept insulting me and told me I was a Satan, a criminal, a no-
good."

Kastner said his behaviour had its roots in his troubled childhood, describing a
mother who did not love him, who left him to cry when he was in pain, and
who regularly beat him and left him on his own for hours at a time.

According to Fritzl, he moved into the Amstetten house in 1959 soon after he
married his wife, Rosmarie. His mother moved into the house with them and
Kastner was told how their roles gradually reversed with Fritzl's mother
coming to fear her son.
his mother was kept in a room without daylight, but Austrian newspapers
speculate it could have been for up to 20 years.

2.Almost always chooses solitary activities.

prefer spending time by themselves, rather than being with other people. They often ap pear to be
socially isolated or "loners" and almost always choose solitary activities or hob bies that do not
include interaction with others (Criterion A2).
3.Has little, if any, interest in having sexual experiences with another person.

They prefer mechanical or abstract tasks, such as computer or mathematical games. They may have
very little interest in having sexual experiences with another person

B: He sexually abused and raped her sometimes several times a day, from the second
day of her incarceration right up until her release in April 2008.Over the course of
nearly a quarter of a century he would rape her at least 3,000 times, resulting in
seven babies who themselves often had to watch the abuse as they grew older.

much of the volcano about him", explaining that violent sex had provided the
main outlet for his pent-up feelings.
-Rape

4.Takes pleasure in few, if any, activities.

There is usually a reduced experience of pleasure from sensory, bodily, or interpersonal experiences,
such as walking on a beach at sunset or having sex.

5.Lacks close friends or confidants other than first-degree relatives.

These individuals have no close friends or confidants, except possibly a first-degree relative

D:- He wasn't active in community or church groups.

-Yet Fritzl remained little-known in Unterach, where those who dealt with him say they saw little in
his character that seemed exceptional or suspicious.

Graf said he sometimes met Fritzl for business dealings, and the pair would share a beer. "He told
jokes, not always the cleanest," Graf said. "He laughed loud, a real boom."

Germany's Bild newspaper interviewed a man it identified only as Paul H., who claims he twice
vacationed in Thailand with Fritzl, and obtained video showing Fritzl on the beach receiving a
massage, eating supper and laughing.

"We sat out on the terrace and had a nice evening," it quoted the friend as saying.

G:"She never showed me any love, she beat me and kicked me until I was on the floor
and bleeding," he said. "I felt so weak and humiliated. I never got a kiss from her or
even a hug although I tried very hard to please her. The only thing she did with me
was go to church.
"She beat me and kicked me until I was lying on the floor bleeding. I had a horrible
fear from her. She kept insulting me and told me I was a Satan, a criminal, a no-
good."

Reports revealed that Fritzl's mother raised him alone after a bitter divorce. Fritzl
claims he was isolated from other children and was an "alibi child"– his mother only
had him to prove to her husband she was not sterile.

6.Appears indifferent to the praise or criticism of others.

Individuals with schizoid personality disorder often seem indifferent to the approval or criticism of
others and do not appear to be bothered by what others may think of them

A:
-"He will remain the same person, and the ways to exercise this control will change and
change with his physical abilities, but his needs will remain the same," she told the BBC
outside the court.
-- that he was always able to discern between right and wrong, and that he always knew
what he did was wrong."
B:-Fritzl admitted he subsequently burned the baby's body in an incinerator, but –
until his admission during his trial this week – always denied that he was responsible
for murder through negligence. "I don't know why I didn't help," he told the court. "I
just overlooked it. I thought the little one would survive."

Until Wednesday, Fritzl had also denied enslavement. His lawyer, Rudolf Mayer,
tried to explain Fritzl's decision to imprison his daughter and force her to submit to
his every whim as the act of a devoted father.

-C: “I knew that Elisabeth did not want the things I did to her,” he would say
later. “I knew that I was hurting her. But the urge to finally be able to taste
the forbidden fruit was too strong.”

- And yet Fritzl seems to have convinced himself that what he was doing to
these children was normal – even wholesome.“It was a beautiful idea for
me,” he said, in the interview that was supposed to show he wasn’t a
monster, “To have a proper family, also down in the cellar, with a good wife
and children.”
-Rape before
- He said: "Iknew Sissi (Elisabeth) was being raped by her father before
she disappeared. I had a good friend from school who was really close to
her. She told me what a monster Josef was – and what he had done to
Sissi.
F: Fritzl also described the amazing planning and secrecy behind his crime,
admitting he had thought about it for years. Fritzl claimed he had kidnapped the
teenage Elisabeth to "rescue" her from alcohol and bad company.

Asked how it was possible for people not to know that something strange was
occurring under his house, he said perhaps people did notice but they did not care,
because it was "my kingdom".

He said he got into a "vicious circle": "My situation just got more crazy. I was
scared of being arrested, and that my family and everybody that knew me would
know my crime … I always knew over 24 years what I did was not correct, and
that I must be mad."

(Cognitive bias)

7.Shows emotional coldness, detachment, or flattened affectivity.

They may be oblivious to the normal subtleties of social interaction and of ten do not respond
appropriately to social cues so that they seem socially inept or super ficial and self-absorbed. They
usually display a "bland" exterior without visible emotional reactivity and rarely reciprocate gestures
or facial expressions, such as smiles or nods

rarely experience strong emotions such as anger and joy. They often display a constricted affect and
appear cold and aloof. However, in those very unusual circumstances in which these individuals
become at least temporarily comfort able in revealing themselves, they may acknowledge having
painful feelings, particularly related to social interactions.

-do not care if his baby die

A: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7949967.stm

B: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/mar/19/josef-fritzl-austria (whole story)

C: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/josef-fritzl-10-years-what-happened-
daughter-dungeon-basement-incest-rape-austria-elisabeth-kampusch-a8322671.html
D:https://web.archive.org/web/20080516001846/http://ap.google.com/article/
ALeqM5g6TMNOu02XFDEmyr9rQRBGdPEt3AD90DO2AG0
E: https://www.standard.co.uk/hp/front/sex-slave-dungeon-i-knew-fritzl-had-raped-his-
daughter-says-man-upstairs-6686436.html
Evening Standard, . (2008). Sex slave dungeon: I knew Fritzl had raped his daughter, says man upstairs. Evening Standard.
Retrieved from https://www.standard.co.uk/hp/front/sex-slave-dungeon-i-knew-fritzl-had-raped-his-daughter-says-man-
upstairs-6686436.html

F: https://www.theage.com.au/world/fritzl-blames-nazis-and-speaks-of-mother-love-
20080510-ge726v.html
Sam, A., & Vienna, . (2008). Fritzl blames Nazis and speaks of mother love. The Age. Retrieved from
https://www.theage.com.au/world/fritzl-blames-nazis-and-speaks-of-mother-love-20080510-ge726v.html

G: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2008/oct/31/joseffritzl-austria
Balakrishnan, A. (2008). Josef Fritzl kept sick mother locked in attic, leaked papers reveal. The Guardian. Retrieved from
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2008/oct/31/joseffritzl-austria

H: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7380969.stm
BBC News, . (2008). Police study old Fritzl sex case. BBC NEWS. Retrieved from
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7380969.stm