Austrian to appear in court over abuse case

Amstetten: A 73-year-old Austrian who has confessed to locking his daughter in a windowless cellar for 24 years and fathering her seven children will appear before a judge on Tuesday.

Investigators were searching the cellar beneath electrical engineer Josef Fritzl's two-storey home, Franz Prucher, head of security in Lower Austria said.

Fritzl appeared before a district court on Monday night which referred him to a judge in St Poelten, the provincial capital of Lower Austria, to decide on his detention, Prucher said.

He is expected to be put in investigative custody for 14 days. After this period, a further hearing will decide whether he can continue being detained.

Elisabeth Fritzl, 42, says her father lured her into the cellar of their home in 1984 and drugged and handcuffed her before imprisoning her.

Three of her children, aged 19, 18 and 5, had been locked in the cellar with her since birth and had never seen sunlight. The younger two were boys, the eldest a girl.

Three other children, two girls and one boy, were adopted and brought up by Fritzl and his wife Rosemarie.

Police said Fritzl had admitted to burning the body of a seventh child in a furnace used to heat the building when the baby died soon after birth.

Authorities are still waiting for results of DNA tests to prove Fritzl is the father of the children.