(CNN) -- Police, medical professionals and those who know Josef Fritzl are struggling to piece together how he led a double life for more than two decades in a small Austrian town.
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Josef Fritzl was in court after admitting raping his daughter and fathering her seven children.
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At his home on Ybbsstrasse in the quiet town of Amstetten, east of Vienna, the 73-year-old retired electrician lived with his wife, Rosemarie, and their three children.
But those who knew Fritzl describe him in such contrasting terms -- friendly, reclusive, arrogant, a kindly grandfather -- that it seems no one really knew him at all.
There were three children who lived with the couple -- all fathered by Fritzl, who admitted in court that he secretly imprisoned his daughter, now 42, for decades.
In addition to those three children, Fritzl fathered four other children with his captive daughter. The children were products of years of sexual assault he inflicted on her, he admitted. Two boys and a teenage girl were locked up with their mother in a basement dungeon. One child he fathered with his daughter died, and Fritzl burned the infant's body, police said.
The children who were locked up had not ever seen the light of day, investigators said.
Fritzl had been lying to his wife for years, telling her his daughter had dropped off the three children at the house because she could not take care of them, police said. In reality, Fritzl had forced his imprisoned daughter to write letters that made it seem that way.
What drove dad who kept 'house of horror'?
(CNN) -- Police, medical professionals and those who know Josef Fritzl are struggling to piece together how he led a double life for more than two decades in a small Austrian town.
art.josef.gi.jpg
Josef Fritzl was in court after admitting raping his daughter and fathering her seven children.
Click to view previous image
1 of 2
Click to view next image
more photos »
At his home on Ybbsstrasse in the quiet town of Amstetten, east of Vienna, the 73-year-old retired electrician lived with his wife, Rosemarie, and their three children.
But those who knew Fritzl describe him in such contrasting terms -- friendly, reclusive, arrogant, a kindly grandfather -- that it seems no one really knew him at all.
There were three children who lived with the couple -- all fathered by Fritzl, who admitted in court that he secretly imprisoned his daughter, now 42, for decades.
In addition to those three children, Fritzl fathered four other children with his captive daughter. The children were products of years of sexual assault he inflicted on her, he admitted. Two boys and a teenage girl were locked up with their mother in a basement dungeon. One child he fathered with his daughter died, and Fritzl burned the infant's body, police said.
The children who were locked up had not ever seen the light of day, investigators said.
Fritzl had been lying to his wife for years, telling her his daughter had dropped off the three children at the house because she could not take care of them, police said. In reality, Fritzl had forced his imprisoned daughter to write letters that made it seem that way.
