Can you imagine being held in captivity for 8 years. A 10 year old girl who is now 18 was able to escape from her kidnapper.
Vienna- A young woman escaped to freedom Wednesday afternoon after eight years’ captivity in Austria’s most sensational post-war kidnapping case, said initial police reports. The report said Natascha Kampusch, who disappeared without trace aged ten on March 2, 1998, had been held captive in a cellar within 30 kilometres of Vienna.
Natascha’s disappearance happened at a time when Europe was preoccupied by the notorious Belgian Dutroux case of child abduction and murder.
In 1998 she vanished on her way to school in Vienna. A nationwide search was immediately launched. Hundreds of police scoured the whole of eastern Austria. Helicopters were brought in, and rivers dragged. No trace of her was ever found.
On Wednesday afternoon a young woman suddenly appeared at Deutsch Wagram in eastern Austria. First reports said she was thrown out, or had jumped out, of a car. Austrian ORF television reported she had been seen “staggering around” in a garden.
The woman told police her name was Natascha Kampusch. Comparative DNA tests were immediately started. A nationwide search was launched for the driver of the car. Natascha’s parents were called in to possibly identify their daughter.
Other sources : CNN-Kidnap girl: Family never gave up
