Argentine ‘Fritzl’ had 10 children by daughter

AN Argentinian man has been charged with raping his daughter multiple times over three decades and fathering 10 children with her, in a case likened to that of Josef Fritzl in Austria.

“The accused denied the allegations but DNA tests have confirmed paternity,” Judge Virgilio Palud said on radio.

The 62-year-old man was charged with repeated sexual abuse and incest, crimes that carry a maximum sentence of 20 years in jail, the judge said.

The detained man’s daughter, now aged 43, claims to have been raped since the age of 13 at the family’s home in the rural village of Nicanor Molinas, 600km north of Buenos Aires.

“It’s even worse than what happened in Austria,” Judge Palud said, referring to the horrific crimes of Fritzl, sentenced to life behind bars in 2009 for having kept his daughter imprisoned for 24 years, fathering seven children with her and killing one of them.

In the Argentine case, one of the 10 children born of the rapes has already died.

The victim, whose identity was not released, said she waited so long to accuse her father because he had threatened her.

She got her chance when he was arrested.

The woman only dared to report the crimes to police in Santa Fe province when her father was arrested for the theft of livestock, the Notife online newspaper reported.

She also said her father kept threatening her with a gun.

The children did not know that their grandfather was also their father.

Only her oldest son found out and afterwards killed himself, the victim said. When she got pregnant, she had to tell the older children and the neighbours that she had slept with other men, who had then run off, the woman said.

The woman said: “There was no room for pain… just punishment, threats, torment and children to take care of.”

The case is the second such shocking father-daughter abuse to emerge in Argentina in as many years.

Last year, the case of the Monster of Mendoza gripped Argentina, when a 67-year-old man was accused of raping and fathering seven children with one of his three daughters.