Maria Natascha Kampusch was abducted on March 2, 1998, at the age of ten. She was held in a secret cellar for more than eight years by her abductor, Wolfgang Piklopil, until she escaped on August 23, 2006. Following her escape, Piklopil killed himself by walking in front of a train at a nearby station.
Kampusch eventually gained her captor’s trust enough for him to take her out in public. He even took her skiing once. But she never stopped seeking an opportunity to flee.
When Natascha Kampusch was 18, an opportunity presented itself, and she seized it.
The Beginning
Natascha Maria Kampusch was born on February 17, 1988, in Vienna, Austria, and grew up in public housing projects on the city’s outskirts. Her area was teeming with drinkers and resentful people, such as her divorced parents.
At the time of her kidnapping, she was a student at the Brioschiweg primary school.
Natascha Kampusch was snatched off the street sometime during her five-minute walk from her house to school by a communications specialist named Wolfgang Piklopil.
Kampusch was taken captive and brought to Strasshof, a little village 15 miles north of Vienna. Piklopil had carefully planned the event, setting up a small, windowless, soundproofed room beneath his garage. It took an hour to enter the hidden area since it was so closely fortified.
In the meantime, a search to find Natascha Kampusch had begun. Because a witness had seen Kampusch being transported in a white van similar to Piklopil’s, the latter was even an early suspect before being ruled out by police.
A Life Spent as a Captive
She asked Piklopil to kiss her goodnight and tuck her into bed on her first night in captivity. Even at bedtime, her abductor would read her stories and bring her treats and toys.
Not all of Piklopil’s actions were as harmless. He declared himself to be an Egyptian god. He insisted Kampusch address him as Maestro and My Lord. He denied her food, made her clean the house while wearing only her underwear, and kept her alone in the dark as she grew older and started to resist. She claimed that he beat her up to 200 times every week.
Kampsuch made many suicide attempts while being oppressed by her kidnapper.
She has generally avoided discussing the sexual aspect of her abuse, but that hasn’t stopped reporters from making a lot of assumptions about what transpired. The abuse, she said to the Guardian, was “minor.” She recalled that when it first started, he would bind her to his bed. However, he was still only interested in cuddling.
Surprisingly, despite all of this, Kampsuch’s ambitions for independence from the time she was 10 years old have not diminished. She saw a vision of her 18-year-old self a few years into her captivity.
“I will get you out of here, I promise you,” the vision said. “Right now you are too small. But when you turn 18 I will overpower the kidnapper and free you from your prison.”
Her Escape
With each passing year, Piklopil became more at ease with his prisoner. He appreciated being heard. He made Natascha Kampusch clean his house and bleach her hair, but he also talked to her about conspiracies and once even took her skiing.
Kampsuch, on the other hand, never gave up looking for a way to escape. She had a few opportunities throughout the dozen or so times he had taken her out in public, but she was never brave enough to take them. As she got closer to becoming eighteen, she realized that something inside of her had started to change.
On August 23, 2006, Piklopil left Kampusch to clean his car while he answered the phone. Then she saw her opportunity. He used to watch her constantly in the past, she recalled. But in order to better understand his caller, he had to take a few steps back due the vacuum cleaner she was using.
She walked on tiptoe to the gate- it had been unlocked; she began to run until she found help.
With his hostage gone, Wolfgang Piklopil soon threw himself in front of a train and committed suicide.
Credit: Wikipedia