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03. 09. 10. - 15:00

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03. 09. 10. - 15:00

Kampusch Investigator slams acquittal of Kidnappers Pal

Michael Leidig

The former head of a special Natascha Kampusch investigation group has criticised judges for acquitting her kidnapper’s best mate of complicity in suicide charges.

Ludwig Adamovich said the recent trial against Ernst Holzapfel had been bungled and that "They hadn’t investigated properly at all."

Businessman Holzapfel from Vienna, Austria, was found not guilty of helping pervert Wolfgang Priklopil escape justice by committing suicide on the day Kampusch fled his clutches four years ago.

Now Adamovich has told Viennese newspaper Heute that Kampusch’s upcoming autobiography "3,096 Tage" (3,096 Days) was of "great importance" in answering questions into her abduction.

Secret files leaked by Austrian MP Peter Pilz last month show that police chiefs and ruling politicians tried to cover up that Kampusch could have been freed days after the kidnapping had investigators followed up a tip off from the head of the police dog unit.

The man told colleagues dealing with the case of a "loner with a sexual tendency towards children" when he heard that investigations were focused on owners of white vans. When stopped in a random traffic check, Priklopil told officers he was renovating his house when they asked him what the cement and other building materials were for.

But police failed to interview the paedophile further despite knowing his address having been given it by the canine unit boss.

Leaked files reveal that two senior police officers who personally knew the policeman asked him to keep quiet about his statements from 1998 shortly after Kampusch fled eight years later.

Pilz said he wanted to encourage Kampusch sue Austria for damages. Her lawyer Gerald Ganzger is understood to be considering the option which could earn his client up to half a million pounds, according to legal experts.

Pilz said it seemed to him officials at the People’s Party (OVP) attempted to cover up the blunders of officers investigating the Kampusch case since general elections were due weeks after she ran to freedom in August 2006. The interior ministry – headed by late OVP official Liese Prokop in 2006 – is in charge of police in Austria.

The top secret documents he presented recently also show that Priklopil took her on at least 13 trips during the eight and a half years following her abduction.

Interview protocols with Kampusch show the pervert took Kampusch on cycling outings, shopping trips and on a trip to a building equipment tool store. It emerged shortly after she escaped that they went on a one-day skiing trip to a nearby winter sports resort.

Holzapfel said in court earlier this week that Priklopil had called himself an "abductor and rapist" after he asked him to pick him up from a mall in Vienna hours after Kampusch fled. The friends drove around for five hours during which the paedophile made a full confession of his crimes before throwing himself in front of a train.

Asked why he did not call police, Holzapfel told judges: "I knew everyone getting in Priklopil’s way put their lives at risk. He was ready to use violence. It was clear to me I was endangered. I was in the same situation as Natascha Kampusch."

Kampusch, who lives a secluded life in Vienna today, will present her autobiography at a bookstore in Vienna next Thursday (9 September).

Hundreds are expected to turn up for the book’s presentation during which the 21-year-old will speak about her experiences in a platform discussion.

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