London, May 5 (ANI): Austrian incest dad Josef Fritzl tricked his daughter into building her own dungeon, it has emerged.

Fritzl ordered unsuspecting Elisabeth to help him fit a steel and concrete door to the cellar where she was to be imprisoned for 24 years.

And just minutes later, he pushed her into the basement room, drugged and raped her, and then locked her up.

After regaining consciousness, 18-year-old Elisabeth realised that she was handcuffed to a wall and had built her own cell.

Fritzl used a handkerchief soaked in ether to drug Elisabeth, who was put on a "dog leash" chain for the next six to nine months, which let her reach the toilet.

Fritzl fathered seven kids by Elisabeth after repeatedly raping her, reports The Sun.

Elisabeth, 42, told police her dad demanded sex at least once every three days for the first 12 years.

Fritzl sought his daughter's help once more to build extra underground rooms for his growing clan of cave children.

Meanwhile a former lodger at the home of Elisabeth and her school friends has admitted that he knew that Fritzl was raping her.

However, he didn't contact police or social services either before or after she disappeared. 

Joseph Leitner, one of Fritzl's former lodger, told how Elisabeth fled home at 17 but was found by father-a year before he imprisoned her.

Meanwhile,  Josef Fritzl has been transferred to solitary confinement, following death threats from his fellow inmates.

According to a report in UK's Daily Express Fritzl's cellmate in Austrian prison threatened to kill him when he learned of his alleged crimes.

The 63-year-old former bank robber allegedly flew into a rage when he discovered that Fritzl repeatedly abused and raped his daughter for 24 years.

"Child abusers are hated in Austrian prisons," News.com.au quoted the cellmate, as saying.

"I know that if somebody has been blacklisted there is always a way of getting to him even if he is in solitary confinement.

"It can be during walks in the yard or during personal hygiene, or even at dinner which is prepared and served by the inmates," he added.

Meanwhile Fritzl is still on suicide watch and his lawyer said he remained "distraught".

"He is very depressed. It is certainly hard for him in jail," Dr Rudolf Mayer said.

"He is also very worried about all the threats. He was with another inmate but now he is on his own. He has a window and, as a remand prisoner, he has advantages over others," he added.

According to Austrian police, Fritzl imprisoned his daughter, Elisabeth, in a soundproof, windowless dungeon in his basement for 24 years, where he fathered seven children by her.

Policemen probing into Joseph Fritzl's incestuous assault on his own daughter Elisabeth Fritzl say that her first two children should have witnessed her being raped repeatedly by her father, from the day they were born until they were toddlers.

The police say Elisabeth was held in only one room in the bunker for the first nine years after Joseph dragged her into his cellar, and that it was in 1993 that the room was connected with other underground chambers in the complex.

Fritzl and Elisabeth's first child Kerstin was born in 1989, and second child Stefan in 1990.

Since the two children spent their whole lives inside the cellar, say the police, they would have had no choice but to witness their mother being repeatedly abused.

The police have also revealed that Fritzl adopted Elisabeth's third child Lisa, born in 1992, because there was insufficient room in the cellar.

According to them, Fritzl allowed the girl to live with his "normal" family in his house upstairs.

The dungeon father later extended his underground bunker complex to provide a separate room for his prisoner children, add the police.

Meanwhile, Fritzl's lawyer Rudolf Mayer, who claims to have received several death threats for agreeing to defend his client, has said he would fight to keep Fritzl out of jail.

"In my opinion Josef Fritzl is psychologically disturbed. He does not belong in prison but in a closed psychiatric unit," the Independent quoted him as saying. (ANI)

A 'tyrant'

Melbourne, May 5 (ANI): The sister-in-law of Joseph Fritzl, an Austrian man accused of holding his own daughter captive for 24 years and fathering seven children with her, has described him as a "tyrant".

The woman, who asked only to be identified as Christine R. to avoid public attention and throngs of journalists seeking interviews, said that Josef Fritzl had instilled a culture of fear at home due to which no one questioned of his daughter Elisabeth's running away to join a cult, and abandoning three children on their doorstep.

"When he said it was black, it was black, even when it was 10 times white. He tolerated no dissent," the Daily Telegraph quoted Christine R. as saying during an interview, conducted at her home in Austria.

"Listen, if I myself was scared of him at a family party, and I did not feel confident to say anything in any form that could possibly offend him, then you can imagine how it must have been for a woman that spent so many years with him," she added.

She even revealed that her brother-in-law was jailed in for "a year and half" in connection with a 1967 rape conviction.

Christine R. said that that event was quite shocking for her sister Rosemarie.

She, however, said that Rosemarie still focused on keeping her family healthy, believing that "everyone makes a mistake".

"You can surely imagine that a woman in such a situation would have been utterly broken and shocked over something like this," Christine R. said.

As time went on, she said, her sister's relationship with Fritzl soured.

"As far I know no sex took place in recent years. I believe it was because of his prior conviction, and because my sister had been getting bigger. And in any case he never liked fat women," she said.

Christine R. even said that neither Fritzl nor Elisabeth ever hinted that something was disturbing about their relationship.

"He was just as strict with her as he was to every other child. There was nothing in particular that could lead you to say he was more intimate with her. From the child as well it never came out. She never confided in anyone," she said.

"My sister is apparently doing very badly and Elisabeth is not in the best shape either. I know my sister and when something is wrong with her children the world collapses. For sure, the world has collapsed for her," added Christine R., who said that she had received updates on the condition of her sister and Elisabeth from a "good source".

Fritzl, who has not been formally charged, faces up to 15 years in prison if he is ultimately convicted on rape charges. (ANI)