timesonline.co.uk — Three girls who were imprisoned by their mother in a house of indescribable filth for seven years may never recover from the ordeal, experts said last night. The girls were shut away from the outside world, existing in almost complete darkness, playing only with mice and communicating in their own language.
Feb 12, 2007 View in Crawl 4
smackheroFeb 13, 2007
i know it runs counter to what most people see the "justice system" as being there for, but i don't think the courts should be sentencing people based on a "an eye for an eye" mentality that caters to the desire for vengence rather than simply protecting society. killing her and giving her a life sentence makes no difference. in any case, criminals should be rehabilitated if possible, and if not, then simply kept from causing further harm to individuals (she doesn't need to be sentenced for life for this to happen).this goes against most people's psychological instincts, but in the end it fosters a better kind of society than one where we relish in seeing those we perceive as "evil" suffer--and in turn debase ourselves in the process.
lishafishaFeb 13, 2007
Back when I was a praying church girl, we would have said that was "giving too much power to the enemy.". And nowadays, I think that's still true. You can believe in divine or demonic intervention, but not to the exclusion of free human will...and humans sometimes take a VERY wrong turn in demonstrating that will.
matt174eFeb 13, 2007
I assumed that there was no window. The article says that they lived in darkness all those years.And if there was a window, I'm sure the witch would have sealed it off with more than a tarp.It makes me so mad that a woman can get away with only five years max... and even worse if she got 5 months. A jail cell would be nothing in comparison to where she made her children live.
zmerlinFeb 13, 2007
I read a short story about this once, where a father kept his daughter indoors all the time, didn't provide any outside world contact, and taught all of the opposite words (ie. Called sugar "salt", called "salt" sugar etc)While it is very sad and unfortunate, it does pose an interesting case study, especially the language part.
toonworldFeb 13, 2007
Does the Austrian legal systems allow for multiple convictions of the same crime? I mean if she did that to 3 people, shouldn't she be charged 3 times and when convicted be sentenced to 15 years?
peppinoFeb 13, 2007
It's not really a made up language but "an almost unintelligible language of their own, described as a “singing-like” form of German"
impossisFeb 15, 2007
Digg is not just a technology site. right on the header it says "News". that doesn't mean news about the latest gadget, or news about whatever the RIAA did this week. It means NEWS. as in, things that happen around the world. if you want a site that's about only technology, kindly take it to Slashdot. Then maybe we won't have to listen to your whining.In an unrelated paragraph, this takes the cake as the most terrible thing I've ever heard of. The mother should hang by her thumbs in the darkest room of Austria's worst prison for the rest of her life for this.