“Residents sometimes heard children’s voices in the basement,” the town’s vice-mayor, Erich Greil, told the Austrian broadcaster ORF. “As soon as (local residents) approached, it went quiet.”
When two social workers arrived last Thursday to check on the children, police said the man attacked them with pepper spray and barricaded the door to the cellar.
he social workers called the police, who arrived on the scene and arrested the man. When police searched the cellar, they found a woman and the six children, believed to be the man’s partner and children.
Police also found several weapons, including a gun, crossbows and compressed air weapons.
According to police, the man said the children were born in England. Police said they were not officially registered in Austria and that they were working to confirm the children’s identities.