Story By:  Ana Marjanovic, Sub-Editor: Michael Leidig, Agency:  Newsflash

Incest monster Josef Fritzl is to stay in a high-security prison after court judges reversed plans to move him to a softer jail.

The evil 87-year-old was jailed for life after keeping his daughter captive in a self-built dungeon for 24 years as a sex slave where he fathered her seven children.

Austria’s Higher Regional Court (OLG) in Vienna has reversed a decision taken in April that would have seen Fritzl moved to a regular prison.

Instead, Fritzl will serve more time in a high-security prison for mentally ill criminals.

The Krems regional court confirmed the decision on Tuesday, 7th June, saying: “The Higher Regional Court (OLG) Vienna has recognised the need for further accommodation in an institution for mentally abnormal lawbreakers.”

The correctional court responsible for Stein Prison – Austria’s most secure psychiatric jail – had decided on 1st April to release Fritzl and move him.

He was due to be released into a normal prison, where he could even have been eligible for early release.

But the move was blocked when the Krems public prosecutor’s office lodged a complaint, backed by senior judges in Vienna.

They stated that the decision to keep Fritzl at the high-security psychiatric prison was justified because he still suffers from a non-treatable serious mental illness.

Fritzl – who changed his name to Mayrhoff five years ago – is reportedly suffering from dementia.

If the Vienna court had upheld the decision for him to be moved to a normal prison, Fritzl could have been eligible to apply to be freed on parole next year in 2023.

Josef Fritzl held his daughter captive in an underground basement dungeon he had built himself in Amstetten from 1984 to 2008.

During this time, he abused and raped her numerous times and fathered a total of seven children with her. He also kept three of these children captive in the basement dungeon.