Real Crime/Paranormal/Conspiracy Theories Book III

Jack Unterweger

Johann "Jack"Unterweger (16 August 1950 – 29 June 1994) was an Austrianserial killer who committed murder in several countries – Austria,West Germany, Czechoslovakia, and the United States. Initiallyconvicted in 1974 of a single murder, Unterweger began to writeextensively while in prison. His work gained the attention of theAustrian literary elite, who took it as evidence that he had beenrehabilitated.

After significant lobbying, Unterwegerwas released on parole in 1990. After his release, he became a minorcelebrity and worked as a playwright and journalist, but withinmonths he resumed killing women. Unterweger hanged himself in prisonafter being convicted of nine more murders in June 1994.

Early life

Jack Unterweger was born August 16,1950 in Judenburg, Styria, Austria to Theresia Unterweger, a Viennesebarmaid and waitress, and Jack Becker, an American soldier whom shehad met in Trieste, Italy. Some sources describe his mother as a sexworker. Unterweger's mother was jailed for fraud while pregnant butwas released and traveled to Graz, where he was born. After hismother was arrested again in 1953, Unterweger was sent to Carinthiato live with his grandfather, who was known as a "roughfellow" who regularly used his grandson to help him stealfarm animals.

Unterweger was in and out of prison formuch of his youth. He worked as a waiter but between 1966 and 1974 hewas convicted sixteen times, mostly for theft-related offences, butalso for pimping and sexual assault on a sex worker; he spent most ofthose eight years in jail.

First murder conviction,imprisonment and release

In 1974, Unterweger murdered18-year-old West German national Margaret Schäfer by strangling herwith her own bra, and in 1976 he was convicted and sentenced to lifein prison. While imprisoned, he wrote short stories, poems, plays,and an autobiography, Purgatory or The Trip to Prison – Report of aGuilty Man, that later served as the basis for a documentary.

In 1985, a campaign to pardon andrelease Unterweger from prison began. Austrian President RudolfKirchschläger (SPÖ/ÖVP) refused the petition when presented tohim, citing the court-mandated minimum of fifteen years in prison.Writers, artists, journalists and politicians agitated for a pardon, including the author and 2004 Nobel Prize winner Elfriede Jelinek;Günter Grass; and the editor of the magazine Manuskripte, AlfredKolleritsch.

Unterweger was released on 23 May 1990,after the required minimum fifteen years of his life term. Upon hisrelease, his autobiography was taught in Austrian schools and hisstories for children were performed on Austrian radio. Unterwegerhimself hosted television programmes which discussed criminalrehabilitation and he worked as a reporter for the public broadcasterORF, where he reported on stories concerning the very murders forwhich he was later found guilty.

Later murders

Law enforcement later found thatUnterweger killed a young woman named Blanka Bočková inCzechoslovakia, and seven more in Austria in 1990—Brunhilde Masser,aged 39; Heidi Hammerer, aged 31; Elfriede Schrempf, aged 35; SilviaZagler, aged 23; Sabine Moitzl, aged 25; Karin Eroglu-Sladky, aged25; Regina Prem, aged 32—in the first year after his release, allgarroted with their bras.

In 1991, Unterweger was hired by anAustrian magazine to write about crime in Los Angeles and thedifferences between U.S. and European attitudes to prostitution. Hemet local police, even going so far as to participate in a ride-alongof the city's red light districts. During Unterweger's time in LosAngeles, three sex workers—Shannon Exley, Irene Rodriguez, andPeggy Booth—were beaten, sexually assaulted with tree branches, andstrangled with their own bras.

In Austria, Unterweger was suggested asa suspect for the sex worker murders. In the absence of othersuspects, police took a serious look at Unterweger and kept him undersurveillance until he went to the United States—ostensibly as areporter—observing nothing to connect him with the killings.

Arrest and death

Police in Graz eventually had enoughevidence to arrest Unterweger, but he had fled by the time theyentered his home. After law enforcement agencies chased him and hisgirlfriend, Bianca Mrak, through Switzerland, France, and the U.S.,he was finally arrested by U.S. Marshals in Miami, Florida, on 27February 1992. While a fugitive, he had called the Austrian media totry to convince them of his innocence.

Unterweger was extradited back toAustria on 27 May 1992, and charged with eleven murders, includingone in Prague and three in Los Angeles. The jury found him guilty ofnine murders by a 6:2 majority (sufficient for a conviction underAustrian law at the time). Based on psychiatric examination,Austrian psychiatrist Dr. Reinhard Haller diagnosed Unterweger withnarcissistic personality disorder and presented his findings to thecourt on 20 June 1994. On 29 June 1994, he was sentenced to life inprison without possibility of parole.

That night, Unterweger committedsuicide at Graz-Karlau Prison by hanging himself with a rope madefrom shoelaces and a cord from the trousers of a track suit, usingthe same knot that was found on all the strangled sex workers.

Prior to his death, Unterweger hadasserted his intention to seek an appeal, and therefore, underAustrian law, his guilty verdict was not considered legally bindingafter his death, as it has not been reviewed and confirmed by thecourt.