Murder case Ilse Moschner

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Some of the seized tools, exhibited in the Vienna Crime Museum

The murder of Ilse Moschner by Johann Rogatsch occurred on January 8, 1960 in Vienna and is considered to be one of the most brutal homicides in Austrian criminal history. The crime made international headlines and sparked a parliamentary debate on tightening the penal system .

The perpetrator received a life sentence and was killed on January 15, 1974 by a fellow prisoner, the ex-police officer and double murderer Ernst Karl .

Dead body

On Monday morning, January 11, 1960, a pensioner found bones wrapped in paper with leftover meat in a rubbish bin on the corner of Lange Gasse and Florianigasse in Josefstadt and brought them to the dog of a friend who was a junk dealer who ran a storage facility in Ottakring . The pensioner was known to search trash cans in the area in order to supplement her pension with usable objects found in them.

The traders at the campsite noticed that the bones could be of human origin, so they informed the police. On the basis of a forensic medical examination, the bones could be clearly identified as parts of a thigh and lower leg of a young woman. The fracture points in the bones showed that the perpetrator had initially used a saw and later an ax to cut up the body.

That same evening, the police began a major search for the other body parts and checked all the rubbish bins around the site in the 8th district. In the courtyard of the house at Florianigasse 17, further body parts and the head of the dead were finally found. In the laundry room and the basement, the investigators discovered remains of meat and blood, as well as a saw. The perpetrator also boiled and burned some of the body parts.

The victim was quickly identified. It was the 18-year-old sports student Ilse Moschner from Ottakring who had been missing since January 8th. This worked temporarily as a debt collector for an insurance company and did not return from a collection process from Florianigasse.

Johann Rogatsch

The 26-year-old caretaker Johann Rogatsch was immediately arrested as the main suspect. He was the only one with access to the cellar compartments, in which the body parts and traces of blood were found, and he had previously tried to distract the police from what was later found. In addition, he knew the victim. Moschner had already collected the insurance premium twice from his partner, who was the only one at Florianigasse 17 to have this insurance. The officers also trusted him to commit the crime, as he had already spent several years in prison for rape, burglary and grievous bodily harm. Rogatsch grew up in Carinthia and moved to Vienna in January 1959, where he lived with his partner and her son.

On the night of his arrest, Rogatsch confessed to the killing, but gave different course of events and motives. The interrogations turned out to be difficult because he only confessed what could be proven beyond doubt. His version that she insulted him and that he accidentally killed her with one blow in an impulse of anger was refuted by the forensic examination. He later claimed that he abused her while she was heavily drunk and that she suddenly died of heart failure. He also incriminated an acquaintance of complicity, who, however, was able to show a solid alibi. Rogatsch then confessed to having falsely accused him.

He was initially charged with murderous murder, desecration of corpses and defamation. On January 29, 1960, the police officer Rosina Baumschlager was received and awarded by Police President Josef Holaubek . The officer from the Ottakring police station had accelerated the identification of the victim and thus the investigation of the murderer.

The murder also triggered a parliamentary debate on tightening the penal system. Because exactly on the day of the crime, the three-time murderer Oskar Wrany was released prematurely after only 13 years in prison. It was discussed whether life imprisonment for such serious crimes should not mean life after all, but this could not be enforced.

negotiation

On June 22, 1961, the trial against Rogatsch began before the Vienna Higher Regional Court, where he pleaded not guilty . He alleged that he was ill-treated, bribed, and forced to confess by the interrogating officers, which resulted in all officers being questioned and one sworn in. The statements of the officials, a former fellow prisoner from the Graz-Karlau prison and Rogatsch's partner, instead gave the impression that Rogatsch had planned the murder for some time.

On June 27, the three psychiatric experts testified who found the defendant to be fully guilty. They described Rogatsch as an obsessive, egocentric psychopath with strong aggressions, who was prone to sexual perversions. Three forensic doctors also refuted Rogatsch's information about the killing of Ilse Moschner and spoke of a clear lust murder. According to her portrayals, Ilse Moschner was strangled, sexually abused and died from bleeding to death before she was dismembered.

Rogatsch often smiled during the testimony and had to be expelled from the room three times because witnesses refused to testify in his presence.

On June 30, 1961, Johann Rogatsch was unanimously found guilty by the jury and sentenced by the presiding judge to lifelong heavy imprisonment, with dark imprisonment on the 8th of every month, the day of Ilse Moschner's murder. Rogatsch appealed and appealed against the judgment unsuccessfully and was transferred to the Stein prison to serve his sentence .

Killing of Rogatsch

According to the prison director, Rogatsch is said to have been one of the most dangerous troublemakers in the detention center, which is why he was placed in the special security block.

On January 15, 1974, Rogatsch was strangled by his fellow prisoner, the convicted double murderer Ernst Karl , in the recreation room of the Stein prison . Karl stated that he acted in self-defense because Rogatsch wanted to force him to break out of prison and then attacked him. Rogatsch was buried in stone on January 18th.

Others

In the Vienna Crime Museum are u. a. Tools of the crime on display.

Web links