Reich mystery hangs over eight people found in wine cellar

AUSTRIAN police have arrested a man of 54 after he attacked two social workers when they found him living illegally in a private wine cellar with a woman and six children he claimed were born in England.

Police were still trying to determine the identity of the children, who were aged seven months to five years old.

Neighbours in Obritz, a small town near the Czech border, alerted local authorities that there was a family living illegally in a wine cellar.

Deputy mayor Erich Greil said: “Residents sometimes heard children’s voices in the basement. As soon as residents approached, it went quiet.”

When two social workers arrived to check on the children, police said the man attacked them with pepper spray and barricaded the door to the cellar.

The 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 youngsters, 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.

The children were taken to a nearby hospital and had not been neglected or harmed, the police spokesman said. They are now said to be in the custody of social services.

Local media reported that the man was a follower of the so-called Reichsbuerger, or Reich Citizens, movement.

The right-wing extremist conspiracy group believes the partition of Germany by Allied powers after the Second World War and the subsequent democratic states that followed were illegal, arguing instead that the original Reich still exists.

A spokesman for the Lower Austrian police would not confirm the man’s reported affiliation with the Reich Citizens.

Several incidents with violent members of the movement and illegal weapons depots earned the movement the attention of the media and the German authorities.

The German authorities estimate that 21,000 people belonged to the movement in Germany as of July 2021.