Austrian police announced on Thursday that they discovered the body of an elderly woman who had died over a year ago, mummified by her son in a basement in the Tyrol region because he wanted to continue receiving benefits allocated to her. The police stated in a report that "the investigations revealed that this 89-year-old woman died in June 2020, and the 66-year-old man kept her corpse in order to continue receiving her benefits."
The suspect admitted to police upon his arrest that he had frozen his mother's body, with whom he lived near Innsbruck, to ensure that no odors would arise from it, and wrapped it in bandages to absorb bodily fluids. Helmut Gufler, the head of the police unit specialized in social benefits fraud, explained to the ORF television channel that the man "covered his mother with a layer of cat litter, and then the body was mummified."
When the man's brother inquired about their mother's condition, he claimed that the elderly woman, who was suffering from dementia and had little family care, had been hospitalized. A new postal worker, responsible for delivering the monthly benefits, requested to see the social benefits recipient; however, the son refused this request, leading the postal worker to file a report on the matter. The police discovered the body last Saturday. The son has been charged with social benefits fraud and hiding a corpse.
