The First Life Sentence of Jack Unterweger - Justizgebäude Salzburg (Rudolfsplatz 2)
Behind the three tall windows of this 1909 Palace of Justice, on 1 June 1976, Salzburg's court sentenced a 24 year old drifter named Jack Unterweger to life for the murder of Margret Schäfer. Fourteen years later he walked free, and nine more women died.
Sobre este lugar
The Justizgebäude was built between 1905 and 1909 on the site of the medieval Fronfeste prison, its monumental facade deliberately aligned with the Karolinenbrücke so that imperial justice would greet anyone crossing the Salzach. Above the three arched windows of the Schwurgerichtssaal, the jury courtroom, stand allegorical figures of Wisdom, Truth and Justice. It was in this building, on 1 June 1976, that the Landesgericht Salzburg sentenced Johann 'Jack' Unterweger to life imprisonment for killing eighteen year old Margret Schäfer in a forest near Herborn, Germany, on 11 December 1974, beating her with a steel rod and strangling her with the wire of her own bra. Salzburg police had already suspected him of the April 1973 murder of 23 year old Marica Horvath in the city, but that investigation was dropped once the verdict was in. In prison Unterweger became a celebrated author, intellectuals including Günter Grass and Elfriede Jelinek campaigned for him, and on 23 May 1990 he was paroled after sixteen years. He went on to strangle sex workers in Austria, Prague and Los Angeles, was convicted of nine murders in Graz on 29 June 1994, and hanged himself that same night. The courtroom has since seen the 2012 refusal to reopen the Heidi Mayrhofer case, the 2021 Festspielbezirk stabbing trial and, on 21 August 2024, a life sentence for a fatal knife attack in Lehen.
Datos clave
- 1976 year — On 1 June 1976 the Landesgericht Salzburg sentenced Jack Unterweger to life imprisonment for the murder of Margret Schäfer; Germany had handed the case to Austria.
- 16 years served — Unterweger was paroled on 23 May 1990 after a campaign by writers including Günter Grass and Elfriede Jelinek; within months the killings resumed.
- 9 murders — The number of murders Unterweger was convicted of in Graz on 29 June 1994, the night he hanged himself in his cell.
📍 Rudolfsplatz 2, 5020, Salzburg