Horror in the Neighborhood

Burglar Caressed Sleeping Viennese Woman (26)

A burglar (stock photo) broke into a house on Arbeiterstrandbadstraße—but his target was neither money, gold, nor jewelry.(Bild: Krone-Collage/Reinhard Holl, Martin A. Jöchl)

Horrifying moments for a 26-year-old woman in Vienna: She was startled awake in the middle of the night because a burglar was caressing her. The incident has sent shockwaves through the entire neighborhood. 

When victims of break-ins talk about the incidents, you usually hear the same things. That it’s terrible that someone has been moving around inside their own four walls—and thus within their innermost circle of safety—without having been invited. That it’s an unsettling feeling to know that a complete stranger has rummaged through personal belongings, mementos, and possibly even underwear. And that it’s difficult to carry on living with the feeling of a break-in as if nothing had happened.

The feeling of insecurity gnaws at her too much. The feeling of being at the mercy of others and of potentially becoming a victim again. Jana M. (name changed) had probably never experienced any of the feelings described above herself until the night of June 24. Perhaps from stories she’d heard from people around her. Or because the area along the Old Danube is repeatedly plagued by burglars.

Two years ago, a murder shocked the neighborhood
Perhaps the Viennese woman had also been worried after 91-year-old “Frau Grete” fell victim to a brutal burglar in September 2024, very close to her current little house on Arbeiterstrandbadstraße. At the time, a 52-year-old Slovak man had sneaked into the elderly woman’s allotment garden cottage, raped her there, and then suffocated her with a cushion and his bare hands.

It probably never occurred to the 26-year-old that she herself could be attacked. But in the early hours of June 24, around 3:50 a.m., a very strange incident was to unfold. M. had been lying in bed next to her husband for some time when—according to her own account—she felt nudges and touches on her skin. What she likely perceived at first, while half-asleep, as her husband’s caresses would turn out to be the touch of a stranger.

Next to her—whether “just” crouching beside the bed or already half-lying in it—the woman then became aware of a stranger who was caressing her upper body. That is, until the woman began to scream loudly and the intruder took off.

When the 26-year-old woke up from the touching and noticed the stranger, she screamed. 

Wiens Polizeisprecherin Anna Gutt über den äußerst verstörenden Fall

Bild: lpd wien / b. elbe

Fingerprints were taken from the victim’s arm
The police searched for the unknown man by helicopter—without success. The man is believed to have entered the house through a tilted window on the ground floor. In addition to securing evidence of the break-in, police spokeswoman Anna Gutt said fingerprints were also taken from the victim’s arm. In the hope that fingerprints can be recovered. No similar cases are known.

Disturbing: The burglar didn’t take anything. He apparently entered the house solely to caress the woman...