On the run

Adolf Schandl was a true criminal who managed to escape from one of Austria’s most secure prisons and thus went down in Austrian criminal history as the “escape king.” Adolf Schandl was born in Vienna in 1936. At the age of 18, he emigrated to Australia, but returned to his old home in Vienna after a few years. He married and settled down. He led a middle-class life and lived with his wife and daughter in a cozy home. But when his marriage failed and he lost his job, he went increasingly off the rails at the age of 32. He drank, gambled, and soon made the fateful acquaintance of a woman with whom he committed three armed robberies between 1967 and 1968, during which two people suffered gunshot wounds. For this, Adolf Schandl was sentenced to 10 years behind bars, which he was to serve in the Stein prison near Krems, one of the most secure prisons in Austria. Shortly after beginning his sentence, he attempted to escape by climbing over the prison walls. In doing so, he broke his leg, which is why the attempt failed. But Schandl did not want to give up. He found two accomplices with whom he planned to escape from the prison. During a hearing before the investigating judge on November 4, 1971, he put his escape plan into action again, with the trio consisting of fellow inmates Alfred N. and Walter S. overpowering the two guards. They stole their service pistols and took them, the judge, and the court clerk hostage. They then began negotiations with the police. They demanded civilian clothing, safe passage, a car, and a two-day head start. In return, they would release the hostages. The negotiators succeeded in getting the kidnappers to release the two guards and the clerk. The police agreed to the deal, but insisted that the clerk be replaced by the police commander of Krems an der Donau. After being assured a head start of 30 kilometers, the trio drove out of the prison with the judge and the commander as hostages. A Hollywood-style chase with the police ensued. When the trio drove their car into a dead end in Vienna-Penzing, the police blocked the entrance to the dead end with their police vehicles. The trio managed to break through the ring of emergency vehicles and drove to Vienna’s Westbahnhof station. There, they hijacked a taxi and its driver and took a newspaper seller as another hostage. Then, on the advice of the police commander, they drove to the Vienna police headquarters to negotiate personally with Police President Holaubek. During the negotiations, the trio was promised a further head start if they released the newspaper seller, which they did. In Breitenlee, they stole a car with two occupants, who had to transfer to the taxi. One of the kidnappers then drove the new car behind the taxi to a quarry. There, they left the taxi driver and the two new hostages tied up. They had previously disabled the taxi. With the new car and the judge and commander as hostages, they continued their escape. They finally released both of them after they promised not to inform the police for 20 minutes. The trio drove to Vienna’s 7th district, Neubau, where they wanted to get a new vehicle. However, when the theft was thwarted, the whole situation became too dicey for the trio. After almost three days on the run, Schandl’s accomplices were persuaded to give up. Adolf Schandl, on the other hand, was only arrested after 16 days on the run. He had gone into hiding at the home of the mother of one of his fellow prisoners in Vienna’s 17th district, Hernals, where he calmly visited coffee houses until he was finally arrested. Adolf Schandl was sentenced to a further 16 years in prison for the prison break and escape. In 1985, he was released early. But Adolf Schandl had gotten a taste for thrills and in 1992 was sentenced to 19 years in prison for aggravated robbery and a shootout with the police, which he had to serve again in the Stein prison. At the beginning of October 1996, however, he was transferred to the Graz-Karlau prison due to the acute risk of escape. But Schandl’s story did not end there, as he found two accomplices who wanted to break out of prison with him. These were double murderer Tawfik Ben Ahmed Chaovali and murderer and pimp Peter Grossauer, who were miraculously allowed to shop together in the prison store on November 14, 1996. A knife was hidden in a plastic bag in the store, which Chaovali suddenly pulled out and used to overpower two of the guards with knife wounds. In the meantime, Schandl and Grossauer tied up the saleswomen. However, the third guard was able to drag his seriously injured colleagues into the hallway, where he triggered the alarm. Homemade bottle bombs were tied around the saleswomen’s bodies. Schandl had stolen the necessary nitro thinner from the prison workshop. Schandl took over the negotiations with the prison management. The trio of kidnappers demanded a helicopter and 8 million schillings. If their demands were not met, the women would be tortured, abused, and killed. The Cobra task force was entrusted with the hostage-taking, and its chief negotiator managed to extend the deadline. In the meantime, snipers took up their positions. After nine hours, the Cobra officers managed to overpower the hostage-takers. No one was injured during the operation. On December 18, 1997, Adolf Schandl was sentenced to 19 years in prison at the Regional Court for Criminal Matters in Graz. Although his previous sentence was set to expire in 2027, he was released early in June 2012, 17 years ahead of schedule, under strict parole conditions, which was an absolute record. To this day, his life continues to inspire the media landscape.