Mystery over mother and daughters found ‘starved to death’ in Vienna apartment

‘No traces of violent intrusion...nor traces of obvious use of force,’ police department says

The women were found in a locked apartment in Vienna (Getty)

An Austrian woman and her twin teenage daughters appear to have starved to death in a locked Vienna apartment, police officers have said.

The bodies were found in municipal housing in the city’s Floridsdorf district on 21 May.

There was no sign of break-in or a struggle at the scene and a toxicology test revealed no sign of poison.

“There were no traces of violent intrusion...nor traces of obvious use of force in the residential premises itself,” a Vienna police spokesperson said.

An autopsy has since been carried out on the bodies of the 45-year-old woman and her 18-year-old daughters.

“State of death can be assumed by starvation,” a police spokesperson said on Thursday.

The women are thought to have died at the end of March or the beginning of April.

The State Criminal Police Office of Vienna has opened an investigation into the deaths, amid confusion as to how the women came to die of starvation.

Detectives have interviewed the deceased women’s relatives, a police spokesperson said.

“Detailed investigations will be carried out in the coming weeks,” the spokesperson added.

The three women are yet to be publicly named.

Additional reporting by agencies