The photo has been used for illustrative purpose.

Gulf Today Report

Austrian police announced that they had discovered the body of an eighty-year-old woman who died more than a year ago.

The body was mummified by her son in the basement of a house in the Tyrol region.

"The investigations revealed that this 89-year-old woman died in June 2020, and the 66-year-old man kept her body in order to continue receiving benefits," the police said in a statement.

When the police questioned him, the suspect admitted that he had frozen the body of his mother, who lived with her near Innsbruck, to make sure it did not emit any odor, and wrapped it in bandages to absorb any corporal fluid.

"He covered his mother with a layer of cat litter, after which the body was mummified," Helmut Gufler, head of the police unit specialising in welfare fraud cases, told local media.

When the man's brother was asking him about their mother's situation, he said that their mother was hospitalised, claiming that woman was suffering from dementia.

The man pocketed 50,000 euros ($59,000) since June 2020 from the payments.

A new postman requested to see the beneficiary of social benefits, but the son refused, so the man reported it to the authorities.

The police discovered the body last Saturday. The son was charged with welfare fraud and concealment of a dead body.