Barbora Skrlova is a Czech woman who became notorious for her involvement in a child abuse case and her ability to deceive people into believing she was a child herself. Skrlova suffered from a rare condition called hypopituitarism, which affected her growth and appearance, making her look much younger than her actual age. She used this to her advantage to escape justice and manipulate others, posing as different children in different countries.
The Child Abuse Case in the Czech Republic
In 2007, Czech police raided a house in Brno and found Ondrej Mauerova, eight years old, locked and chained in the cellar. This was the start of Barbora Skrlova’s story. Klara Mauerova, Ondrej’s mother, was a 31-year-old woman who had split up with her husband because she was mentally ill. My sister Katerina Mauerova lived with Klara and her two sons, Ondrej and Jakub. Both of them were abused horribly by their mother and her sister.
Two grown women and a girl aged 13 were also found in the house by the police. The girl said her name was Anicka and that she was an orphan who had been taken in by the Mauerova family. She was actually 33-year-old Barbora Skrlova, who had become friends with Klara while they were both studying education in college. Skrlova told them her name was Anicka and that she had nowhere else to stay, so she moved in with the Mauerovas.
It was Skrlova’s plan to abuse the boys because she was in charge of Klara and Katerina, who were both part of a cult called the Grail Movement. They believed Skrlova when she said that the boys were possessed by evil spirits and needed to be punished and cursed. She also made it look like the boys were acting up and breaking things, and she made them write letters calling out their mistakes.
She then got the sisters to torture the boys in different ways, like by burning them with cigarettes, hitting them with belts, starving them, making them cut themselves, and even partially skinning Ondrej while he was still alive.
There were also webcams that recorded the abuse and sent it to other cult members, who watched and gave orders. The abuse was found by the police after one of the webcams was accidentally linked to a neighbor’s computer. The neighbor then called the police.
The Escape to Norway
Once the police caught Klara and Katerina Mauerova, Skrlova got away by acting like a child. She ran away to Norway and changed her name to Adam Fiser, a 13-year-old boy from the Czech Republic who had gone missing.
It’s thought that Skrlova talked to Adam’s parents on the internet and got them to help her pretend to be their son. To look like Adam, Skrlova shaved her head, tied her breasts together, and dressed like a boy.
She went to school in Oslo and lied to teachers, classmates, and social workers to make them think she was a teenage boy. For a while, she also lived in a children’s home, where she continued to lie. She did, however, quickly leave the house and never came back.
Police searched all over the country for the missing boy, but they didn’t know that he was actually an adult woman who was trying to avoid being caught. They finally found Skrlova in Tromsø, Norway, an Arctic city. There, they arrested her and told everyone who she really was.
The Trial and Sentence
Skrlova was extradited back to the Czech Republic, where she faced trial for her involvement in the child abuse case. She pleaded not guilty, claiming that she was also a victim of the cult and that she had dissociative identity disorder (DID), which made her believe she was different people at different times.
However, the court rejected her defense and found her guilty of orchestrating the abuse of Ondrej and Jakub Mauerova. She was sentenced to five years in prison in 2008. Klara Mauerova was sentenced to nine years in prison, while Katerina Mauerova was sentenced to ten years in prison.
