Acid bottles, evidence at trial (Reuters/Landrov)

But the prosecutors were relentless, observers would later say. In hindsight, it may have been their decision to show the grisly videotape of body parts being dissolved in the same acidic cleanser that Pandy allegedly used on his family, which made the difference.

Perhaps it was the Prosecutor General Alain Winant's chilling depiction of Pandy as a pastor who felt that he could act "as a God in every sense of the word," a man who "has reached such a level of virtuosity when it comes to lying that one can really speak of a form of art in his case."

Perhaps it was Pandy's own rambling denunciation of the case against him as a "witch trial" during a closing statement that observers said confirmed what court appointed psychologists had found when they described him as "paranoid, hostile and anti-social.

"Here in the capital of Europe I have been subjected to a trial for sorcery," he told the jurors in a statement peppered with obscure references from the Bible, about the fall of the Roman Empire and the trial of Socrates. "At every turn, the proceedings have been very black, full of tragedy, full of Satanism."

After twelve hours of deliberation, on March 8, a jury convicted Pandy of six counts of murder. He was also convicted of raping his daughters.

Agnes Pandy was convicted of five counts of murder, and of the attempted murder of her stepsister Timea. Now 44, Agnes Pandy was sentenced to 21 years in prison.

Her father was sentenced to life.

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