Seisenbacher, 62, was convicted in 2019 of several counts of aggravated child abuse, including taking advantage of ‘a relationship of authority’.

Seisenbacher (two-time world champion in 1985 and 1986) was sentenced on the testimonies of three women who accused him of abusing them when he was their coach.

The first reports of abuse of girls, the youngest of whom was nine years old, emerged in the Austrian press in 2014, but after the prosecution filed charges Seisenbacher fled to Georgia and then to Ukraine, the country that extradited him to Austria.

He was a popular figure as a coach, and in 1996 he was awarded the Honorary Decoration in gold for services to Austria.

As head of the Georgian national team he won two golds at European championships and another at the London 2012 Olympic Games, before moving to Ukraine.

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