PÅ RYKK: Investigation leader Tor Kallmyr from Kripos helped organize the search for Monika’s mobile phone in 2015 after the eight-year-old girl was killed in Bergen. Photo: Tor Erik H. Mathiesen / VG
The decisions made by the first police patrols can be absolutely decisive for whether suspicious deaths are solved.
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Less than 20 minutes ago
On Monday, VG reported that Norwegian police responded to just over 2,200 suspicious deaths last year.
Most suspicious deaths have a natural cause. It can be illness, suicide, overdose deaths, accidents.
And sometimes it’s murder.
It will often be the first patrol at the scene to decide whether the homicide alarm goes off. A crime technician is then called to the scene. Åsted is blocked off. Clues are collected and all witnesses are interviewed.
The choices that are made at the very beginning can have a major impact on whether the case can be resolved.
– The first thing I expect from a police officer who arrives at a crime scene is that you stop completely and ask yourself basic questions such as: Is this okay? Does this follow the laws of nature? Can you lie like that? Should the rope be attached like this? Should such young people die this way?
PROFESSIONAL RESPONSIBILITY: Tor Kallmyr in Kripos Photo: Julie Holmberg / VG
The man who asks the questions is called Tor Kallmyr and has traveled to crime scenes for suspicious deaths since he joined the police in 1998. For the past 14 years, he has been a police investigation manager at Kripos.
– Overall, the level of the Norwegian police is good, but when mistakes are made, the consequences can be so disastrous. In the worst case, murderers can go free and gross miscarriages of justice can occur, says the experienced police officer.
Errors and omissions
In the past year, VG has uncovered inadequate investigations and police errors in several cases where people have died under suspicious circumstances.
This has led to surveillance videos being deleted, the cause of death not being clarified and important crime scene investigations never being carried out.
In several of the cases, the errors have led to murder charges being dropped on the basis of the evidence.
Tor Kallmyr refers, among other things, to the mistakes that were made when eight-year-old Monika was found dead in 2011. She was found hanging from a belt and the Bergen police initially wanted to dismiss the case as a suicide. Four years later, the mother’s ex-boyfriend was convicted of the murder.
– Just the way the belt was tied in that case should be enough to ask the question; Can an eight-year-old girl do this, says Kallmyr.
Must be curious
In general, he believes that the Norwegian police can do better at thinking about the “worst case scenario” when they go to a crime scene.
– This does not mean that all deaths can be murders, but several murder investigations could have gotten off to a much better start if the first police officers on the scene had been even more curious about what actually happened, says Kallmyr.
The investigator believes that he sees no regional differences in where in Norway the police make the most mistakes.
– There are good police officers all over the country. Serious mistakes can happen in supposedly well-resourced police districts, and we can see impeccable initial police work in smaller districts where they have few murder cases, says Kallmyr.
The Kripos investigator nevertheless believes that the police districts can be better at asking for expertise, help and assistance if they are faced with a difficult case.
He points to what the mother of Beate-Catrin Antonsen told VG. When she asked the local sheriff’s office if they could contact Kripos after her daughter’s death, she is said to have been told: “We are as good as Kripos”.
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– I have no doubt that these police officers are as good as police officers in Kripos, says Tor Kallmyr.
– But when it comes to murder, a police officer from Kripos has more experience. I think that statement is almost as bad as sitting as a general practitioner and saying that you know as much about cancer as a cancer specialist, says Kallmyr.
Only 18 months after Beate-Catrin was found dead, Nordland police district asked for assistance from Kripos to investigate the death.
Prosecutor Stig Morten Løkkebakken has previously stated that the police learned a lot from the case:
– Among other things, we have identified that back in 2016 we had too high a threshold to request assistance from Kripos.
Not the FBI model
There are currently no official guidelines for when a police district should contact Kripos for assistance.
– But the sooner Kripos is in place, the better assistance we can provide, says Sigurd Andreas Moe, who heads the violence section.
– In a murder investigation, it is somewhat true that every minute counts. We know that many tracks weather. The crime scene must be examined for DNA and fingerprints before it is contaminated. Telecom and internet data must be collected before it disappears. Witnesses have greater credibility the closer in time the interviews are made, he says.
When Kripos enters a case months and years after the death has occurred, they rely to a large extent on the original investigations and reports from experts.
– Some mistakes are irreparable. If the video recording is not secured, it no longer exists. After a certain time, the mobile data is deleted. If an autopsy has not been carried out, the body may be cremated. Then there are no answers.
LEADER: Sigurd Andreas Moe at the violence section of Kripos Photo: Harald Henden / VG
He emphasizes that Kripos does not know what is the reason when a police district chooses not to ask for assistance.
– I do not feel that it is seen as a defeat to ask for assistance from Kripos. Rather, I think there is a desire for us to fix this ourselves – we can manage to achieve this on our own.
– Kripos does not have the FBI model where they roll in and say that “we will take over this case”. Kripos comes when local police ask if we can help. When we come we are wanted.
Published:
Published: 19.12.23 at 21:37
2023-12-19 20:37:07
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