On Monday 27 June, Trond Normanseth, his wife Torunn and Trond’s son, Emil (15), are getting ready to go on holiday to Western Norway. They will leave the next day.
Suddenly the police come to the door and say that he has been charged with a bank robbery in Fetsund on 10 July 2014and taken to Lillestrøm for questioning.
It was Romerikes Blad who mentioned the matter first.
Thought it was bullshit
While Trond is packing in the car, his wife is in the house doing the laundry and hanging up clothes. Emil (15) was in the garage fixing a motorcycle.
It is Trond’s son who shouts that there is someone who wants to talk to him.
– Emil sits in the living room because he gets a little scared, and thinks it might have something to do with the motorcycle, says Trond to Dagbladet.
Trond meets two police officers down the hall, who have a paper in their hand and say they want to arrest him. They say that he is charged with a bank robbery in Fetsund on Romerike on 10 July 2014.
sea view
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– I’m in a “little bit out of myself” state, and I sit down on the pouf in the hallway. I can’t read the charge. “This must be nonsense,” I say several times.
One of the police officers tells Trond that this is not nonsense, but serious.
The charge is read out, and the police believe he is the man who robbed Trøgstad sparebank in Østfold eight years ago.
The police also have access to search the house.
Later, Trond is told that a police officer has seen him in the program “En del av meg” on TV 2.
The policeman thinks that Trond is very similar to the man who is wanted for the bank robbery. He has convened the investigation team, which concluded that it was 51 percent likely that Trond was the robber.
– Strike with a left hook
It provided grounds for charges and arrest. He is therefore taken to Lillestrøm police station for questioning.
Put your foot down
Trond changes his clothes and is led down.
Torunn is questioned in one of the police cars outside. Later, she and Emil travel to Torunn’s sister while the search is in progress.
Before Trond goes to the flat cell, the police want him to get naked so they can examine his rectum. Trond refuses.
– There I put my foot down, and luckily I let it go, he says.
During the interrogation, Trond is asked where he was on 10 July 2014.
Unable to remember where he was on that date, he asks to borrow his phone so he can check.
The police check his phone for traces, while he is explained carefully what the charge is about.
Firefighters made a tragic discovery
– The police showed me four pictures. The first photo looked quite similar to me at first glance, but when they showed me photo number two, three and four, you could see that it wasn’t me.
Trond notes that the robber in the photo is missing the tattoo he has on the left side of his neck.
– All I thought about was that we were going on holiday, and I wanted to go home and finish packing.
Turned my life upside down
After returning home after a long day at the police station, Trond learns that Torunn and Emil have found out where he was when the robbery on 10 July 2014 took place.
On Monday 7 July 2014, Trond, Torunn and his two children were in Forvik on Helgeland, where there was a ferry accident and he was interviewed by VG about the incident.
He sends the VG link and bank transactions showing that he used his card in Trøndelag on 10 July 2014, the day the robbery took place, to the police – and is released.
TATTOO: The picture shows the tattoo Trond has on the left side of his neck. Photo: Private
sea view
While Trond and his family are on holiday, the experiences from the interrogation linger.
He tells Dagbladet that the incident became a topic that was always on the table.
– What did you think then?
– I thought: “Can they come and get me again?”
When the family returns home from the holiday, Trond has one last conversation with the police. In conversation with the police, he was told that he had been checked out of the case. He received the layoff at Altinn on Friday 5 August.
Trond experienced the incident as having his life turned upside down.
– It is quite brutal to be ripped out of the situation you are in, he says.
However, Trond thinks the police could have been more humble when they discovered they had arrested the wrong man. To date, he has not received any apology.
– Can be experienced violently
Dagbladet has been in contact with the East police district on Sunday. They reply that they do not have the capacity to answer the inquiry.
Made a shocking discovery in the house of horrors
Opposite Romerikes Blad confirms Mette Eriksen, police prosecutor in the East police district, that an official saw Normanseth in a TV series.
Eight police officers took part in the operation, but it was mainly about having enough officers to search the home effectively to check the accused in or out of the case as quickly as possible, emphasizes Eriksen.
– The police were of the opinion that there were reasonable grounds for suspecting that this man was the real perpetrator at the time of the arrest. The police had previously also received a decision on a search from the court, she tells the newspaper and continues:
– The police understand that such an operation with subsequent arrest, search and questioning can be experienced violently, especially when it turns out that we did not have the right perpetrator.
The family thought he was dead
Eriksen states that the focus was to secure any evidence and get a quick overview of whether they had the right man.
– He was questioned shortly after his arrest and released the same evening, and the police do not recognize a lack of humility.
The police prosecutor explains that Normanseth was in practice checked out of the case after the questioning, but that they formally checked him out after the answer to the DNA tests was available. She confirms that the case has now been handed over to the father of the family.
Eight years after the robbery in Fetsund, the police have not given up solving the case. Eriksen asks people with information to call 477 80 607, or the police’s joint number 02800 outside office hours.
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