Police misconduct in Norway

Police misconduct has become an issue of high media attention in Norway. The death of Eugene Ejike Obiora, a naturalized Norwegian of Nigerian origin in September 2006 stirred an uproar that as of September 2007 has caused the authorities to announce significant changes to the way charges of police brutality and other forms of police misconduct, including corruption, involving the Norwegian police will be handled in the future.

Statistics on police misconduct

The Special Unit for Police Affairs was established on January 1, 2005. In 2006 the unit received 904 complaints, of which 101 led to indictment. Of these 26 ended with the issuance of a fine. In 8 cases criminal charges were brought, in 64 decision was made to prosecute, and 3 cases were given "påtaleunnlatelse" (decision not to try the case despite a conclusion that a punishable offense has taken place). Four police officers alone were responsible for 63 of the 101 cases.

Noted cases

One officer employed in Oslo Police District, one of the four mentioned, was sentenced in 2006 to two years in prison for human trafficking, embezzlement of money and weapons, as well as theft of emergency passports.

Two cases were from Follo Police District (immediately south of Oslo). One officer was accused of having felt up a number of women during interrogations. He was acquitted on almost all charges by the regional court. Another officer had been accused of abuse of power during an arrest. This case is now receiving a subject to renewed trial in the regional court, ordered by the Supreme Court, after an initial acquittal at the lower court was appealed.

The fourth case involves a female officer from Telemark Police District who was issued a fine of 10.000 kroner and the loss of her employment for a period of five years for embezzlement and breach of confidentiality, among other issues.

In late June 2007 the Oslo daily newspaper Dagsavisen published an overview of police cases with a deadly outcome. The presentation showed the investigation into ten of the most serious cases which were concluded after the establishment of the Special Unit for Police Affairs on January 1, 2005. In all 10 cases, all charges against the police were eventually dropped.

In recent years, several police officers have been noted to be instrumental, on some occasions aware and intending, in several cases of miscarriage of justice. In the most prominent case, the one in the case against Fritz Moen, several officers appear to have manipulated timelines, threatened the accused and witnesses and made false statements in the intent to close the case. Several cases appear to have the same characteristics.

Police internal affairs investigations on the Internet

In mid-September 2007, the leader of the Special Unit for Police Affairs, Jan Egil Presthus, stated to the Oslo daily Dagsavisen that all investigations into police conduct in cases that have ended in deaths are going to be posted on the Internet. He states that total openness in this way will strengthen the publics confidence in the unit's integrity and ability to conduct its investigations impartially. This came following Dagsavisen's listing in June of police cases with a deadly result.

A buzzing media discourse focusing on deaths incurred during police arrests and transports continued in Norway throughout 2007, and Presthus counts this as one factor triggering the initiative to publish ongoing investigations on the Internet. The cases will be presented on the web pages of the Special Unit for Police Affairs, and they will be presented in a way that preserves the anonymity of officers that are involved, and also other parties in cases where that is considered necessary with respects to protection of privacy.

Top police leadership confirms significant changes will take place

As a direct consequence of the Obiora case, training at the Norwegian Police Academy has undergone changes and national police director Ingelin Killengreen has instigated a thorough review of police methods in general.

Norway Minister Praises Police Response to Gunman

Long process of identifying Breivik's victims begins

Trond Berntsen, 51 An off-duty police officer who had volunteered as a security guard on Utoya. He pushed his young son to safety before he confronted Breivik and was gunned down. Stepbrother of the Crown Princess.

• Tore Eikeland, 21 A youth politician who was named by Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg at a memorial service on Sunday. He spoke at the Norwegian Labour Party conferences in 2009 and 2011 and was chairman of a regional youth party. The Prime Minister said his death was "incomprehensible".

• Hanne Kristine Fridtun, 20 A youth leader who made a haunting call from Utoya as the rampage continued. “I can’t speak loudly, I have to whisper,” she told a reporter from Norway's NRK. “Twenty of us have hidden down by the reeds. We’ve heard shooting. We don’t know what’s happening.”

• Johannes Buo, 14 Thought to be the youngest victim of the Utoya massacre. A friend wrote in a Facebook tribute: “It is unreal what has happened. You are an incredibly strong person ... We all hope desperately to get you home safe and sound.”

• Sondre Dale, 17 Director of Hauguland Labour Youth and a member of its nominating committee. Mr Dale is missing and feared dead.

• Monica Bosei, 45 Head of the Norway Maritime Museum, who volunteered at the camp as a kitchen helper. Became suspicious of Breivik's claim that he was a policeman when he refused to answer any questions about the bombing in Oslo.

• Guro Vartdal Håvoll A passionate conservationist who cited Nelson Mandela as one of her heroes. Lobbied politicians on youth issues like young people's bus passes.

• Jamil Rafal Yasin, 20 An Iraqi-born delegate from the port of Egersund. Appeared on the Norwegian version of X Factor. Missing and feared dead.

• Gunnar Linaker, 23 Described by his family as a "big bear", he was a passionate football supporter. Spoke to his father on the phone as the attack began saying: "Dad, dad there is a shooting, I have to go."

• Emil Okkenhaug, 15 On his first political summer camp. Missing following Friday's shootings.

• Syvert Knudsen, 17 A young chef who has not answered his phone since the attack. His stepfather said: "There isn't much hope, but it's important for us that he is found."

• Tarald Mjelde, 18 Described by friends as "the little big boy with an enthusiasm that infected everyone around him". Missing.

• Snore Haller, 30 A painter who was invited to the camp as a guest of one of the political committees. Described as "kind, generous and quiet.

• Ismail Haji Ahmed, 20 A dancer who had appeared on Norway's Got Talent under the stage name of Isma Brown.

• Simon Saebo, 19 School president who earned the nickname John F Kennedy for his charisma. Missing and feared dead

Developments came a day after a judge, Kim Heger, reported back on remarks by Mr. Breivik at a closed-door custody hearing — his first court appearance since Friday’s massacre. The police said later they were not ruling out the possibility that Mr. Breivik’s claim of accomplices, which he described as “two more cells” in an organization he called Knights Templar, was accurate. But they also noted that he had previously told them he had acted alone.

Some security analysts, like Tore Bjorgo, a professor at the Norwegian Police University College and an expert on right-wing extremism, were also skeptical, questioning whether the Knights Templar organization that Mr. Breivik claimed in his manifesto to have helped form in 2002 really existed or was simply an effort to claim a more elaborate history and role.

Mr. Breivik became much more extreme in the last two or three years, Mr. Bjorgo said. “That’s why I have some real doubt about this Templar claim in 2002,” he said. “It doesn’t correspond to his history. I’m not convinced it’s a real organization. It could be a fantasy or a threat, or it could be to try to show that he is part of a larger network.”

Mr. Breivik’s brief appearance at an Oslo courthouse on a cold misty day came as Norwegians were still grappling with the enormity of the attacks on Friday that amounted to one of the worst mass killings in postwar Europe. By Monday evening, at least 100,000 mourners had converged on Oslo to honor the victims and repudiate the suspect’s ideology of hatred toward Muslims and advocates of multiculturalism, who he said were ruining Norway and threatening Western European civilization.

The judge ordered Mr. Breivik held in jail for eight weeks, half of it in isolation, with no access to the outside except through his lawyer. The judge refused to open the hearing to the public, arguing that evidence could be ruined. Mr. Breivik, who had asked for an open hearing to explain his actions and his views about Muslims and to wear some sort of uniform, was denied on both counts. He was photographed in a car leaving the hearing wearing a red sweater embossed with a Lacoste alligator emblem.

Up to 1,500 people filled the narrow streets around the courthouse, especially in the back, near the entrance to the underground garage where they believed Mr. Breivik would be brought in.

The crowd was mostly quiet and pensive, as if in mourning, but some people expressed anger, too, shouting at a car they thought might be carrying Mr. Breivik. Naim Alizadeh, 20, hit the vehicle as his friend, Alexander Roine, 24, screamed repeatedly: “You traitor! Get out of the car! Long live Norway!”

“I’m here to show that everyone hates him, and that he’s not a hero,” said Mr. Alizadeh, a McDonald’s employee who moved to Norway from Afghanistan at age 13. He said he had two friends on the island — one dead, one wounded.

“People want to see face-to-face the guy who did this,” said Bernt Almbakk, 31, a lawyer. “It’s very personal. This is a small country.” Rather than anger, Mr. Almbakk said, “it’s the sorrow and the feelings — it’s been a very hard weekend with a lot of tears.”

Harald Stanghelle, the political editor of the newspaper Aftenposten, said that “coming here is a way to participate.” Norway, he said, “is a country of grief and sorrow, trying to overcome a great shock. There’s a hope to participate and be together.”

At one point, there was clapping in the crowd. From the front of the courthouse came a newlywed couple. “It was a glimpse of normal life in this film of horror,” Mr. Stanghelle said.