Jakob Holmberg, a prosecutor in the case, claims the sentence itself is far too short considering the nature of the attack, and should be taken up in the court of appeals.

“I have made up my mind to appeal, with specific regard to the sentencing,” he told the TT news agency.

The 52-year-old professor was sentenced Tuesday to five years in prison for aggravated assault and was also ordered to pay his 32-year-old wife 96,900 kronor ($13,800) in compensation for the attack.

However, Holmberg had been aiming for a sentence of eight years.

Holmberg claims that the motive behind the attack, which the professor claimed was so his wife “would never kiss another man again,” should be worthy of a harsher punishment.

The prosecutor also hopes a review from a higher court will help contribute to the establishment of legal precedent regarding such cases in the future.

“For the most part, there is a lack of comparable precedent. This is a very new classification of crime which has only been around for two years and needs to be tested in a higher court,” he said.

The 52-year-old man, who is a respected researcher at the Karolinska Institute north of Stockholm, attacked his wife in May at their home south of the city.

In a fit of jealousy over suspicions that his wife was seeing another man, the academic straddled his wife while she was sleeping and sliced off her lower lip with a scalpel.

“I’m going to see to it that you can never kiss again. I’ll get four years in prison, you’ll get a life sentence,” he told his wife as he cut off her lip, according to statements given to police.

The professor’s lawyer was unable to be reached for comment, being currently on holiday.

TT/The Local/og

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