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CRIME

Murder suspect arrested in Somalia: report

The murder of 21-year-old Jonas Thomsen Sekyere led to national headlines and mass grief in November 2012. After an international manhunt, the primary suspect has reportedly been arrested.

Published: 8 July 2014 10:01 CEST
Murder suspect arrested in Somalia: report
Many turned out to pay their respects to Jonas Thomsen Sekyere after he was stabbed to death in a Kødbyen hotspot. File photo: Andreas Beck/Scanpix
The suspect in a high-profile 2012 Copenhagen murder has been apprehended in Somalia, the tabloid Ekstra Bladet has reported. 
 
The 29-year-old man is the primary suspect in the murder of 21-year-old legal student Jonas Thomsen Sekyere at a popular Copenhagen nightspot in November 2012.
 
Sekyere was stabbed in the heart inside the nightclub Bakken in Vesterbro’s meatpacking district, Kødbyen.
 
The murder, which police believe was unprovoked, caused an outpouring of sympathy from city residents. 
 
Hundreds paid tribute to the victim outside of the nightclub and over 2,000 attended the young man’s funeral in Assistens Kirkegård in Nørrebro. 
 
Shortly after the murder, Copenhagen Police arrested and released three young men suspected of being involved in the stabbing. Police then issued an international arrest warrant for the 29-year-old primary suspect.
 
Ekstra Bladet’s sources within Somalia confirmed that the man was arrested. 
 
“I have visited him in jail,” the man’s cousin told the tabloid. “He is doing fine and is just thinking about his wife and two children in Denmark.”
 
Copenhagen Police have yet to confirm any developments in the case.
 
“I have absolutely no comment on the [new] information,” homicide detective Jens Møller told Ekstra Bladet. 

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CRIME

Danish government backs removing children from gang-connected families

Denmark’s government wants authorities to be able to move children out of families in which parents are gang members and is likely to formalise the measure in parliament.

Published: 9 April 2024 13:38 CEST
Danish government backs removing children from gang-connected families

The justice spokesperson with senior coalition partner the Social Democrats, Bjørn Brandenborg, told regional media TV2 Fyn that he wants authorities to have the power to remove children from their families in certain circumstances where the parents are gang members.

Brandenborg’s comments came on Monday, after Odense Municipality said it had spent 226 million kroner since 2009 on social services for eight specific families with gang connections.

“There is simply a need for us to give the authorities full backing and power to forcibly remove children early so we break the food chain and the children don’t become part of gang circles,” he said.

The measure will be voted on in parliament “within a few weeks”, he said.

An earlier agreement on anti-gang crime measures, which was announced by the government last November, includes provisions for measures of this nature, Brandenborg later confirmed to newswire Ritzau.

“Information [confirming] that close family members of a child or young person have been convicted for gang crime must be included as a significant and element in the municipality’s assessment” of whether an intervention is justified, the agreement states according to Ritzau.

The relevant part of November’s political agreement is expected to be voted on in parliament this month.

READ ALSO: Denmark cracks down on gang crime with extensive new agreement

Last year, Justice Minister Peter Hummelgaard told political media Altinget that family relations to a gang member could be a parameter used by authorities when assessing whether a child should be forcibly removed from parents.

In the May 2023 interview, Hummelgaard called the measure a “hard and far-reaching measure”.

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