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Mother ‘shut in dog crate and dropped in river’

A 34-year-old man in Norway has confessed that he put the dead body of his partner's mother into an iron dog cage and then dropped it into a nearby river, claiming that his partner had murdered her beforehand.

Published: 22 April 2015 08:46 CEST

Mother 'shut in dog crate and dropped in river'

The Skien River, where police found the cage and remains on Tuesday night. Photo: Skienselva.no

"I can confirm that my client has acknowledged complicity in transport," the man's lawyer, Tollef Skobba told Aftenposten newspaper on Wednesday.

Police divers on Tuesday night recovered the dog cage, along with the remains of Kari Grønnestad, who disappeared three years ago aged 59, after carrying out a search in the Skien river.

Kari Grønnestad, 59, disappeared without a trace three years ago. Iit was only on Sunday, when police were called out to the home of her 31-year-old daughter and her partner following a loud row, that he made his grisly accusation.

The woman was arrested on Sunday night along with her partner, who was released on Monday after a ruled that there was insufficient reason to keep him in custody.

The woman's lawyer, Bjorn Nærum, claims that she is surprised by the man's confession and denies having any involvement with her mother's disappearance.

Grønnestad's daughter was the last person to see her mother before she went missing in 2012.

She then went on to play a prominent role in the search efforts, releasing photos of her mother to the media and begging for clues as to her whereabouts. The search was closed after several months and police never suspected anything criminal had taken place.

“She has always been in despair that her mother has not been found after all these years,” Nærum told VG. “It’s an enormous burden for her to deal with the allegations that she has killed her mother. She strongly denies this.”

Norwegian police charge Olympic champion's father for domestic violence

Jakob Ingebrigtsen and two of his brothers, Henrik and Filip, who are also athletes, shocked Norway last October when they accused their father of being violent.

“We grew up with a very aggressive and authoritarian father, who used physical violence and threats as part of his upbringing,” the brothers wrote in an op-ed for newspaper VG. “We still feel a sense of discomfort and fear that we have felt since childhood,” they added.

Police opened a probe into the abuse claims and on Monday said prosecutors had decided to charge Gjert Ingebrigtsen, 58, with domestic violence against one of his children.

According to a source close to the case, the acts in question do not concern the trio of known athletes but another, younger child.

Over a period of four years, from 2018 to 2022, Gjert Ingebrigtsen allegedly manhandled, insulted, threatened and hit the child in the face with his hand or with a towel.

Responding to questions from AFP, Therese Braut Vage, who led the investigation, would not confirm this account.

Police said they had closed investigations into other events concerning the six other children in the home either due to a lack of evidence or, in one case, because the statute of limitations having expired.

Gjert, who coached Jakob until after the 2021 Olympics in Tokyo — where Jakob won the gold — has always denied the accusations against him.

“As far as the dismissed cases, we agree that there is no evidence to prove that Ingebrigtsen committed any wrongdoing,” his lawyer John Christian Elden told AFP on Monday.

“For the rest, Ingebrigtsen disputes the description of the facts on which the indictment is based — and he therefore does not admit his guilt,” he continued in an email.

Jakob Ingebrigtsen is the most successful of the three brothers, twice winning gold in the world championships 5000m in 2022 and 2023, as well as the Olympic 1500m gold.

The 23-year-old is also preparing for the Olympic Games in Paris this summer.

Henrik, 33, and Filip, 31, were European champions in the 1500m in 2012 and 2016 respectively.

After breaking with his sons, Gjert Ingebrigtsen shocked Norwegian athletics by becoming the trainer of another runner, Narve Gilje Nordas.

The Norwegian Olympic Committee has said that Gjert will not be granted accreditation for the Olympic Games in Paris this summer, as was the case at last year’s World Athletics Championships.

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