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CRIME

No injuries after shooting near Aarhus market

The latest in a string of shooting incidents linked to organised crime gangs in Aarhus took place outside a shopping centre in broad daylight.

Published: 26 June 2017 13:20 CEST
No injuries after shooting near Aarhus market
Photo: Iris/Scanpix

Nobody was injured during the incident on Saturday evening at the Bazar Vest shopping centre on Edwin Rahrs Vej in the Brabrand district of Denmark’s second largest city.

East Jutland Police confirmed that several shots were fired near the Autobazaren car workshop near Bazar Vest.

“The shooting is being considered part of the ongoing gang conflict in Aarhus,” the police wrote in a press statement.

Nobody was hit by any of the shots, according to police.

The recent surge in organised crime-related violence in Aarhus has been linked to attempts by a Copenhagen-based gang known as ‘Loyal to Familia' to establish itself in the city.

A Brabrand-based group connected to Odense gang Black Army is attempting to prevent this, reports news agency Ritzau.

Shooting incidents have now plagued the area since the end of May, with dozen of arrests made.

The Gellerup neighbourhood, the area around Bazar Vest and Edwin Rahrs Vej, has a higher proportion of residents with immigrant backgrounds, higher unemployment and more people living under the poverty line than the overall average for Aarhus.

In 2016, the Jyllands-Posten newspaper reported a significant drop in crime rates in the neighbourhood.

READ ALSO: Denmark government grants gun amnesty in bid to reduce firearms

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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