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CRIME

Danish gang member in critical condition after Copenhagen shooting

A 20-year-old man is in critical condition after being shot in the Tingbjerg district of Copenhagen in the early hours of Friday.

Danish gang member in critical condition after Copenhagen shooting
Photo: Jens Dresling/Polfoto/Ritzau

An overturned car was found by police responding to the incident at the cross between the Åkandevej and Ruten roads at 2:30am, police deputy inspector Dannie Rise confirmed.

“One person who was shot was sitting in the car,” Rise said.

The inspector declined to confirm where the man had been hit or how many times, but his condition was reported as ‘critical’ on Friday morning.

He is known to police in connection with Copenhagen’s ongoing gang conflict, which the shooting is also suspected as being connected to, reports Ritzau.

Police have not made any arrests in connection with the incident at the time of writing.

The suspected shooters may have fled from the scene in a white Audi that was later found aflame in a parking lot in the town of Taastrup just outside Copenhagen.

“It is common knowledge that they [gang members, ed.] drive away and set their cars on fire after shootings. It is too early to say whether the two things are connected in this case,” Rise said.

Police were carrying out forensic investigations and interviewing witnesses on Friday morning.

Security camera footage may also help with police investigation of the crime.

“We must also take care of the victim’s relatives,” Rise said.

The 20-year-old is currently in intensive care at Copenhagen’s Rigshospitalet, where police are also present – due in part to concerns for the man’s safety.

READ ALSO: Nørrebro residents 'living in fear' after one killed, two wounded in shooting

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.

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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