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Norway 14-year-old admits to murdering girl

A fourteen-year-old boy in Norway has admitted to killing a girl of the same age who was found dead in a river almost two weeks ago.

Published: 11 September 2015 21:19 CEST

Norway 14-year-old admits to murdering girl

Police on Thursday investigating the site where Alma Gabriela Knutsen's body was found. Photo: Tor Erik Schrøder / NTB scanpix

Police at first thought that Alma Gabriela Knutsen had drowned by accident when her body was found floating in the Søgneelva river near Kristiansand in Norway almost two weeks ago.

The body was discovered by kayakers out paddling.

As the police investigated, however, they found more and more technical evidence that pointed to foul play.

The girl's family suspected that Alma's death was not an accident from the start.

“They had a bad feeling about what had happened to her,” Terje Pedersen, an officer with the local police told Norway's Dagbladet newspaper.

Yesterday, a 14-year-old boy admitted to police that he had killed the the young girl and that the two were “young people who knew each other”.

“Based on the information the boy has given in questioning, we consider it to be a murder,” Terje Kaddeberg Skaar, a prosecutor with the Agder police told national broadcaster NRK.

Both of the young people were from the small town of Søgne with a population of about 11, 000.

“They were the same age, and youth circles are small here,” Pedersen told Dagbladet.

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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