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CRIME

Child witnessed double murder on Danish island

A 27-year-old was arrested on Sunday night for killing his 25-year-old ex-girlfriend and her 35-year-old new boyfriend, Funen Police said.

Published: 18 April 2016 09:11 CEST
Child witnessed double murder on Danish island
Police technicians at the scene of the crime. Photo: Frederik Racher/Scanpix
The female victim was pregnant with a child from her new relationship.
 
The double murder occurred when the suspect was dropping off a six-year-old child that he shared with his ex. According to police, the child saw the shooting deaths. 
 
“He pulled his ex-girlfriend out to the car and shot her. Then the new boyfriend came out of the house and the perpetrator drove into him with the vehicle and shot him,” police spokesman Henrik Justesen told news agency Ritzau. 
 
Justesen said that the six-year-old girl was sitting in the car throughout the entire incident. 
 
Neighbours called in the shooting to the police, who blocked off the Svendborg Sound Bridge, which connects the islands of Tåsinge and Funen. 
 
Funen Police said that a post-mortem investigation revealed that the 25-year-old woman was pregnant. 
 
The 27-year-old suspect was due to make a preliminary court appearance on Monday. 

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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