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Man found dead in cell was accused of attempted sexual assault on 14-year-old: report

A man suspected of assaulting a 14-year-old girl in Denmark has been found dead in his prison cell, a local media has reported.

Published: 12 January 2018 16:01 CET

Man found dead in cell was accused of attempted sexual assault on 14-year-old: report

File photo: Henning Bagger/Scanpix Denmark

The man was found dead at a custodial facility in the southern town of Kolding on Friday morning.

Michael Weiss, Chief Superintendent with South East Jutland Police, confirmed the death to newspaper Randers Amtsavis.

According to the newspaper, the man in question is 37 years old and was remanded in custody on Thursday on suspicion of repeated attempted sexual assaults and other offences of a sexual nature relating to a girl under the legal age of consent.

Police did not however confirm that information.

“I will not comment on who the person in question is or what happened specifically. But we are investigating the case,” Weiss told Randers Amtsavis.

The 37-year-old was charged during preliminary hearings on Thursday with several cases of attempted rape of the girl, according to the newspaper.

He denied the charges and his preliminary detention was extended by four weeks. That detention was appealed to a higher court, according to the report.

'More Danes than ever' victims of digital crime

The number, released by the Danish Crime Prevention Council (Det Kriminalpræventive Råd) represents a significant increase on the previous year’s figure of 150,000.

Denmark’s justice ministry, national police and the University of Copenhagen all work with the Crime Prevention Council in an annual study which tracks the figure through contact with victims.

It represents a trend which is unlikely to slow down in coming years, according to the Council’s director Erik Christensen.

“Technological advances mean that there are more and more doors through which the criminals can walk in relation to scamming us normal members of the public,” he told newswire Ritzau.

The emergence of AI could make it even more likely that people become subjected to digital fraud attempts, he said.

The study found that online payments and abuse of payment information were most common types of fraud defined as IT-related.

But “contact fraud”, in which scammers contact targets by email, telephone or online, is also on the rise.

The figure for that specific type of crime went from 13,000 in 2022 to 47,000 last year.

READ ALSO: Danish courts issue warning over SMS scam

“Our best advice is that if each of us takes good time when we get an email or SMS… and check whether it is [actually] from the Tax Agency, municipality or bank,” Christensen said.

He also advised asking a family member or trusted person for a second opinion before answering any email or SMS, if in doubt.

In the most common type of IT crime – online transactions – some 85,000 people in Denmark last year lost money to scams such as fake web shops or trades with private individuals.

Another form – which hit 64,000 people – involves purchase of a fake or counterfeit item.

Some 76,000 people were victims of having their bank card details stolen and misused, some 19,000 more than in 2022.

“We must move away from shaming people who get scammed because anyone can fall victim to it. Even when you look at these numbers, we know there are also unreported cases,” Christensen said.

The Council director stressed the importance of victims of online fraud not feeling shame over what had happened.

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