An old romance with Sweden’s top police leadership has been revealed, which also involves the commander of the defense forces, Micael Bydén. The love tangle is being investigated at the same time as the Swedish police were reprimanded for their poor handling of the Easter riots.
The news of the last few days about the top management of the Swedish police has reminded me of a TV soap series. There is a romance between two high-ranking police chiefs, which has involved jealousy, maybe even violence, and maybe hiring an incompetent.
Romance also has a connection with the Swedish Defense Forces, as one of the police chiefs, Linda Staaf, is the commander by Micael Bydén current partner. Bydén divorced his longtime wife this spring.
The other party to the romance was the police chief of the Stockholm region and the deputy chief of police Mats Löfving.
The ambiguities date back to 2015, when Löfving hired Staaf as head of intelligence in the Central Criminal Police, i.e. the current NOA police unit. Löfving was the top director of NOA at the time.
From the beginning of the week, Löfving was still the second highest in the Swedish police hierarchy. Now he has been transferred to other duties during the investigation.
At the moment, it is being investigated, first of all, whether Löfving was a stayer when he hired Staaf, i.e. whether they already had a relationship at the time of the selection.
There were many applicants for the place, and Staaf has no police training. He is a lawyer and economist by training.
What also needs to be clarified is whether Löfving made a mistake when he granted Staaf a weapon-carrying permit, even though those who prepared the case did not support it.
In 2020 and 2021, Löfving is suspected of having committed gross deprivation of liberty, harassment and violence towards Staaf. The announcements have not been made by Staaf itself, but have been the result of internal police discussions. In both cases, the investigation was stopped a few days after the report was made.
Now all this will be clarified again. Löfving has been transferred to other positions, Staaf is not moving to the Ministry of Justice’s police department as agreed, and now the police director general is also demanding answers From Anders Thornberg.
Bad flaws in taming riots
At the same time as the romance revelations, an external investigation into the actions of the police in connection with the so-called Easter riots was completed.
External liquidator (you switch to another service) by Gunnar Karlsson according to the police did not use all their special skills in controlling the riots. In addition, there were too few specially trained police officers on duty, which led to the fact that the police officers in the field lacked appropriate equipment.
As a result, 14 civilians and 300 police officers were injured in the riots in Stockholm, Örebro and Linköping.
Surveyor Karlsson presents a 35-item list of improvement suggestions. In his opinion, in similar situations, the police should use, for example, water cannons and high-powered acoustic sounds to make the rioters surrender. In addition, police officers need new types of shields for protection.