Car worth SEK 300,000 seized • 19 cases since the law came into force on Friday
The law came into force on Friday and up to Monday morning 19 cases have been reported, the police’s national media center told TT.
Police around the country have, among other things, seized cars, motorcycles and cash. The cases are now taken over by prosecutors and decisions on whether the items should be confiscated or not are finally made after a court review.
In Greater Gothenburg alone, there are six cases linked to the law. According to the police, the first seizure concerned a Mercedes-Benz worth SEK 200,000–300,000.
“It shouldn’t pay to be a criminal and we have prepared and will be aggressive in testing the new law,” says Erika Gustavsson, group manager in Gothenburg city, in a comment.
Network peaks
You must particularly target leading people in the networks. They earn a lot of money but are difficult to access as they rarely commit the crimes themselves, according to Gustavsson – who also believes that the seizures can make it more difficult “to market gangster life where branded clothes and status items are displayed”.
“We now hope to counter that by taking attributes that we suspect come from criminal activity,” she says.
The new law means that people who, for example, have large amounts of cash, a property, watches or other luxury items but lack income in proportion to the property, and cannot explain where it comes from, can lose it.
Unlike before, the person does not need to be suspected of or convicted of a certain crime and the property does not need to be linked to any specific crime. If it is considered “clearly more likely” that the items stem from crime than that they do not, ownership shall pass to the state.
With the law behind them, the police and the government hope to be able to attack the criminal economy, which is estimated at 100-150 billion kroner annually.
Has been criticized
However, it has received severe criticism and has been pointed out as judicially insecure, as people can lose assets without being suspected of crime.
Minister of Justice Gunnar Strömmer (M) believes that the law meets legal certainty requirements. At the same time, it must be seen with new eyes, he said at a press conference last week.
We build something that is next to traditional models. All the guarantees that apply to legal certainty within the framework of criminal cases are undeniably not there when doing things outside of it.