The murder in Skogås in the Court of Appeal: the 16-year-old wants to be acquitted

Hearing in the Court of Appeal about the murder of the 15-year-old in Skogås

He is convicted of having shot a peer in the head inside a sushi restaurant in Skogås. But the boy has always denied any crime.

The case is now being taken up in the Court of Appeal.

– We have not received an answer to the relevant question, says lawyer Björn Sandin.

There is no murder weapon. No fingerprints. No witnesses have seen the now 16-year-old boy fire the fatal shot.

But the Södertörn district court still considered that the evidence was sufficient. In November, the young man was sentenced to four years of closed youth care for the murder of a 15-year-old in the center of Skogå in January 2023.

Another five people were convicted of involvement in the crime. All have appealed the verdict. On Monday, the deliberations began in Svea Court of Appeal.

The lawyer: Can’t get an answer

The 16-year-old has requested, via his lawyer Björn Sandin, that the higher instance should acquit him completely.

“Through the investigation in the case, it has not been proven that my client was guilty of murder and the serious weapons crime involved,” writes the attorney in his appeal.

After the negotiations in the district court, Sandin told Aftonbladet that several question marks remain.

– Who fired the fatal shot at the restaurant? Our view is that we do not get an answer to that through the evidence relied on by the prosecutor.

– There is nothing concrete that ties a perpetrator to the scene.

Showed wads of bills

Prosecutor Ida Arnell has built the case around messages and images found in the mobile phones of those involved.

Among them are some messages that the 16-year-old sent to a friend shortly after the fatal shooting.

“Pannan bro then his head fell straight down on the table. He died, or he will be disabled for the rest of his life,” the boy writes, among other things.

According to Björn Sandin, this does not prove that the convicted person is the murderer.

– It could be that he is describing something he has seen.

The preliminary investigation report also contains photos where the 16-year-old poses with wads of banknotes. The prosecutor believes that it is money that he received in payment for the shooting death.

– The investigation has shown that it could not have been someone else who carried out the murder, said district court judge Kian Amraée when the decision was handed down.

The murder was an act of revenge

The 15-year-old victim is believed to have been killed in retaliation for an attack on a relative of Foxtrot leader Rawa Majid.

At the end of December, a 27-year-old man was arrested who is suspected of having planned the murder. A survey carried out by Aftonbladet shows that he was one of 21 people whom the police considered to be “full members” of Foxtrot before the split.

The hearing in the Court of Appeal is scheduled to last until February 7.