The increase occurred at the same rate as the record number of people without identity documents came to Sweden last year.
– There will be more and more common. It will be very many people from countries where they may not have a reliable census, says My Hedstrom, bureau chief of the Prosecution Legal.
The vast majority of asylum seekers, and especially the group of young unaccompanied, has no reliable identity documents when they come to Sweden, while very few medical age assessments have been made in recent years.
Under the My Hedstrom has been the large number of people with unknown identity led to it has become more common in criminal cases where the perpetrator’s age is unknown and he wants to be seen as a child. Any compilation of the number of cases is not available but the prosecutor’s office, the increase marked clearly, according to prosecutor Helena Wigilius who worked on the issue at the Development Centre in Stockholm.
More and more prosecutors in touch with questions about the age of criminal suspects and especially unclear about whether the suspect is 15 years of criminal responsibility is something that has come up since last year. Echo has spoken with police who also noticed the increase, which complicates the work of the police because age controls how they may act against the suspects.
– We have seen that there is ongoing trials where there is the issue of very serious violent crime – murder and aggravated rape – where the perpetrators or the offender’s age has been a major issue, says My Hedstrom at the prosecutor’s office.
the age determines the sentence – younger equals a milder penalty and for 15 is not criminally responsible. The question of the offender’s age at issue in a pending case in which a person on an accommodation for unaccompanied children in Mölndal suspected of the murder of a woman who worked at HVB home in January this year.
Another example is child rape at an asylum accommodation in Alvesta in January. Two perpetrators who initially said they were 15 years were assessed rather be over 18 and was condemned by both the District Court and Court of Appeal to prison.
A fall further in time is a rape of a 13 year old girl in Mariestad. In June sentenced the offender to probation instead of jail because Skaraborg District Court could not rule out that he was under 18. Admittedly, shows his national passport that he’s 20, but according to his own admission pass is false and with the help of other documents he claims that he is under 18th
Through a medical age assessment can be closer to the truth, but does not establish a precise age. In criminal cases, it is primarily a study of teeth made of Forensic Medicine.
But the method has been cut by the National Board and today it is difficult for the courts to decide how much hard evidence a dental examination is to prove age. Uncertainty can lead to children convicted as adults but also to adults convicted as children, according to My Hedstrom.
– There is one legal uncertainty for the children who are actually children who are forced to be placed along with these adults, hardened criminals, people.
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