SANDNES (Nettavisen): On Tuesday, Viggo Kristiansen testified in the trial against his former best friend Jan Helge Andersen in Sør-Rogaland district court. Andersen is charged with the murder of 10-year-old Lena Sløgedal Paulsen in Baneheia in Kristiansand in 2000.
In the original Baneheia case, Kristiansen was sentenced to 21 years in custody for the murder and assault of Lena and Stine Sofie Sørstrønen (8). After serving 21 years as an innocent in prison, he was released on 1 June 2021 and in December 2022 he was acquitted in the Baneheia case.
Andersen denies criminal guilt.
Also read: Viggo Kristiansens in police questioning: – It has been bloody chaos
Facts about the Baneheia case
- Stine Sofie Sørstrønen (8) and Lena Sløgedal Paulsen (10) were raped and killed in Baneheia in Kristiansand on 19 May 2000. Two days later they were found.
- Viggo Kristiansen and Jan Helge Andersen were arrested in September of the same year, prosecuted and later sentenced to 21 years’ detention (10 years’ minimum) and 19 years’ imprisonment respectively for the rape and murder of the two girls.
- Andersen confessed and has today served his sentence. He was released on probation on December 22, 2015.
- Kristiansen has claimed that he is innocent. He had his criminal case reopened on 18 February this year.
- Since the verdict, several people have highlighted weaknesses in the evidence that convicts Viggo Kristiansen. In particular, findings and the analysis of partial DNA traces and elements from Kristiansen’s mobile phone at a base station that did not have coverage at the scene where the murders took place have been explained as exclusionary evidence.
- The Borgarting Court of Appeal will hear Kristiansen’s reopened case.
- The Oslo State Prosecutor’s Office must make a recommendation to the Attorney General as to whether a full trial should be carried out in the Court of Appeal or whether an acquittal should be handed down without a main hearing.
- Both Kristiansen and the next of kin have expressed that they want a new main negotiation.
- After Kristiansen had the criminal case reopened, he applied for release for the first time. The Borgarting Court of Appeal did not uphold him on 29 April 2021. Kristiansen appealed the decision.
- On 21 May, the appeals committee in the Supreme Court concluded that the case should be taken up for full consideration by five judges.
- State prosecutors Andreas Schei and Johan Øverberg state on 31 May 2021 that the prosecution supports Viggo Kristiansen’s appeal for release and requests that the issue of release be dealt with in writing.
- On 1 June, the Supreme Court’s appeals committee decided that Kristiansen should be released. Just before 11 p.m., he drove out the gates of Ila prison as a free man for the first time in almost 21 years.
- On 02.09.22, the Oslo State Prosecutor’s Office (OST) confirmed that the case has been fully investigated by the police and that they have sent a recommendation to the Attorney General.
- On Friday 21 October 2022, the Attorney General made it known that he will submit a request for an acquittal for Viggo Kristiansen in a court hearing where the case will be finally decided by verdict.
- It is the court that makes the final decision.
- On 13 December 2022, a simplified court hearing was held in the Borgarting Court of Appeal where the Kristiansen case was heard. This was a mere formality.
- On 15 December 2022, the final acquittal in the criminal case came.
- On 24 February 2023, the Attorney General decided that a request should be made to reopen the case against Jan Helge Andersen for the murder of Lena Sløgedal Paulsen. He was acquitted of this murder in the original case.
- 12 January 2024 The Attorney General decided that Andersen should be prosecuted for the murder of Lena Sløgedal Paulsen. Andersen still claims that Viggo Kristiansen participated in the murders and assaults of both victims in the Baneheia case.
- The trial against Jan Helge Andersen started on 16 April in Sør-Rogaland District Court, court location Sandnes.
SOURCES: NTB, Nettavisen
Viggo Kristiansen’s lawyer: – It’s sad
Kristiansen, for his part, has sued the state for a total of NOK 90 million for the judicial murder and its consequences. So far, he has been awarded 55 million.
Ahead of the trial, Kristiansen had urged the press not to take pictures of him. As a witness, he has no protection against this. All witnesses can be photographed, while an accused or accused person escapes this because the law protects them.
Large parts of the press present in Sandnes nevertheless took pictures of Kristiansen and his girlfriend, but mainly chose to publish pictures of the two from behind. Some other media published pictures with the faces of Kristiansen and his girlfriend.
Also read: Viggo Kristiansen received a parking fine when he testified in court
After the court day, the media got pepper.
– This is sad. He made a rather strong appeal through the press release sent out on Monday. Some media chose to respect it, there is a high press ethical standard, so those who chose to do so do not have to answer for the choices they have made, but Kristiansen was disappointed when he had made such a clear appeal, says top lawyer Brynjar Meling to a combined press.
He is counsel for Kristiansen in the case against Andersen.
HERE YOU CAN SEE THE VIDEO AND LISTEN TO THE RECORDING FROM THE CONVERSATION WITH JAN HELGE ANDERSEN
– Kristiansen has a strong need to start over in life
The press release sent out by Meling states, among other things:
“On behalf of Kristiansen, the press would therefore be advised to respect his urgent wish not to be photographed. Kristiansen has a strong need to start over in life and put this case behind him. He has never sought attention and never asked to be part of this case and one would think that the press would understand that 24 years in the media spotlight is sufficient.”
It also appears from the press release that Kristiansen understands that there is great public interest in his diploma. But he concludes with a strong appeal:
“Based on this, the press is requested to take their share of the responsibility for the case being carried out in the most gentle way possible for Kristiansen, by failing to photograph and publish pictures of him in connection with the case.”
Also read: This is how Jan Helge Andersen explains the abuse images that were found on the PC after secret searches
Nettavisen is among the media that have published pictures of Kristiansen and his girlfriend from behind and without naming her.
Why is it important for him not to be pictured?
– He has a strong desire to get his life back, his face back and to be a completely ordinary man on the street. So maybe it’s ambitious, but that’s what he’s working for. Then he does not want to contribute with images in the media that mean he is constantly recognised, says Meling.
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Nettavisen has mainly taken into account Viggo Kristiansen’s wish that he not be pictured in connection with his status as a witness in the case. However, we have used one photo in the coverage on Tuesday. There, Kristiansen is seen from a distance and from behind, to show his presence as a witness in court.
The girlfriend posts pictures on social media
He also points out that there can always be reasons and arguments for Kristiansen to be photographed and that Kristiansen wants to work in the garden and in the house and just be anonymous like everyone else.
– Then getting his face back is something important to him, says the top lawyer.
Kristiansen has been pictured several times in public and his girlfriend has also posted pictures of the two of them on social media. After he was acquitted in the Baneheia case in December 2022, he agreed that TV 2 could take pictures of him in a bakery. In September 2023, he also had his picture taken when the award-winning author Bjørn Olav Jahr received an award from Fritt Ord for his work on Kristiansen’s fight to have the case reopened.
Also read: This is how Jan Helge Andersen was grilled in questioning about Viggo Kristiansen
– His girlfriend posts pictures of the two of them on social media, what will be the big difference?
– The big difference is that his girlfriend posts pictures on social media, it’s a private thing.
– But you pointed this out with recognition.
– Yes, what people do in social media is something else. This is in connection with the trial in Baneheia, replies Meling.
Hit back against Jan Helge Andersen
Kristiansen used the very first part of his statement in court to send a jab at the media:
– Of course, there are some nerves involved. It is of course connected to the media. The way they are disrespectful according to me as a witness. I have known the media up close and there are probably a lot of nerves connected to that. I will try to explain myself as best I can, he said from the witness box.
When Kristiansen explained himself about the actual case against Andersen, among other things, he distanced himself from the fact that he should have had a leadership role for Andersen. Andersen, for his part, has named Kristiansen as the main man behind the murders. Andersen himself served 15 years in prison for the murder of eight-year-old Stine Sofie Sørstrønen. He was arrested on 13 September 2000 and released on parole on 22 December 2015.
– I do not feel that I have dominated him or decided for him in any way. But he was perhaps a bit more shy according to other people than I was, Kristiansen said in court.
Read Nettavisen’s live report from the fifth day of the trial here.
Kristiansen also refuted Andersen’s claims that the two must have camped together in Baneheia, and that they were looking for tent sites on the night the girls were killed.
– Most people who were born and raised on Eg are aware that it is not allowed to sleep in a tent up there. He almost has to answer for himself for the claims he makes. It cannot come from my side.
– Never processed it
During what marked the start of the trial’s second week, there were many questions that Andersen could not answer. He explained that he did not know the answers.
The experts who have assessed Jan Helge Andersen’s mental health, however, questioned whether his memory and other cognitive abilities were as poor as Andersen has claimed.
The experts showed, among other things, that Andersen has had very good results in a memory test, and that he also does not appear to have a bad memory in the conversations they have had with him.
Andersen was also asked by the legal aid lawyer for the bereaved parents, Audun Beckstrøm, whether he has tried to suppress the events in Baneheia.
– Yes, no, I have never processed it. When this comes into my head, I turn on music, put the plugs in my head and get my thoughts elsewhere, said Andersen, who says he does not have a mental illness today.
He also said that he has had nightmares about the events in Baneheia.
– I have had nightmares about this for many years, but it has started to become very rare,
Told about the time before the arrest
In September 2000, around three months after the murder, Jan Helge Andersen was arrested.
During this period, Andersen was at work. He was asked about this by expert Terje Tørrissen in court.
– What was it like to be at work? What feelings did you have during the three months, Tørrissen asked.
– I don’t know what I felt. I would think it was good to get away from the area by working as much as possible, answered Andersen.
– But being at work in a situation where you know what happened and that no one was arrested: How was it emotionally?
– I do not know. I assume that throwing yourself into work takes your mind off things, answers Andersen.
– But does it take so little to get out of your mind after two rapes and two murders?
– I don’t know, answered Andersen.
Tags: Baneheia case Jan Helge Andersen Reacting press pictures Viggo Kristiansen girlfriend
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