Investigation manager in the Baneheia case: This is how they worked

The short version

• Investigation manager Ingebjørg Hansen testifies on Monday in the case against Jan Helge Andersen. He is charged with the murder of Lena Sløgedal Paulsen (10).
• Andersen has already been convicted of the murder of Stine Sofie Sørstrønen (8).
• After Viggo Kristiansen’s acquittal, the murder of Lena Sløgedal Paulsen remained unsolved.
• By finding old test tubes and microslides at Oslo University Hospital, results have been obtained.
• Difficulties in the investigation are caused by the destruction or handing over of seizures.

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Section leader of the homicide section in the Oslo police district, Ingebjørg Hansen, has led the investigation into the murders in Baneheia since 2021.

She testifies in court on Monday in the case against Jan Helge Andersen.

He is charged with having killed Lena Sløgedal Paulsen (10) in Baneheia on 19 May 2000. He has previously been convicted of having killed Stine Sofie Sørstrønen (8).

After Viggo Kristiansen was acquitted of the crimes in Baneheia in 2022, the murder of Sløgedal Paulsen has remained unsolved.

– When we started the investigation, we began by mapping the technical traces in the case. The mapping was to see if there was an opportunity to carry out new investigations, explains Hansen via video link.

She says that it was important for the members of the investigative team to challenge the two main hypotheses, which were that there was either one or two perpetrators.

– Having an awareness of hypothetical thinking has been an important factor. Because we know from experience that you unconsciously look for what speaks for, and not what speaks against, says Hansen.

You can find everything from VG about the Baneheia case here.

The Baneheia case explained

Server trouble

The section leader says that they asked for everything from the Agder police district, but were told that there were no seizures kept in the case. Then they asked that all backup servers from 2000 to the present day be reviewed.

But they had been replaced. The ICT department did not have access to the case file itself when the replacements were made. Only headings were available, not the content.

Also read: Jan Helge Andersen in court again: – Maintains his explanation

– They began to follow it, and happened to find some backup tapes or diskettes in a safe in a room that they actually no longer had. But there were creative souls who searched and found it. We have done a lot to try to restore it, but there we have had negative results, says Hansen.

In addition, the police found various ring binders with tips, survey forms and notes. They also found a map with sticky notes of witness observations.

– We also found a complete case document that the state attorney in Agder had, she adds.

Also read: Witness about Andersen in Baneheia: – Scouting for something

Found test tube

Clothes had been returned and washed, and there were thus no traces to be found on them.

Hansen says they contacted Oslo University Hospital and asked them to search freezers, cupboards and offices to see if more evidence was found.

– There we were told that they had some test tubes, which are scraps of cotton swabs or textiles. They found microslides, which are swabs secured on a glass plate, and also biopsies taken from the girls’ abdomens, she explains.

Reference samples were obtained from all men who could have contaminated the samples, and all samples were analysed.

– It was important for us to discover whether there could have been contamination, she says.

The knives

Investigation manager Hansen says she will not go into detail about what they have found about knives, all the while Kripos will present a report.

– What I can think of to mention is that we have gone through all the documents in the case, and that we see that it is mentioned that people have submitted or reported that they have submitted.

She says that there are five knives and two sheaths.

– It is both before and after the arrest in 2000. We cannot find that seizure reports or investigation reports have been written on these.

Also read: Expert on the interrogations: – Presented as a conclusion

Destroyed – or handed over

As Hansen sees it, it is mainly new DNA tests and traces from Oslo University Hospital that have given objective results in the new investigation.

– The reason why it has been difficult and that it has given us limitations in carrying out those investigations is simply that seizures have been destroyed or handed over. That it is not just to be found. When you don’t have it directly, it’s difficult, she explains in court.

Also read: Therefore, they believe Jan Helge Andersen was alone in the murders

Stains of an unknown substance were found on the clothes and on the skin of Sløgedal Paulsen and Sørstrønen. What it is, apart from the fact that it is probably from a petroleum-based product, has not yet been found out.

Comparisons have been made with all possible oils and fluids, condoms and cycling equipment, without success in identifying what it is.

Attempts have also been made to see if it could be from clothing.

Defense attorney Svein Holden says in court that they received a report from Kripos on Sunday, in which it had been investigated whether what was on the victims’ skin was polyamide or nylon.

The result was that the investigations “strongly suggest” that it did not contain any remains of this.

Hansen says that they have tried to find the importer of the clothes that the girls were wearing, in order to be able to carry out investigations in that way.

– If you don’t have what is made from the manufacturer, then it is extremely difficult. There will be a bit of a guessing competition, she says.

The first verdict:

Kristiansand city court sentenced Viggo Kristiansen to 21 years in prison for, among other things, the rape and murder of the two girls. Jan Helge Andersen was sentenced to 17 years in prison, and acquitted of the murder of Lena Sløgedal Paulsen.

The appeal case:

Viggo Kristiansen and Jan Helge Andersen both appealed the verdict. Kristiansen because he pleaded not guilty, while Andersen appealed the sentencing. The Court of Appeal upheld the verdict against Kristiansen, and gave Andersen a two-year longer sentence. They both appealed to the Supreme Court. Kristiansen’s case was not processed, while Andersen’s was rejected. The sentence of 19 years’ imprisonment was upheld.

The reopening:

Kristiansen maintained his innocence throughout and petitioned for the case to be reopened several times. On 18 February 2021, the Re-admission Commission decided that the case should be looked at again. Kristiansen was released from Ila prison on 1 June 2021, after 21 years behind bars.

New investigation:

It is decided that the Oslo police district will carry out the new investigation. Andersen is charged in the new Baneheia investigation, for the murder of Lena Sløgedal Paulsen (10), for which he had previously been acquitted.

Acquittal:

Attorney General Jørn Sigurd Maurud apologized most strongly to Viggo Kristiansen when he presented the Attorney General’s recommendation to the Borgarting Court of Appeal in October 2022. The result of the new investigation was that Kristiansen must be acquitted. On 15 December, an acquittal was handed down in the Borgarting Court of Appeal. Viggo Kristiansen was thus innocently convicted of the murders in Baneheia.

New indictment:

On 12 January 2024, the Attorney General requested that charges be brought against Jan Helge Andersen for the murder of Lena Sløgedal Paulsen (10). On 16 March 2024, the trial against him begins in Sør-Rogaland district court.