
Olof Palme murder: Sweden identifies man who killed PM in 1986 - Tomte
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-52991406
======
alkonaut
Headline is bad, it's rather "Case is closed because best suspect dead so
can't be followed up properly and there are no other suspects".

The mystery isn't "solved". The murderer isn't found. The word "identifies"
just means they mention the name of their current prime suspect, but even if
he were alive he likely wouldn't be convicted with the evidence that exists.
The case is merely "closed".

~~~
swinglock
Indeed. They just finally gave up.

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ACS_Solver
To summarize what was said during the press conference, and the prosecutorial
logic:

* The conclusion is essentially based on the information available at the time of the murder, and witness testimony from that time. The early investigation was a huge parade of mistakes, and no conclusive technical evidence could be obtained. The only substantial evidence the police has is two bullets, and they're so damaged that the Swedish forensics experts are not confident they could be matched to a weapon.

* Engström, the suspect, is known to have been near the murder scene at the time, and he has been conclusively shown to have lied about his actions. Among other things, he claimed to have provided first aid to Olof Palme, and to have spoken to his wife, both of which are false. Engström has also changed his story or provided contradicting testimony on other things. The early assessment was that he enjoyed the attention and wanted to inflate his own importance.

* The other witnesses generally describe a fleeing suspect whose description matches Engström's. He himself provided another description. None of the other witnesses remember Engström being at the scene in the minutes after the murder, contrary to his own statements.

* Engström had shooting experience, and was good friends with a weapons collector who had a large amount of firearms, including the type used in the murder.

* Attempts to find a forensic link failed, including in the recent months. The possible murder weapon owned by Engström's friend was inconclusive. DNA swabs from Engström's family could not be matched to anything. The police appear to have no DNA of the murderer from the crime scene.

* While the above points would be enough to arrest Engström and likely to charge him, this would likely not be enough evidence at a trial. Most importantly, there's no hard evidence that Engström had a weapon on him that night.

Interestingly, today even the PM who took over after Palme said that even he
had noticed the police incompetence within hours of the murder.

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progre
Watching the extended press conference now. No technical evidence points to
the identified man but as I understand very little technical evidence exists.
Lots of weird circumstances around this guy but overall this seems pretty
weak. The guy has promoted himself as a key whitness since the morning after
the murder, cunning strategy if he really did it. But he comes across as a bit
of a dunce in the interviews.

Edit: still watching. They just said that what they have now wouldn't hold
water in a court

Edit 2: the procecutor is getting ripped to pieces by the journalists now

~~~
kzrdude
It does not seem morally right to "convict" (in the media) this man
posthumously, based on no technical evidence. They are trying to put forward a
story as canon, and while that is good for the many (the police, and for
Sweden in general), the integrity of the judicial process and this man's right
to due process is sacrificed.

~~~
renewiltord
He's dead. Might as well throw a stick over the walls with Diogenes' corpse.

~~~
progre
His wife is still alive though

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siljon
Even though I have suspected Stig Engström for a while, and so many statements
that he been saying are incorrect compared to other witnesses. However, I
would argue this is still not enough to guarantee he is the murderer, but only
becoming the new prime suspect. But they can't get any further and they state
they should have suspected him earlier so they could press him when was alive.

Worst part is the media stated that they had found technical proof and more
and that should be released today and that is why they could decide he was the
murderer. But all we got is: That is not possible but the story doesn't match
up around Stig.

------
bjourne
The Palme murder was the largest unsolved crime mystery of my life time and it
ends like this? Definitely a very disappointing conclusion to the
investigation.

You couldn't even make it into a movie script because it would be so
unbelievable.

A 52 year old man that has no history of crime and who most considers somewhat
"feminine" sees Palme and decides to shoot him on a whim. With a revolver he
carries in his purse this night. Then he flees the scene but returns ten to
fifteen minutes later. None of the other dozen witnesses who are still there
and are being questioned by the police recognizes him and he blends in as just
another witness. Then instead of keeping a low profile he contacts the police
the following days and offer to testify. He also does several interviews in
the media over the years. Fourteen years later he dies in an apparent suicide
never having told anyone about the murder.

~~~
9nGQluzmnq3M
Only problem is, all the other possible suspects are even less likely:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Olof_Palme#Mu...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Olof_Palme#Murder_theories)

It's a Sherlock Holmes case: "Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever
remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth."

~~~
zosima
Christer Andersson, the man identified as GH in the wikipedia article is imho
just as likely, if not more so, compared to the Skandiaman.

1\. He lived in the vicinity of the murder scene

2\. He fits the description given by many witnesses extremly well.

3\. He owned a revolver of the same type as the murder weapon

4\. He claimed to have sold the revolver to some unknown person when asked.

5\. He had just been bankrupted, due to a change in tax policy, implemented by
Olof Palme's government

6\. The police had been called to his home some time before the murder,
because someone had heard a gunshot. He claimed then to have accidentally shot
at Olof Palme on television.

7\. He committed suicide in 2004 when police was knocking on his door.

8\. He claimed to have an alibi the evening of the murder, but his alibi did
not check out.

There is no smoking gun, but he is definitely just as likely a culprit as the
man currently pointed out.

------
panpanna
It's been a good week for the cold case unit in Sweden!

They also solved a very high profile double homicide after 16 years. This time
the killer was alive and has already confessed.

[https://www.thelocal.se/20200609/how-swedish-police-
tracked-...](https://www.thelocal.se/20200609/how-swedish-police-tracked-down-
double-murder-suspect-after-16-years-linkoping)

~~~
PedroBatista
Maybe they got too infatuated because this one fell short.

------
rixrax
Color me unconvinced. Two shots, Palme was dead before hitting the ground.
Murderer escaped through outdoor stairway and he/she or the gun was never seen
again.

Doesn’t sound like an incident by random Swede who decided to bring his .357
along to an evening stroll in downtown. Just like Oswald said - I’m just a
patsy.

~~~
INTPenis
Exactly. Also happened near an intersection with plenty of obscured getaways.

The police are trying to say that a middle aged, fat, graphics artist who
worked late until 23:19 on a friday evening in february ran into the prime
minister on his way to the tube, shot him twice, stuck around the crime scene
with the murder weapon and then went back to the office to have coffee with
the nightwatchman. They can confirm this from his punch card and the
nightwatchman.

He missed his last train home so had to wait it out at the office to take the
bus home later.

This reaching really just makes them look incompetent and silly.

------
kzrdude
I wonder if they didn't in passing mention (in the press conference) the
reason why the case is concluding now: In 2016, most of the old team went into
retirement and they recruited some new members.

FWIW, as of this writing, the press conference is still ongoing, started 1
hour and 30 mins ago.

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mschuster91
Interesting side fact: The Palme murder was long blamed on the Kurdish
organization PKK which got banned as a "terrorist" organization in Europe
around 1993/94 as a result.

To this day, the German government (one might assume on "request" of the
Turkish government) uses that ban to prosecute anything even remotely dealing
with Kurdish organizations - even things such as a depiction of Öcalan's face
are banned.

~~~
NotSammyHagar
I assume this the same Kurdish group that has been fighting Turkey for
decades, and in Iraq, the one the us allied with to fight Isis? Turkey of
course accuses them of all bad things. Maybe it was Turkey. The US never
really satisfactorily has gotten past our own JFK murder even though they
caught the person.

~~~
mschuster91
Yep, exactly this Kurdish group - although to be precise, the ISIS fighters
were the YPG/YPJ; these are loosely associated with the PKK which is still
enough for the German government to say PKK = YPG. Utterly ridiculous.

------
patrik1900
First of all: If Stig did it, there would have to have been more than one
person involved in the murder. There's not a snowball's chance in hell that
Stig could know Palme was passing by otherwise. And there's no way he could
have killed Palme on the spur of the moment. (Too many reason to go into
here.)

It all falls down on this simple fact. What an amazing embarrassment for the
Swedish investigators.

Now, if there was more than one person involved (a conspiracy), does anyone
really believe the other(s) would let Stig keep on drawing attention to
himself? He would be dead in short order.

------
filleokus
I was personally hoping for more direct evidence. Considering the amount of
time that have passed since the murder, my thought was always that the most
likely evidence to ever surface was some intelligence records from old South
African or Soviet archives.

After almost 35 years it would be next to impossible to find some gunman
working alone guilty of it in court, even if he admitted to it. I'm guessing
there's very little non-public info he could divulge to prove he was there or
any physical evidence he could provide to prove his own guilt.

The best (and perhaps only) bet for physical evidence would probably be
bullets with the same led isotope composition, and a plausible gun...

------
patrik1900
Farsical. Just because the investigators don't have the actual perpetrator(s)
on the radar it doesn't follow that the only one they haven't managed to look
more closely at is the perpetrator. They still need some actual evidence.
Being angry because Stig is more intelligent than the police, and told them
so, is not evidence.

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AndyMcConachie
I wonder how this relates to the information South Africa handed over in March
on the killing.

[https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jun/08/case-of-
sweden...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jun/08/case-of-sweden-
murdered-pm-1986-olof-palme-south-africa)

Maybe through that information they determined any South African leads were
dead ends.

------
pvaldes
So he is "identified" as a killer now because a journalist and police say
that. No weapon. No proofs. Throw a dice. Guilty.

And we were spending all this money on expensive judges, prosecutors and
lawyers, for thousands of years without a reason...

------
thomasfl
Most expensive criminal investigation ever comes to a final end. Too bad the
suspected killer died many years a go.

~~~
Shalle135
Maybe they can use their resources to something useful now instead of a 30 yr
old murder which may even been exceeding the prosecution time limit, depending
on the motive. Also everyone has known for the past 20 yrs that nobody is
gonna get convicted for it.

~~~
jpalomaki
Seems to be there are no such time limits for murder investigations in Sweden
[1].

[1]
[https://sverigesradio.se/sida/artikel.aspx?programid=2054&ar...](https://sverigesradio.se/sida/artikel.aspx?programid=2054&artikel=3417924)

~~~
panpanna
Interesting that Sweden changed the law _specifically_ for this murder.

