The case of the Swedish school gunman who police won't name

Yahoo

06-02-2025

In the low-level buildings of Campus Risbergska in Orebro, a 35-year-old man stalked the corridors looking for his targets.
He chose to spare some from death. Others were shot with his high-calibre hunting weapon. But three days after Sweden's worst mass shooting, the names of many of the victims have still not been made public. Nor has the official identity of the killer, who later shot himself.
Police and local authorities have also been reluctant, so far, to provide a suspected motive. However, there are clues that the gunman may have targeted migrants – something likely to inflame growing tensions in a country growing more Right-wing.
The killings took place at a large learning centre popular with non-Swedish residents who want to integrate. Mandatory language tests were proposed recently in Sweden by a Right-leaning government that has begun to take a hard line on migration.
In a blurry video showing the attack unfolding a voice can be heard between the shots, shouting in Swedish: 'You must leave Europe.'
Among the victims identified locally on Thursday were a number of Syrians who had come to Sweden as refugees, and a Bosnian. Bojan Sosic, the Bosnian ambassador, said he 'found it odd' that police were 'withholding information that pertains to foreign citizens'.
Others echoed his sentiments. Iuri Baptista, a student at the Campus Risbergska and an immigrant, said he was frustrated and that the withholding of information had made him fearful for his life in Sweden.
He said: 'It affected me, in a sense, on an unconscious level. If I go to the supermarket, should I think: 'You are a racist? Did you vote for the [Right-wing] Swedish Democrats? Would you have killed me if you had the opportunity? Are you treating me like this because I'm not Swedish?''
The question of migration is high on Sweden's agenda. The anti-immigration, nationalist Sweden Democrats were the second-largest party in the 2022 election, and ended up propping up the government.
The popularity of the conservative bloc grew in the aftermath of the 2015 migration crisis and rising gang violence.
The current government has prioritised limiting migration to the country by tightening migration laws and supporting strict citizenship laws. Since then, it has floated controversial policies, such as one forcing public sector workers to report undocumented people to authorities.
Last week Salwan Momika, an anti-Islam activist who publicly burned a Koran in Sweden, was shot dead at a flat outside Stockholm as he made a live broadcast on TikTok.
School attacks with deadly outcomes are rare in Sweden. Until Tuesday, the 2015 sword attack on a school in Trollhattan was the deadliest, with a 21-year-old man wearing a mask and a helmet killing three people. The attacker was shot dead by police, who said his attack was a hate crime inspired by xenophobia.
Asa Erlandsson, a reporter with the Swedish daily Dagens Nyheter, who wrote a book about the Trollhattan attack, said that until police clarified the reason behind the Orebro shootings it would be hard to determine the gunman's motive.
However, Erlandsson noted there were some similarities between the two events. 'A person with significant social difficulties, who has been unemployed for a long time, who is described as deeply lonely, and who appears to have been suicidal,' she said.
While the authorities remain tight-lipped, media in Sweden have identified the gunman as 35-year-old Rickard Andersson, who had three weapons with him and had a licence for four guns. The police found 10 empty magazines and unused ammunition.
Photos and elements of biography began circulating, describing him as a closed person who had difficulties studying at primary school and was unemployed at the time of his death.
Ardavan Khoshnood, a researcher in criminology from Lund University, said police had been slow to present information to the public.
'I believe that the reason for that is the magnitude of the attack,' he added. 'I believe that the reason why the police have been a little slow with giving out information is that they have had problems with identifying the victims, as well as really being sure that the individual they have found dead also is the offender.
'This is a very new thing for Sweden. We have never had this before.' He concluded that the perpetrator had planned the attack in advance after going through a 'radicalisation process', and may have been mentally unwell.
The silence from the authorities may remind some of the aftermath of the Southport killings in Britain, which triggered riots. But, as in Britain, there appear to be good reasons for the lack of public information.
Some of the victims in Sweden, for example, have not been identified, in part because of severe injuries and a fire that appeared to have started by the gunman.
Ioannis Ioannidis, a surgeon at Orebro University Hospital, told Nerikes Allehanda, a local newspaper, that some survivors suffered severe injuries, probably caused by hunting ammunition fired from a high-velocity weapon.
'The injuries are extensive even if the bullet does not hit the heart, liver or other major organs. You can be hit in an arm or leg and then bleed to death due to the extensive soft tissue damage,' he said.
Families have been gathering in the car park across the road of the campus to lay flowers, light candles and observe a minute of silence in memory of the victims of the tragedy. With them last Wednesday were King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden and Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson.
Synthia, a resident who visited the memorial last Tuesday, said the attack had made her feel sad and angry. She added: 'It's scary that something like this has happened so close to my home.'
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