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Joachim Posener a free man

After almost ten years on the run Joachim Posener is finally a free man. Posener disappeared from Sweden in the wake of the so-called Trustor affair in 1997 but the time limit for his prosecution has now expired.

Published: 13 July 2007 08:20 CEST

Posener was thought to have escaped with 46 million of the 600 million kronor ($89 million) stolen from investment company Trustor in 1997. An international warrant for his arrest was issued the same year.

“The arrest order has been lifted as the limitation period for prosecution has expired,” prosecutor Bernt Berger told Aftonbladet.

The Trustor affair began after British businessman Lord Moyne bought the majority stake in Trustor. Trustor’s own money was illegally used to finance the purchase. Shortly afterwards, it became clear that the company had been subject to a major fraud.

Lord Moyne, a writer and son of the well-known British aristocrat Diana Mitford, was cleared of any wrongdoing. Two other men, Thomas Jisander and Peter Mattsson were convicted in 2001 but subsequently freed on appeal.

In 2004, Posener was ordered by a court to pay back 125 million kronor to Trustor. The case was tried in his absence, and attempts to find out where he was hiding were unsuccessful.

Posener’s lawyer, Leif Gustafsson, has long maintained contact with his client.

“The elapsing of the prosecution term means that he can no longer be charged for any crime, so in that respect he can return to Sweden if he wishes,” he told Aftonbladet.

Posener does however still owe 21 million kronor to the Swedish Enforcement Authority (Kronofogden).

Sweden's 'snippa' rape case to go to the High Court

Attorney General Petra Lundh criticised the appeals court for “a number of serious miscarriages of justice” in the way it dealt with the case.

The man had been sentenced to three years imprisonment in 2021 after the district court heard how he, in the prosecutor’s words, had “by sticking his hand inside the plaintiff’s shorts and underwear, holding his hand on the the girl’s ‘snippa’ and having a finger inside her ‘snippa’, performed a sexual act” on her.

The girl’s testimony was found to be credible, in part because she had told her mother about the incident on their way home.

But in February this year, the appeals court threw out the conviction, arguing that it was unclear what the girl means by the word snippa, a word taught to Swedish children to refer to female genitalia.

Despite agreeing with the district court that the man had touched the girl between her legs and inserted his finger into her snippa, the court found that it could not be determined whether the girl was referring to her vulva or to her vagina.

If the man had inserted his finger into her vagina, that would have met the standard to be classified as rape. Because the girl said that his finger was “far in”, but could not state exactly how far, the appeals court found that it could not establish beyond doubt that the man had inserted his finger in her vagina and not her the vulva.

Because no lower-grade charges, such as sexual abuse or molestation, had been filed against the man, the appeals court could not consider other offences.

This week, the Attorney General lodged a complaint with the Supreme Court against the appeal court’s decision. Now the Swedish Supreme Court has given the appeals court until April 12 to explain its decision-making in the case.

The Supreme Court has not decided whether it will hear an appeal against the decision to clear the man of rape charges.

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