Draft:Sten-Erik Eriksson

Sten-Erik Eriksson (1931—2017) was a Swedish murderer and pedophile.

Eriksson suffered from a serious mental disorder and had a lack of insight into his problems. On march 22, 1967, he lured an eight-year-old boy to a deserted house in Lidingö municipality, Stockholm, where he raped and strangled the boy to death. Just over a week later, Eriksson was arrested and confessed to the crime.

Because of his disability, he was not sentenced to prison, but rather to forensic psychiatric care. Eriksson was treated in forensic psychiatric care until his death in 2017.

Life before the murder

Early life

Eriksson grew up with his mother in Stockholm.

When he was eight years old, he was admitted into Hammarbo school home in Tungelsta, where thirty-two boys and zero girls attended. Eriksson spent five years there and being exposed to sexual things at the school home was nothing unusual for him. According to Eriksson, there should "never have been any adult who noticed anything, or wanted to notice". ("aldrig varit någon vuxen som märkte något, eller ville märka".)

In and out of mental hospitals

He came home to his mother when he was thirteen years old, but his time with her was short-lived. A year later, Eriksson was admitted to a mental hospital in Ulleråker. He stayed there until he was seventeen years old. At the hospital, the boys were kept to themselves, and about a year later, his interest in boys really began to blossom.

After dispersing at two different workplaces, Eriksson was admitted into the Salberga mental hospital in Sala.

At the age of twenty-one, the doctors at Salberga decided that Eriksson should be forcibly sterilized. Later in life, however, he and few others received damages from the state for the procedure. Eriksson spent the 175.000 SEK he received on watches, clothes and to give back to his mother.

On January 19, 1957, he was discharged after spending eight years at Salberga. He was twenty-six years old at the time.

His freedom was not long-lasting, however, as he was convicted of fornication and assault on underage boys the following year. Eriksson was sent back to Salberga on June 24, 1958, and remained there until November 1, 1966, when he was discharged on a trial basis and was allowed to live in a home run by the Swedish Salvation Army.

The murder & the verdict

The murder

On March 22, 1967, Eriksson lured an eight-year-old boy, after he helped the boy pump his bicycle, to a nearby dilapidated abandoned house in Lidingö. Eriksson had told the boy that the deserted house was his summer cottage. There he both raped and strangled the boy to death with his jacket laces. According to Eriksson himself, he told the boy that he was gonna tie a bow, but instead he strangled the boy to death. It is unclear whether he did this before or after the rape.

According to other sources, the boy started screaming. Eriksson, who was then seized by panic, made the quick decision to strangle the boy to death to stop the screaming.

Eriksson then took the boy's corpse and hid it away in a hollow tree trunk.

Home and back

After the murder, Eriksson made a package of his clothes and buried them at Värtahamnen to avoid his fingerprints being found. When he had successully buried the package, he want back to his mother in Blackeberg, where Easter dinner was served.

Afterwards, Eriksson returned to the crime scene where he lit a cigarette. While he was sitting and smoking, the police showed up and arrested him.

Verdict

Sten-Erik Eriksson was convicted of murder and aggravated fornication with a minor. He was handed over to forensic psychiatric care with a special transcript test. It was here that it was discovered that Eriksson was suffering from a serious mental disorder and therefore he was sentenced to closed forensic psychiatric care instead of prison.

Life after the murder

Eriksson often expressed in public how he did not consider himself a danger to society and requested his release on several occasions. The last one was in Januari 2017, but his discharge request was rejected as the eighty-five-year-old was still considered dangerous by the court. The Administrative Court's final decision was based on a medical opinion that stated, among other things, that Eriksson's risk of reoffending with violence or sexual offenses was still considered high if treatment were to be discontinued. .

Until the start of 2016, he had been tried forty-two times by the County Court in Kronobergs County.

According to the doctors, Eriksson showed symptoms of a particular schizophrenic disorder that was most evident in his youth. The symptoms also indicated that the pedophilia persisted until his death despite the long treatment.

Sten-Erik Eriksson remained in forensic psychiatric care until his death in 2017, making him the person who has spent the most time deprived of liberty, both in total and continuously; for a total of sixty-six years.

The escape attempts

1998

Eriksson was locked up in several forensic psychiatric clinics around the country and tried escaping several times. During one of the attempts, which took place in 1998, he managed to outrun two guards and escape during a supervised leave. Eriksson was being treated at S:t Sigfrids hostipal at this point in time.

A month and a half later he was arrested in Örnsköldsvik near some children.

2010

During a visit to a cemetary, Eriksson slipped under a hedge and then escaped in a taxi. His plan was to flee to Norway, but he was arrested by police on a train in Charlottenberg. It had been speculated about if the escape attempt was planned, and if Eriksson had an accomplice to help him go trough with the escape

Denmark

In an interview with Expressen, he expressed that he was keen to escape if he got "a real chance". The plan then was that instead of fleeing to Norway as he had intended to do before, Eriksson would flee to Denmark instead.

Interests

Gambling

During his time in forensic psychiatric care, Eriksson developed an intrerest in betting pools and once won 72.000 SEK together with a fellow patient.

Walks

It happened that he was allowed to go out for walks in the city, under the supervision of two staff members. Eriksson liked to drink hot chocolate in cafés, go for a haircut or pick up cans for his use of the deposit system.