Jens Lapidus - Never Fuck Up

The cop paused. Niklas was into the story.

“What happened?”

“He clocked me. If I’d been out with a male colleague, someone from my usual gang, for example, that never would’ve happened. But now, now this girl’s there and we can’t bring the asshole down the normal way. He was just too tough. So we used the batons. A lot. Until we got him down and could cuff him.”

Another pause. The cop swallowed. The gravity in his eyes gleamed again.

“And now they’re talking excessive force. You understand?”

Niklas was surprised at the turn. This felt private, intimate.

“Sure. It sounds fucked up. You were just doing your job.”

“This is society’s demise we’re talking about. If the police allow a bunch of violent old fuckers to go around and do whatever they want without us being able to fight back, then who’s going to stop them? If the police let a bunch of junkies deal drugs, who’s going to keep young people from dying prematurely? If the police can’t do anything about domestic violence, who’s going to make sure innocent women aren’t humiliated?”

Niklas nodded in time to the outpouring. The last thing the cop said cut deep. This was bigger than he’d thought—Sweden was in worse shape than he’d expected. If the police didn’t do the job, who would do it?

He felt drunk. The cop kept talking about society’s decline. Niklas’s thoughts galloped off. Again and again: if the cops don’t take care of it, then someone else has to.

Pensioner Assaulted with Batons—and Is Written Up by the Police

Two police officers almost beat a pensioner unconscious with batons. They then wrote him up for assault. A surveillance camera revealed how the police abused the 63-year-old man.

Aftonbladet has acquired the videotape from the store’s surveillance camera, which shows the police officers striking the pensioner Torsten Göransson at least ten times with their batons. The tape has also been given to the prosecutor.

The images were captured by a surveillance camera in a twenty-four-hour bodega in Aspudden in southern Stockholm.

“I hope they’re prosecuted. The police can’t be allowed to do this kind of thing,” said Torsten Göransson.

Victim was defending himself

Göransson had driven to the store from his apartment in Axelsberg to buy cigarettes. But the store clerk had refused to sell him cigarettes because the bills he had were too large.

“The ATM machine in Aspudden only had five-hundred-kronor bills,” Göransson explained. “Then the police showed up. They started beating me with batons. Over my entire body. I fought back as much as I could in self-defense.”

Göransson was arrested and brought to Skärholmen’s police station. He was not released until late that night.

Confiscated video footage

The following day, he went to Huddinge Hospital to have his injuries documented. Then he reported the police officers.

Meanwhile, the police officers had written up Göransson for assault.

Judging by the video footage that Aftonbladet acquired, Göransson’s version of events appears to be the accurate one.

The video footage clearly shows the two police officers using their batons to beat Göransson repeatedly over his entire body.

Journalists are the rats of humankind; fake-PC-dyke-Communist politicians are the cockroaches of the earth; and Internal Affairs police investigators are the bloodsuckers of the world. They live off of other people’s ruin. They thrive on betrayal: spit on loyalty, dignity, and respect. They let Sweden down. Let everyone down who is working for a better country.

Thomas knew that most cops who loved the more confrontational side of police work, those who didn’t just waste away behind a desk or pussy out as soon as the heat was turned up, would, at some point during their career, be subjected to internal investigations. That was just par for the course; the police department was forced to stage a little self-scrutiny from time to time to keep the politicians and the public happy. But sometimes it got serious—when the media got involved. When journalists who knew nothing about life on the street started to scrutinize, criticize, theorize. Hunt. The beaters were consequence-neutral—they didn’t give a damn what happened to the individual policemen whose heads they wanted on a spit. The media should be outlawed.

That’s why he wasn’t really too surprised when, three days after the articles appeared in Aftonbladet, Expressen, Metro, City , and probably a bunch of other newspapers, he saw the envelope in his mailbox at work. Internal Affairs (IA), Stockholm County. The message was brief.

Ai 1187-07. Chief Prosecutor Carl Holm has decided to commence a preliminary investigation against you and Cecilia Lindqvist in regards to serious professional misconduct, etc., on June 11 of this year on Hägerstensvägen. The Chief Prosecutor has given the undersigned Internal Affairs officer the right to charge you with suspicion of grave professional misconduct or, in the alternative, grave assault. According to the internal database, you are scheduled to work during the day on June 25, therefore, you are called to Internal Affairs headquarters on that day at 1300. You are also hereby informed of your right to have legal representation present at the interrogation.

His nose was pounding after the head butt from that fucking boozehound. He felt nauseated.

They were going to commence an investigation against him—and that could lead to suspension and transfer, or, worse, dismissal. It could lead to a charge of professional misconduct being brought against him. He remained standing in front of the mailbox, the letter in hand. Didn’t know what to do.

Read the verdict again. Saw the report number again. Ai 1197-07. Thought of all of those who’d been through this before him.

His phone rang.

“Hello, Andrén. This is Stig Adamsson. Are you in?”

After the incident at the morgue, Thomas didn’t trust Adamsson one bit. What did he want now? Could it have to do with the murder? More likely, it had to do with the Internal Affairs investigation that he’d just found out about. He responded, “I just got in.”

“Great. You think you could come by my office? The sooner the better.”

Six colleagues were standing around the coffee machine in the hall. They greeted him. Everyone knew. He could tell. He could see right away which ones were on his side. A discreet nod, a wink, a wave. But two of them stared straight through him—there were quislings among the patrol officers too. Thomas made a point of greeting the four who were his friends.

The door to Adamsson’s room was closed. According to police etiquette, that meant you were expected to close it after you when you went inside.

Thomas knocked. Heard a quiet “Come in” from inside.

Adamsson was sitting in front of his computer with his back to the door. A tired, old ballbuster. The unit chief turned around.

“Hey, Andrén. Have a seat.”

Thomas pulled out the visitor’s chair and sat down. He was still holding the letter from IA in his hand. Stig Adamsson looked at it.

“This is really unfortunate.”

Thomas nodded. Could he trust Adamsson?

“So, I’m guessing everyone already knows?”

“Well, you know how it is. Talk spreads faster than wildfire around here. But I heard it by the formal route. They made this a rush job and everything, sent it straight to the prosecutor. They’re dragging the girl into it too, Lindqvist.”