It is a strange story that is told in TV4’s review program Kalla Fakta in the beginning of 2017.
A tipper must have told about unspecified invoices sent to and paid for by the Swedish Property Agency, and expensive furniture and carpets must have disappeared without a trace from Royal Rosersberg Castle north of Stockholm, which is managed by the authority.
The tracks lead to a senior employee at the Swedish Property Agency, who, among other things, is suspected of having the authority pay for renovations of his private properties in Sweden and Finland.
According to the lawsuit against him and five others, who in various ways are suspected of being involved, these are suspected bribery offenses of just over SEK 7.6 million.
– There are six people who are charged. There is a main defendant who is charged with aggravated bribery, aggravated infidelity to a principal and aggravated bookkeeping offense. Then there are three contractors that the prosecutor claims have bribed the property manager, says Martin Bresman, deputy chief prosecutor at the National Unit against Corruption at the Public Prosecutor’s Office.
– A subordinate person at the property agency has also been prosecuted for aiding and abetting the crimes that the property manager is suspected of, he continues.
The furniture and carpets that have disappeared from Rosersberg Castle have also been seen in photographs from the chief employee’s house in Finland.
Among other things, a carpet made by the famous Swedish textile artist Märta Måås Fjätterström, worth approximately SEK 130,000, according to the indictment, was transported from Rosersberg Castle to the criminal suspect’s house.
The man lived for a period in a 500 square meter home in the castle.
Although the then CEO Björn Anderson must have known about the suspicions against the employee for two years, a police report should not have been made until October 2016 when TV4 began to sniff at the suspicions. For this he is charged with the rather unusual charge of misconduct.
– My client denies the crime. His attitude is that as soon as there has been a concrete reasonable suspicion that should be reported to the prosecution, he has also done what has been imposed on him in that part, says Frida Wallin, the former director general’s defender.
But is it really his job to judge what is enough to prosecute?
– That is the position that the court must make. Whether there has been an obligation to report to the prosecution earlier than at the moment it is actually done.
