In six months, the Bergen police eliminated nearly 2,000 old cases. One of them concerned one of the largest bankruptcies in Norway. – E24

As of early 2018, nearly 5,500 cases in the West Police District had been on hold for more than three months. Little or nothing was done with them. More than 1,200 had been in bed for more than a year.

One of the cases in the stack concerned Heidrun founder Kjetil Rasmussen and his business operations, which BT / E24 spoke about this weekend.

Suspended without investigation

Rasmussen was reviewed by the trustee in one of Heidrun’s bankruptcies, who believed that not everything had turned out according to the book at the company where Rasmussen had been chairman of the board and CEO. But the conditions that the housing manager would have investigated were never investigated. The case was dropped.

– The background was the lack of case-processing capacity in the police district, and in the economy, environment and crime investigation section in particular, writes police lawyer Anders Hoff in an email to BT / E24.

It was he who recommended closing, in the fall of 2018.

– No questioning has been conducted in the case, or investigative steps of particular importance have been taken, writes Hoff.

Open for more closings

During this period, the Western Police District was in full swing with a shakeup, among other things, on how economic crimes should be investigated. But they had a big problem: the pile of thousands of old cases.

They didn’t have enough investigators or police attorneys to check the pile.

Finally, the police chief took action, under pressure from the prosecutor. A separate group of investigators and lawyers were tasked with reviewing and cleaning up, either clearing up the cases or closing them.

On June 1, 2018, the prosecutor also facilitated the closing of cases for six months than usual.

The main problems were in the ecological section

In the financial section, the situation was particularly bad. While the clean-up work in most of the police district focused primarily on minor cases, the green people also had large and severe case complexes and collected dust.

They did their own review, with the help of Økokrim.

– In our field, they worked a little harder, says Sylvia Myklebust, who is the head of the prosecution section in the department of organized crime, economic and environmental affairs.

They had especially struggled with the lack of law enforcement attorneys who could handle the often complex cases.

Myklebust says larger boxes also fell off during the cleanup operation.

– The evidence had weakened, so we decided that there was no basis here to initiate an investigation, even though we had originally decided that it should be investigated, he says.

“Lack of capacity to process cases”

On Saturday, Bergens Tidende and E24 told the story of Heidrun’s founders, Kjetil Rasmussen and Dag Frode Herfindal.

Kjetil Rasmussen was sued for, among other things, property impairment by attorney Alf-Erik Jentoft, who was the administrator after one of Heidrun’s bankruptcies.

Rasmussen is one of those who can be linked to the majority of companies that have gone bankrupt in this country in recent years.

Now Rasmussen and Herfindal have been quarantined for bankruptcy.

Rasmussen and Herfindal have rejected the allegations made in the BT case and believe that they have not committed any criminal offenses.

– There has never been any ulterior motive to deceive anyone, Herfindal told BT / E24.

Attorney Jentoft’s report against Rasmussen was without consequences.

In the fall of 2018, the prosecution dismissed the case, just a year after the police put it on their table, in reference to “lack of capacity to process cases.”

– This is part of the action that was carried out in the police district to fight for the control of arrears, writes the prosecutor Eirik Stolt-Nielsen in an email to BT.

“Inadequate quality”

The police managed to drastically reduce the backlog of cases: by the end of 2018, 3,479 older cases had been processed. Of these, more than half (1793 cases) were dropped for various reasons.

The final police report itself after the clean-up project rendered a harsh verdict on how the work had been organized previously. “We believe it is a fundamental finding that the quality of research and especially its quality assurance is often poor,” he said.

The section leader, Sylvia Myklebust, emphasizes that in her department they started cleaning old cases as early as the year before. But the work became easier when the Public Ministry facilitated the closing of cases that had been pending for a long time, he explains.

I don’t know how many henlas of eco-section

BT / E24 has asked the police how many cases were eliminated by the finance section in its internal cleaning process. They have not been able to produce those figures.

– It is difficult to extract the figures, but we can say that we are talking about a good number of cases, says Myklebust.

He stresses that it was absolutely necessary for them to get rid of some of the cases that had just been left behind.

– We would never have made it up the stairs if we hadn’t, she says.

Although the report against Kjetil Rasmussen was withdrawn, the police were not done with him and the Heidrun compound.

There would be more criticism of Rasmussen and his business partner Dag Frode Herfindal, from home managers in other bankruptcies. So far, the police have not concluded in these cases.

– The police are reviewing the reports of the housing managers and we are in a phase where we obtain supplementary documentation to shed more light on the cases, writes police lawyer Anja Mathiesen in an email to BT.

– Should have been investigated further

Housing manager Alf-Erik Jentoft, who delivered the now-closed report against Heidrun founder Kjetil Rasmussen, emphasizes that it should be the prosecution’s responsibility to prioritize which cases will be investigated.

– But in my opinion this case should have been investigated further, writes in an email to BT.

Jentoft notes that Rasmussen had been involved in a series of bankruptcies in which housing authorities had flagged suspicions of criminal offenses.

– This information was provided in the review, writes Jentoft.

Kjetil Rasmussen himself stated on BT / E24 on Saturday that housing manager Jentoft’s presentation of his roles in previous bankruptcies is misleading. He points out that he resigned from the board of directors of the companies in question before the bankruptcy occurred, and says that he himself has not been guilty of any crime.

I think they have better control now

In the wake of the cleanup, the West Police District has placed nearly all economic crime investigations in Bergen.

In addition, the internal cooperation routines between lawyers and investigators have been modified to make the investigation more efficient. The process was completed at the end of 2019. Now, section leader Sylvia Myklebust believes that they have better control and that the cases they decide to investigate are also being investigated.

State Attorney Eirik Stolt-Nielsen writes in a report that the project’s mandate to reduce the number of older cases was met very well. He is also pleased that the project has not “abused the opportunity to close cases” and believes that a good job has been done.

Sigurd Granli is a police attorney and specialist in the department of financial and labor crimes. He thinks the situation is better now than it was a few years ago.

– We have not counted the cases, but there is no doubt that the cases with which we work, we do much better now than five years ago.