Four Eritrean migrant men have now been charged for raping a 40-year-old migrant woman at the end of June in a forest in Flemingsberg, with all men now facing prison and deportation.
According to the indictment, the woman was drunk and therefore had difficulty defending herself when she was led out to the forest. There, one of the men – a 35-year-old from Sandviken – kicked her to force her onto the ground. Then, all four men raped her and filmed the assault.
The woman was also raped at a different location by one of the four men at an elevator near the Flemingsberg train station. In that second case, one of the men stood guard at the elevator during the assault, according to Swedish newspaper Expressen.
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Prosecutor Axel Frick at the Södertörn Prosecutor’s Office says the crimes are serious due to the fact it was a gang rape and the men “showed particular recklessness or brutality” by filming the abuse.
“This is a serious crime and why I today brought charges for two cases of rape that happened in close proximity to each other,” he said. “I assert that the defendants took advantage of their numerical superiority as well as the plaintiff’s intoxication and fear.”
The prosecutor is requesting all four men, 35-year-pld Mihretab Gebrehiwt, 33-year-old Haileab Weldemichael, 30-year-old Seare Redae, and 27-year-old Huluf Gebremariam, be deported and banned from returning to Sweden for 15 years.
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“When it concerns such a serious crime, as a prosecutor, I must demand deportation,” said Frick.
The victim’s lawyer, Karin Rajala, said she would not comment on how the woman was affected by the events, but according to prosecutors, she suffered physical injuries in the form of pain and bruises.
The trial starts on Dec. 5 and is expected to last at least five days.
Sweden has been beset by a wave of sexual violence from migrants and a rapid increase in gang rapes, such as this case.
In 2018, Swedish newspaper Expressen reported on this growing trend in Sweden. After an investigation into the court cases involving gang rape over the previous two years, the paper found that 43 men had been convicted of the offense. The paper also determined that 40 of the 43 men with gang rape convictions were either immigrants born abroad or born in Sweden to immigrant parents.
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Also in 2018, SVT reported that rape statistics in Sweden showed that 58 percent of men with rape or attempted rape convictions over the preceding five years were immigrants born outside the European Union, mainly from North Africa, South Africa, Afghanistan, and the Middle East.
The BBC also reported that in cases where victims did not know their attackers, the proportion of foreign-born men convicted of sexual assault was 80 percent.
Gang rapes involving migrants are not unique to Sweden either, with half of all gang rapes in Germany committed by foreigners.
