A live hand grenade left in a stroller at a residential building in central Gothenburg could have caused mass casualties, a district court has concluded, yet the case has ended with only one person receiving a sentence because the suspected organizer was too young under Swedish law to face criminal punishment.
The incident traces back to August 2025, when a 15-year-old boy traveled from Vänersborg to Gothenburg after allegedly being recruited through encrypted messaging platforms by criminal contacts who offered him payment to carry out an attack.
As reported by Samnytt, his mission was to place a grenade at the entrance of an apartment building on Viktoriagatan in the Vasastan district. The device, investigators later confirmed, was fully operational. However, it failed to detonate.
Instead of leaving the scene, the teenager returned, retrieved the unexploded grenade, and attempted to escape. He entered another apartment building nearby and hid the armed grenade inside a baby stroller left in a stairwell.
Police later located the device and bomb disposal specialists safely neutralized it. According to the National Bomb Disposal Service, there was no technical malfunction explaining why the grenade had not exploded earlier.
Judges sentenced 15-year-old Alvin Ramelund to one year and six months in closed juvenile care, while the 14-year-old recruiter, identified as Sam Nur Ali, was free to go despite the court finding that his involvement amounted to conspiracy to murder.
The case has fueled renewed debate over the increasing use of minors by organized criminal groups in Sweden. Authorities have warned that younger teenagers are being recruited precisely because their criminal responsibility is severely limited.
Last month, the Swedish government announced plans to move ahead with temporarily lowering the age of criminal responsibility to 13 for the most serious crimes.
Justice Minister Gunnar Strömmer revealed this would apply for a five-year period and represents a major shift from Sweden’s current system, under which the age of criminal responsibility is 15.
“The changes we are making now are both desirable and necessary,” Strömmer said at a press conference, as cited by Aftonbladet. He argued that the measure must be weighed against what he described as the reality of an increasing number of serious violent crimes committed by very young offenders. “It is about protecting society,” he said, adding that while he placed “great value” on the risks identified by consultation bodies, the government believed action was required.
In a post on Instagram, Strömmer’s Moderate party wrote, “52 children under the age of 15 were involved in legal trials for murder or attempted murder last year. A breathtaking and painful number. This is not how it should be in our society.
“One thing is certain. If we continue as we have done so far, things will go as they have so far. And there is no alternative. Therefore, society must find a better way to deal with the 13- and 14-year-olds who commit the most serious crimes, such as murder and attempted murder.”
