Pray, Obey, Kill (2021) s01e01 Episode Script
Where Truth Lies
1
- Where should I sit?
- You can sit here.
Yes.
- Clapperboard.
- Great.
- All set?
- Yes.
Go ahead.
You've spent 17 years in prison.
You agreed to this interview because
you say the truth hasn't come out.
Why serve 17 years
instead of telling the truth?
Partly because I was naive enough
to assume
that I wouldn't be convicted
of something I didn't do.
I did not instigate murder.
Why would I be convicted?
I believed, like so many
ordinary Swedes do,
that here you can't be
wrongly convicted.
In other countries perhaps,
but not Sweden.
- Emergency 112. How may I help you?
- I don't know.
I just came in here.
There's blood everywhere.
In Knutby.
Shock and despair spread
throughout the little town of Knutby.
The murder of a young woman and
the attempted murder of her neighbor
is in stark contrast
to this quiet, peaceful community.
This is one of the most bizarre criminal
cases in Sweden in modern time.
A web of religion, sex
and cruel, callous murder,
unprecedented
in the judicial history of Sweden.
Who was the driving force behind this?
This is an important piece of evidence
that has been manipulated.
It plants seeds of doubt
among the public.
Is this what actually happened?
This is a difficult time,
but we believe in God.
We're not giving up.
PRAY OBEY KILL
EPISODE ONE:
WHERE TRUTH LIES
I've seen some pretty strange things
in my time. Nasty stuff.
As a police officer,
I've seen just about everything.
But what went on in Knutby is
undoubtedly one of the strangest things
that I've ever encountered.
- I'll just adjust this.
- Now, let's see.
Can we please have more sun over here?
This one must go.
Get ready for a take.
- Camera.
- Clapperboard.
- Camera set.
- Go ahead.
- Emergency 112. How may I help you?
- I've been shot!
- Where are you?
- Gränsta, Knutby.
I can't I'm bleeding heavily.
- Is there anyone else there?
- My name is Daniel Linde.
- Is there anyone else there?
- Yes, Samuel Frankner.
- Can I speak to him?
- Yes. Samuel here!
- Hello.
- Hello.
- Who is this?
- The emergency services.
- How is your friend doing?
- I don't know.
I just came in. I heard something.
There's blood all over the place.
I have no idea what happened.
Who did this? Was it self-inflicted?
Or did someone else do it?
I don't know. I have no idea.
Did you see anything, Daniel?
- A masked man.
- Okay.
A masked man.
This was the middle of winter.
The weather was quite cold.
It was a Friday night.
We went back to the police station
to leave our reports.
While I was there I received a call
from our communication center.
A person had called 112.
This person had been shot.
My boss called me and said
there's been a shooting in Knutby.
To be honest,
I didn't really believe it.
That someone would get shot here,
I thought that highly unlikely.
I expected to be back in bed
in 15 minutes.
I hadn't gotten very far when I saw
the emergency services
and I thought this must be serious.
We can see that there are people
in the house.
There are people at the entrance
as well.
We rush inside and see a man
lying on a stretcher.
He's trying to talk,
but his mouth is injured.
However, he was able to describe
a man of large physical stature.
The patio door was open. Someone
had entered from the back of the house.
So I sent out the dog handler with
police officers from the task force.
They found tracks straightaway.
The officer-in-charge ordered them
to follow the tracks from the house.
I sat in my car, switched on the police
radio to listen to their conversation.
2114, come in.
They found tire tracks a distance away.
A car had driven off.
They were cordoning off the area
and waiting for daylight.
And I thought,
there isn't much more I can do here.
I can go home now
and report back to the office.
While I was standing outside
the house, a man came up to me.
Can I go over to Helge's wife
and tell her he went to the hospital?
And I thought, Helge? Who's Helge?
A neighbor. He lives up there.
He pointed.
It can't have been more
than 100 meters away.
He went in the ambulance.
And then it suddenly struck me.
Shit, a person just left
the crime scene.
He was the man standing behind
the stretcher holding the IV drip.
At that exact moment,
a woman came running out.
She was screaming
and waving her arms.
"There's blood everywhere!
Alexandra is not responding! Help!"
At that point I see a police officer
enter the house from a side door.
And then nothing happens.
It's totally quiet and dark.
And I'm thinking, what's going on here?'
We prepared to enter the house.
I reacted when I saw
how many people were in there.
I was a little surprised.
We entered the house
and searched the ground floor.
We went upstairs.
All the doors were closed except one.
The two officers that went in first
approached the open door
and they could see
that there was a person on the bed.
They immediately radioed back to say
that there was a women in the bed,
who was likely dead.
SANNA & HELGE FOSSMO MARRIED 2000
I already felt that this seemed like
a strange commune.
When I informed them
that the woman was dead,
the only response I got was,
"Oh, is she dead?"
No one is upset. No one is crying.
No one seems shocked.
You would expect hysteria.
You would expect chaos.
I got this Twin Peaks feeling
about the place.
Emergency 112. How may I help you?
I've been shot
- Where are you?
- Gränsta, Knutby.
I have a printout
of the emergency call here.
Samuel comes in there.
The operator asks him,
"But who did it? Was it self-inflicted?
Did someone else do it?"
Samuel, "I don't know.
I have no idea. A masked man.
"The ambulance is here."
According to the emergency call,
it was Samuel Frankner
that said it was a man.
- But when we listened to this before
- Mm.
Who did this? Was it self-inflicted?
Or did someone else do it?
- I don't know. I have no idea.
- Look here
Go back again.
A masked man.
- Okay
- A masked man.
- It's not the same voice.
- No, it's not.
This doesn't tally
with the police report,
which states that Samuel says
it's a masked man.
- But we just heard Daniel say it first.
- Precisely.
From the very start
of the investigation,
in the emergency call,
a mistake has been made.
It's very confusing
for the police from the start.
Daniel Linde is found shot here.
They find him first.
Then the police find Alexandra
shot in her home.
The opposite happened actually.
Alexandra is shot first.
Then Daniel Linde.
The place where this happened
is interesting.
This area is called The Hill,
a congregation of about 100 members.
Most of the leaders live here
and this is where the events unfold.
In a shooting in Knutby
early this morning,
a woman was killed and a man injured.
A major search operation for the suspect
is underway reports Radio Uppland.
I'm Kenneth Åhgren,
Uppsala Police Department.
In 2004, I led the investigation
into the Knutby case
from the very first hour.
First I want to present
We were aware from the start that
they'd had a party the night before.
Was jealousy a factor?
Had something gone wrong?
We also found out that the person
who was shot first, the man,
he owned a computer company
with links to the Baltic States.
So we turned our attention
to all ferries departing from Sweden.
We sent out an all-ports warning
to ensure that the suspect
couldn't leave the country.
I was in an exclusive interview
when this news broke.
At that stage we knew this concerned
a pastor and a young woman.
No, a pastor and a pastor's wife,
that was what we knew then.
This was the very first information
that was released.
I remember it so well.
I found it difficult to focus.
I found it fascinating
from the start actually.
The web of mystery tightens around
events here in Knutby this weekend.
One of the pastors, Peter Gembäck,
agrees to give an interview
on condition that there are
no follow-up questions.
Someone close to us
has died suddenly.
A close friend's wife
is no longer with us.
Another close friend is lying wounded
in the hospital.
This was all so sudden.
Obviously, we're in shock.
We're heartbroken. We're grieving.
In the beginning, it seemed like any
other murder. No one knew very much.
Initially,
it seemed to be domestic-related.
A crime of jealousy perhaps.
And it was, in a way.
But there was much more to it
than that.
Personnel attending the scene
got a feeling
that the pastor had acted strangely.
He went in the first ambulance
to the hospital.
Something is not quite right here.
While Helge is in
Daniel Linde's house,
his wife has been murdered.
The whole thing was very strange
from the start.
I immediately felt
that this didn't add up,
so I decided to have
Helge arrested at the hospital.
We decided to bring him in
for questioning instead,
because you just can't
arrest people
without a clear picture
of what happened.
It was better to wait and see.
Helge was interviewed
like everyone else.
He didn't know anything.
The interview lasted for 30-60 minutes.
Helge didn't know
that his wife was dead.
We hadn't informed him yet.
While this was going on
I heard from the dog handler.
They had found footprints
leading from the house,
to a road some distance away.
These were very small footprints.
They were more like footprints
from a woman or child.
After we took a break
we decided to inform him
that his wife was dead.
He became very upset.
He cried, for a few minutes.
Then he calmed down again.
At this point we asked
if he knew of anyone
that might have anything against
his wife and the man who was shot.
Did you see anything, Daniel?
A masked man.
An alert was issued
for a perpetrator.
A perpetrator in a murder case
is easy to imagine as a big man.
Not a slight young girl.
And then he mentions Sara Svensson.
That last year she had hit
his wife over the head
with a hammer.
A woman has been arrested
in connection with a shooting yesterday
in a village outside Uppsala,
where a 23-year-old woman died
and a man was shot and injured.
She was arrested at her home
in Småland.
She had previously lived
in the murdered woman's home.
Following questioning
yesterday and today,
we found out about
this aggravated assault.
That's how she came to our attention.
Those involved are all members
of the small congregation in Knutby.
Almost a week ago a 30-year-old man
was shot and injured.
The 23-year-old sister of the so-called
Bride of Christ was shot and killed.
- Why did she do this?
- The motive is not clear yet.
Nor am I at liberty to comment
on her statement.
Spoken interrogation.
Reference number, 774-04.
Date, 30 January 2004.
Interrogator, Jan Halling.
Type of interrogation, 23:6.
Suspect, Sara Svensson
She tells us what she did
with her shoes.
We found them in a dumpster
in Småland.
They are the perpetrator's shoes.
She tells us what she did
with the gun. We search for it.
We found it off the Öland Bridge.
We found the silencer
in a bag in Småland
exactly where she said
that she had disposed of it.
The 26-year-old woman
was interviewed again today,
but there's still no explanation as to
why she killed a 23-year-old woman
and shot and injured
the 30-year-old man.
Is this what happened?
Is this possible?
We must work with what we have
despite the lack of solid evidence.
What I want to say is the truth
and this is exactly the way I saw it.
I
I was feeling really awful
And it is something that
I talked to Helge about
and it was something
And he understood how I felt.
- Do you mean Helge Fossmo?
- Yes, precisely.
And then, around that time,
when I was feeling so
I felt so far away from God.
This feeling came over me,
a feeling that I myself didn't
I could never come to this conclusion
myself. How can I put it?
And it was
Alexandra, she was going to
She had
finished her time living here on Earth.
And she would
She would go to heaven.
Even though she was young,
there was nothing wrong with that.
And it was like
this strong compelling feeling
that forced me to think that
Alexandra should go home to heaven,
as we say.
And that would happen through me.
SARA SVENSSON SUSPECTED
OF AIDING AND ABETTING MURDER
Jan Halling was
the interrogating officer.
A short so-called 24:8 interview,
confession or denial.
But it continued late into the night.
When it was over,
she had admitted to Janne
that she had done it,
but that she alone was responsible.
No one else was involved.
When asked directly
if she had done it,
she bent over
and put her head on her knees.
She raised her head slowly
and said yes
and then, "But I was alone."
She stresses this several times,
that she was alone,
no one else was involved.
And this made us suspicious.
When someone says that
in a confession interview,
the police immediately suspect
that they were not alone.
The District Court detention hearing
with Sara Svensson
will commence now in Courtroom 1.
Perhaps it wasn't a big deal
for us journalists,
but it generated huge interest
for the public,
when it became clear
that this concerned religion.
The fact that it was
a small congregation.
That she had been kicked out
of the congregation.
And then it was easy to assume,
she acted out of revenge.
But that was when
we still didn't know much.
- Skandia Liv.
- Hi. My name is Helge Fossmo.
- Hi.
- Hi. I'm calling you regarding
my wife's life insurance policy.
She has passed away.
I'll check that for you.
Do you have her date of birth?
Yes. It is, 27-05-80.
- And she has passed away?
- Yes.
Oh, she was so young.
The police suspect
Pastor Helge Fossmo pretty quickly.
He's married to Alexandra
who was found dead in bed.
In their bed.
Indeed, that puts the spotlight
on him, statistically.
And you wonder what his alibi was
on that particular night.
A rather poor alibi.
Alexandra is sleeping there.
Helge doesn't sleep there that night.
He says that he slept
in the children's room that night.
Alexandra was shot three times here.
Helge says he was asleep there
and was not awoken by the gunshots.
The police measured the sound level.
It was 100 dB.
There's a small room in between.
How far, ten meters?
- It's no more than that.
- Not far between.
It's not, yet Helge says
that the text message alert
on his mobile phone woke him.
And then he shows up
at Daniel's place.
We know
that he was at Daniel's early on.
But we don't know exactly where he was
when Alexandra was shot.
No one can confirm that, actually.
He was suspected early on.
That's why he was arrested.
His phone was tapped
and they heard certain details.
- Hi, it's Helge.
- Hi.
Hi. I was just thinking, all of this
What the police are doing now is,
they're trying to find an instigator.
In which case Sara won't be guilty,
she'll be a victim.
And that's so typical of the devil,
because then it's God's fault.
There was a telephone call that came
to the attention of the police.
Helge is telling a member
of the congregation
that he is going to tell everyone
that Sara acted alone.
Everyone should do likewise.
There should be nothing
to implicate Helge or anyone
in the congregation.
What I feel now is,
we have to do our best every day
and pray to fight the Spirit
that wants to turn this on us.
It's an accusation against me
and the congregation.
Ensure there's nothing that leads back
to the congregation or to me.
Sara alone is the guilty one
and we must pray for that.
We must fight for that.
We have to do this!
And we have to do it forcefully
to end this once and for all.
Yes, fine. Bye.
The telephone tapping provided us
with one important detail
and a few small details too.
It became clear to us
that the victims' spouses
were having a romantic relationship.
Text message from Helge to Anette:
I really need YOU close.
Our love is the greatest love of all.
I'll be quiet until after the police.
Your Man.
From Anette to Helge:
The police are coming out to me too.
From Helge to Anette:
How do you feel?
Nothing strange about that?
Don't worry.
I'm with you all the way. I love you.
We are one! We'll keep tight.
Kisses!
She arrived this afternoon at Uppsala
District Court, using the back entrance.
A 26-year-old woman
is suspected of murder,
alternatively conspiracy
to commit murder.
The dead woman's husband,
a pastor in the congregation,
is suspected of murder
alternatively attempted murder
and aiding and abetting
the said crimes.
The injured man's wife is,
on the basis of probable cause,
suspected of conspiracy to commit
murder and attempted murder,
alternatively, aiding and abetting
these crimes.
The investigation has shown
that the suspects
are in a romantic relationship.
If the motive was that
Helge and his mistress
wanted to get rid of Helge's wife
and her husband
then it was best
to get rid of those two.
So a possible motive became clear.
You can call me naive.
You can call me stupid.
You can say, you should know better.
From what I know,
I believe he is innocent.
Our congregation is full of love
for one another.
So you're saying their relationship
is no different from any other
in the congregation?
In our congregation we love each other
more than some see as normal.
- You have full faith in the pastor?
- Yes.
We're actually closer than ever,
but the atmosphere is obviously
This is a difficult time, but we believe
in God and we're not giving up.
- Hi there!
- Hi!
You were right about
Pentecostal congregations.
A pastor cannot divorce.
"Every divorce is a deviation
from God's divine plan."
- So there are rules?
- Yes, this seems to be the standard.
So I can understand why
the police suspected Helge.
A wife dying avoids divorce.
You can continue being a pastor
if your wife dies.
- But not if you have divorced her.
- Check this out.
- Oh! The interrogation?
- With Helge Fossmo.
- Mm.
- Sent by the police.
Yes.
Helge gave us written permission
so I sent it in.
- And it worked. Is that everything?
- Check it out.
17, 18, 19. That's all, right?
Why does he want us to see these?
He told us on the phone
that he has nothing to hide.
This means
we can examine everything.
Yes, we'll see how it went.
These contain stuff that's to
his advantage and stuff that is not.
Exciting. The police are the only
ones who have seen this material.
Well, his lawyer possibly.
We've got almost 40 hours here.
- We'll divide them between us.
- 20 each.
A fun weekend for us.
Do you have a DVD player?
I think I have one at home.
Case number, K774-04.
Date, 04-02-06. The time is 13:14.
Interrogating officers, Inspectors
Leif Spånbo and PO Sandström.
Interrogation location,
Uppsala Police Station.
Type of interrogation, 23:6.
Name of interrogated individual,
Helge Fossmo.
He is a suspect.
He has been informed of this.
His defense lawyer, Ola Nordström,
is present.
Account of events.
I traveled around
the whole country almost
in order to find out as much
as possible about Helge.
What was he like as a kid
and at school?
How did he behave in his youth group
and in the parish?
I wanted to find out everything
about Helge.
I even read the book
about the Pentecostal Church
to understand what it all meant.
At 16:36 on January 21 this year,
you sent a text message to Anette.
"Mine, mine, mine. You truly are
and that makes me very happy.
I love everything you are
and with everything I have.
We need to keep really tight now.
We are one."
What does "keep tight" mean?
To stay close in our hearts.
It has to do with unity.
It has nothing to do with leaks.
To stay tight, close to one another.
For each other, dependently.
To stay really tight,
I can understand that.
- But keep really tight?
- Yes.
Well, that was in fact what I meant.
The woman who was detained
two weeks ago was released today.
- Why was Anette released?
- She was no longer a suspect.
There was no reason to detain her.
She was involved in the sense
that she was Helge's mistress.
But she wasn't a part of this.
It never entered her mind.
I'd like to begin by telling you
that Anette was released.
She was released yesterday.
How do you feel about that?
Of course I'm very relieved
to hear that.
For several weeks after the murder,
the congregation showed unwavering
support for their friends in custody.
They refused to believe
that the pastor and nanny
could murder one of their own. But
the revelation that the pastor had lied
about his relationship with the woman
next door has devastated them.
He was responsible for
so many people's lives.
He took advantage of his position
and we're paying for that now.
And it's just so disgusting.
That's what we believed
in our hearts
that there was
no romantic relationship
involving Helge.
And now it turns out
that's not true
so he can't be a pastor any longer.
Because of what I said earlier,
today, I feel so naive and stupid,
but I did say what I believed
to be true. I trust the police.
Today, I thank God for the police.
It's
I'm glad that they brought this
to light, that he was exposed.
He was a wolf in sheep's clothing.
That's the truth.
Dearest friends.
What we must go through!
I love you so much.
You are all truly wonderful.
I'm glad that we're all here.
That we're gathered here together.
The situation is difficult.
It has been for some time now.
We know that.
People from the congregation
phoned me.
They want to come in
and tell us what they know.
Ten people showed up.
We were very interested to hear
what they had to say,
when ten of them came in.
But we were not so impressed
when they each had a note
with the same thing written on it.
And then the tide turned.
He used to be a saint in their eyes
and now he was the devil himself.
We assumed
he was somewhere in between.
P4 Uppland, Swedish Radio.
After 97 years the Philadelphia
congregation in Knutby has dissolved.
The decision was made
by the remaining members,
according to the newspaper, Dagen.
The congregation attracted media
attention at home and abroad
in connection
with the 2004 Knutby case,
when one person was murdered
and another wounded.
How are you getting on there?
I think we should try to find a way
to persuade them to talk to us.
I'm trying to find a way
to approach the subject.
Now that the congregation
has been dissolved,
maybe they have a different story
than the one they could in 2004.
This is what I wrote,
"We feel that we now have
a unique opportunity
to provide an informed, detailed,
more balanced and honest account"
We can omit a word there,
how it changed gradually over time.
I don't want to put this in writing,
but there's no leader
stopping them now.
I drive to Knutby.
I take a right turn
onto a narrow forest road.
As I drove along the road I turned off
my headlights and drive slowly.
I turned the car,
stopped and put on my
my disguise.
I put on my shoe covers, my gloves
and I loaded the gun.
I put the bullets, the remaining four,
in my pocket.
And then I go.
I walked towards
the utility room door.
I very quietly open the door
walk through the kitchen
Then I check my phone to see
if I had received any more
anonymous text messages.
And I'm hoping that I will see
that there's a text message
telling me
that I don't have to do this.
But there isn't.
Now I know what I have to do.
She told us in great detail
about text messages
that she had been receiving for months
prior to January 2004,
through which
she had been indoctrinated.
She received instructions via
text messages from an unknown person.
She believed they're from God,
or someone up there.
Then I received an anonymous
text message. When I opened it,
first it said sender.
I think it said unknown number.
When I opened it, the message said,
"What you know you must do,
you must do.
If you don't,
then it will be too late for you."
First I thought I had no idea
where this came from.
But of course I associated it
with the anxiety
and how I had felt,
that compelling feeling.
I also felt that I somehow
had to carry this out.
So, I told Helge.
Which I found very difficult.
But in any case
He didn't dismiss it,
but he thought that it sounded very
He considered it for a long time.
In some way I think that he thought,
"Well, maybe this is how it should be."
Sara says in several interrogations
that you received
anonymous text messages
that you then forwarded to her phone.
Well, I've sent text messages
to Sara's phone,
but I have neither received nor sent
anonymous text messages.
- And you're sticking to that?
- Yes, I am.
Helge was working closely
with the Lord God Father in Heaven.
He had everything he wanted.
He had money, women.
Everyone in Knutby
loved and supported him.
He had everything
he could possibly ask for.
He couldn't reach any higher.
I'm not sure if it was
from the phone tapping,
or if it was during a police interview
that he said
that the police would never manage
to crack him.
That was what he thought.
He was convinced that the police
would never get to the bottom of it.
It's not only the fault
of the police and prosecutor
that this wasn't properly investigated.
If I had told the truth in 2004,
then perhaps they would have
investigated this, but I didn't.
Even if I understood
after a while in prison
that what went on in Knutby
was wrong,
I was still very afraid
of the consequences
of betraying my leader.
She made me promise before God
that I would never reveal
that she was the one
behind the text messages.
And she went on to say
that if I ever broke that promise
I would lose my daughter.
So I didn't dare.
If this story ends in the way that
I believe and I hope that it will
Then?
Can I take you out to dinner
one evening?
It would be nice to meet
under different circumstances.
- If that happens, would you accept?
- Of course.
Of course! Who says no to a free meal?
Even if it doesn't turn out that way,
Helge, I'll accept anyway
and I'll pay for the meal.
- Where should I sit?
- You can sit here.
Yes.
- Clapperboard.
- Great.
- All set?
- Yes.
Go ahead.
You've spent 17 years in prison.
You agreed to this interview because
you say the truth hasn't come out.
Why serve 17 years
instead of telling the truth?
Partly because I was naive enough
to assume
that I wouldn't be convicted
of something I didn't do.
I did not instigate murder.
Why would I be convicted?
I believed, like so many
ordinary Swedes do,
that here you can't be
wrongly convicted.
In other countries perhaps,
but not Sweden.
- Emergency 112. How may I help you?
- I don't know.
I just came in here.
There's blood everywhere.
In Knutby.
Shock and despair spread
throughout the little town of Knutby.
The murder of a young woman and
the attempted murder of her neighbor
is in stark contrast
to this quiet, peaceful community.
This is one of the most bizarre criminal
cases in Sweden in modern time.
A web of religion, sex
and cruel, callous murder,
unprecedented
in the judicial history of Sweden.
Who was the driving force behind this?
This is an important piece of evidence
that has been manipulated.
It plants seeds of doubt
among the public.
Is this what actually happened?
This is a difficult time,
but we believe in God.
We're not giving up.
PRAY OBEY KILL
EPISODE ONE:
WHERE TRUTH LIES
I've seen some pretty strange things
in my time. Nasty stuff.
As a police officer,
I've seen just about everything.
But what went on in Knutby is
undoubtedly one of the strangest things
that I've ever encountered.
- I'll just adjust this.
- Now, let's see.
Can we please have more sun over here?
This one must go.
Get ready for a take.
- Camera.
- Clapperboard.
- Camera set.
- Go ahead.
- Emergency 112. How may I help you?
- I've been shot!
- Where are you?
- Gränsta, Knutby.
I can't I'm bleeding heavily.
- Is there anyone else there?
- My name is Daniel Linde.
- Is there anyone else there?
- Yes, Samuel Frankner.
- Can I speak to him?
- Yes. Samuel here!
- Hello.
- Hello.
- Who is this?
- The emergency services.
- How is your friend doing?
- I don't know.
I just came in. I heard something.
There's blood all over the place.
I have no idea what happened.
Who did this? Was it self-inflicted?
Or did someone else do it?
I don't know. I have no idea.
Did you see anything, Daniel?
- A masked man.
- Okay.
A masked man.
This was the middle of winter.
The weather was quite cold.
It was a Friday night.
We went back to the police station
to leave our reports.
While I was there I received a call
from our communication center.
A person had called 112.
This person had been shot.
My boss called me and said
there's been a shooting in Knutby.
To be honest,
I didn't really believe it.
That someone would get shot here,
I thought that highly unlikely.
I expected to be back in bed
in 15 minutes.
I hadn't gotten very far when I saw
the emergency services
and I thought this must be serious.
We can see that there are people
in the house.
There are people at the entrance
as well.
We rush inside and see a man
lying on a stretcher.
He's trying to talk,
but his mouth is injured.
However, he was able to describe
a man of large physical stature.
The patio door was open. Someone
had entered from the back of the house.
So I sent out the dog handler with
police officers from the task force.
They found tracks straightaway.
The officer-in-charge ordered them
to follow the tracks from the house.
I sat in my car, switched on the police
radio to listen to their conversation.
2114, come in.
They found tire tracks a distance away.
A car had driven off.
They were cordoning off the area
and waiting for daylight.
And I thought,
there isn't much more I can do here.
I can go home now
and report back to the office.
While I was standing outside
the house, a man came up to me.
Can I go over to Helge's wife
and tell her he went to the hospital?
And I thought, Helge? Who's Helge?
A neighbor. He lives up there.
He pointed.
It can't have been more
than 100 meters away.
He went in the ambulance.
And then it suddenly struck me.
Shit, a person just left
the crime scene.
He was the man standing behind
the stretcher holding the IV drip.
At that exact moment,
a woman came running out.
She was screaming
and waving her arms.
"There's blood everywhere!
Alexandra is not responding! Help!"
At that point I see a police officer
enter the house from a side door.
And then nothing happens.
It's totally quiet and dark.
And I'm thinking, what's going on here?'
We prepared to enter the house.
I reacted when I saw
how many people were in there.
I was a little surprised.
We entered the house
and searched the ground floor.
We went upstairs.
All the doors were closed except one.
The two officers that went in first
approached the open door
and they could see
that there was a person on the bed.
They immediately radioed back to say
that there was a women in the bed,
who was likely dead.
SANNA & HELGE FOSSMO MARRIED 2000
I already felt that this seemed like
a strange commune.
When I informed them
that the woman was dead,
the only response I got was,
"Oh, is she dead?"
No one is upset. No one is crying.
No one seems shocked.
You would expect hysteria.
You would expect chaos.
I got this Twin Peaks feeling
about the place.
Emergency 112. How may I help you?
I've been shot
- Where are you?
- Gränsta, Knutby.
I have a printout
of the emergency call here.
Samuel comes in there.
The operator asks him,
"But who did it? Was it self-inflicted?
Did someone else do it?"
Samuel, "I don't know.
I have no idea. A masked man.
"The ambulance is here."
According to the emergency call,
it was Samuel Frankner
that said it was a man.
- But when we listened to this before
- Mm.
Who did this? Was it self-inflicted?
Or did someone else do it?
- I don't know. I have no idea.
- Look here
Go back again.
A masked man.
- Okay
- A masked man.
- It's not the same voice.
- No, it's not.
This doesn't tally
with the police report,
which states that Samuel says
it's a masked man.
- But we just heard Daniel say it first.
- Precisely.
From the very start
of the investigation,
in the emergency call,
a mistake has been made.
It's very confusing
for the police from the start.
Daniel Linde is found shot here.
They find him first.
Then the police find Alexandra
shot in her home.
The opposite happened actually.
Alexandra is shot first.
Then Daniel Linde.
The place where this happened
is interesting.
This area is called The Hill,
a congregation of about 100 members.
Most of the leaders live here
and this is where the events unfold.
In a shooting in Knutby
early this morning,
a woman was killed and a man injured.
A major search operation for the suspect
is underway reports Radio Uppland.
I'm Kenneth Åhgren,
Uppsala Police Department.
In 2004, I led the investigation
into the Knutby case
from the very first hour.
First I want to present
We were aware from the start that
they'd had a party the night before.
Was jealousy a factor?
Had something gone wrong?
We also found out that the person
who was shot first, the man,
he owned a computer company
with links to the Baltic States.
So we turned our attention
to all ferries departing from Sweden.
We sent out an all-ports warning
to ensure that the suspect
couldn't leave the country.
I was in an exclusive interview
when this news broke.
At that stage we knew this concerned
a pastor and a young woman.
No, a pastor and a pastor's wife,
that was what we knew then.
This was the very first information
that was released.
I remember it so well.
I found it difficult to focus.
I found it fascinating
from the start actually.
The web of mystery tightens around
events here in Knutby this weekend.
One of the pastors, Peter Gembäck,
agrees to give an interview
on condition that there are
no follow-up questions.
Someone close to us
has died suddenly.
A close friend's wife
is no longer with us.
Another close friend is lying wounded
in the hospital.
This was all so sudden.
Obviously, we're in shock.
We're heartbroken. We're grieving.
In the beginning, it seemed like any
other murder. No one knew very much.
Initially,
it seemed to be domestic-related.
A crime of jealousy perhaps.
And it was, in a way.
But there was much more to it
than that.
Personnel attending the scene
got a feeling
that the pastor had acted strangely.
He went in the first ambulance
to the hospital.
Something is not quite right here.
While Helge is in
Daniel Linde's house,
his wife has been murdered.
The whole thing was very strange
from the start.
I immediately felt
that this didn't add up,
so I decided to have
Helge arrested at the hospital.
We decided to bring him in
for questioning instead,
because you just can't
arrest people
without a clear picture
of what happened.
It was better to wait and see.
Helge was interviewed
like everyone else.
He didn't know anything.
The interview lasted for 30-60 minutes.
Helge didn't know
that his wife was dead.
We hadn't informed him yet.
While this was going on
I heard from the dog handler.
They had found footprints
leading from the house,
to a road some distance away.
These were very small footprints.
They were more like footprints
from a woman or child.
After we took a break
we decided to inform him
that his wife was dead.
He became very upset.
He cried, for a few minutes.
Then he calmed down again.
At this point we asked
if he knew of anyone
that might have anything against
his wife and the man who was shot.
Did you see anything, Daniel?
A masked man.
An alert was issued
for a perpetrator.
A perpetrator in a murder case
is easy to imagine as a big man.
Not a slight young girl.
And then he mentions Sara Svensson.
That last year she had hit
his wife over the head
with a hammer.
A woman has been arrested
in connection with a shooting yesterday
in a village outside Uppsala,
where a 23-year-old woman died
and a man was shot and injured.
She was arrested at her home
in Småland.
She had previously lived
in the murdered woman's home.
Following questioning
yesterday and today,
we found out about
this aggravated assault.
That's how she came to our attention.
Those involved are all members
of the small congregation in Knutby.
Almost a week ago a 30-year-old man
was shot and injured.
The 23-year-old sister of the so-called
Bride of Christ was shot and killed.
- Why did she do this?
- The motive is not clear yet.
Nor am I at liberty to comment
on her statement.
Spoken interrogation.
Reference number, 774-04.
Date, 30 January 2004.
Interrogator, Jan Halling.
Type of interrogation, 23:6.
Suspect, Sara Svensson
She tells us what she did
with her shoes.
We found them in a dumpster
in Småland.
They are the perpetrator's shoes.
She tells us what she did
with the gun. We search for it.
We found it off the Öland Bridge.
We found the silencer
in a bag in Småland
exactly where she said
that she had disposed of it.
The 26-year-old woman
was interviewed again today,
but there's still no explanation as to
why she killed a 23-year-old woman
and shot and injured
the 30-year-old man.
Is this what happened?
Is this possible?
We must work with what we have
despite the lack of solid evidence.
What I want to say is the truth
and this is exactly the way I saw it.
I
I was feeling really awful
And it is something that
I talked to Helge about
and it was something
And he understood how I felt.
- Do you mean Helge Fossmo?
- Yes, precisely.
And then, around that time,
when I was feeling so
I felt so far away from God.
This feeling came over me,
a feeling that I myself didn't
I could never come to this conclusion
myself. How can I put it?
And it was
Alexandra, she was going to
She had
finished her time living here on Earth.
And she would
She would go to heaven.
Even though she was young,
there was nothing wrong with that.
And it was like
this strong compelling feeling
that forced me to think that
Alexandra should go home to heaven,
as we say.
And that would happen through me.
SARA SVENSSON SUSPECTED
OF AIDING AND ABETTING MURDER
Jan Halling was
the interrogating officer.
A short so-called 24:8 interview,
confession or denial.
But it continued late into the night.
When it was over,
she had admitted to Janne
that she had done it,
but that she alone was responsible.
No one else was involved.
When asked directly
if she had done it,
she bent over
and put her head on her knees.
She raised her head slowly
and said yes
and then, "But I was alone."
She stresses this several times,
that she was alone,
no one else was involved.
And this made us suspicious.
When someone says that
in a confession interview,
the police immediately suspect
that they were not alone.
The District Court detention hearing
with Sara Svensson
will commence now in Courtroom 1.
Perhaps it wasn't a big deal
for us journalists,
but it generated huge interest
for the public,
when it became clear
that this concerned religion.
The fact that it was
a small congregation.
That she had been kicked out
of the congregation.
And then it was easy to assume,
she acted out of revenge.
But that was when
we still didn't know much.
- Skandia Liv.
- Hi. My name is Helge Fossmo.
- Hi.
- Hi. I'm calling you regarding
my wife's life insurance policy.
She has passed away.
I'll check that for you.
Do you have her date of birth?
Yes. It is, 27-05-80.
- And she has passed away?
- Yes.
Oh, she was so young.
The police suspect
Pastor Helge Fossmo pretty quickly.
He's married to Alexandra
who was found dead in bed.
In their bed.
Indeed, that puts the spotlight
on him, statistically.
And you wonder what his alibi was
on that particular night.
A rather poor alibi.
Alexandra is sleeping there.
Helge doesn't sleep there that night.
He says that he slept
in the children's room that night.
Alexandra was shot three times here.
Helge says he was asleep there
and was not awoken by the gunshots.
The police measured the sound level.
It was 100 dB.
There's a small room in between.
How far, ten meters?
- It's no more than that.
- Not far between.
It's not, yet Helge says
that the text message alert
on his mobile phone woke him.
And then he shows up
at Daniel's place.
We know
that he was at Daniel's early on.
But we don't know exactly where he was
when Alexandra was shot.
No one can confirm that, actually.
He was suspected early on.
That's why he was arrested.
His phone was tapped
and they heard certain details.
- Hi, it's Helge.
- Hi.
Hi. I was just thinking, all of this
What the police are doing now is,
they're trying to find an instigator.
In which case Sara won't be guilty,
she'll be a victim.
And that's so typical of the devil,
because then it's God's fault.
There was a telephone call that came
to the attention of the police.
Helge is telling a member
of the congregation
that he is going to tell everyone
that Sara acted alone.
Everyone should do likewise.
There should be nothing
to implicate Helge or anyone
in the congregation.
What I feel now is,
we have to do our best every day
and pray to fight the Spirit
that wants to turn this on us.
It's an accusation against me
and the congregation.
Ensure there's nothing that leads back
to the congregation or to me.
Sara alone is the guilty one
and we must pray for that.
We must fight for that.
We have to do this!
And we have to do it forcefully
to end this once and for all.
Yes, fine. Bye.
The telephone tapping provided us
with one important detail
and a few small details too.
It became clear to us
that the victims' spouses
were having a romantic relationship.
Text message from Helge to Anette:
I really need YOU close.
Our love is the greatest love of all.
I'll be quiet until after the police.
Your Man.
From Anette to Helge:
The police are coming out to me too.
From Helge to Anette:
How do you feel?
Nothing strange about that?
Don't worry.
I'm with you all the way. I love you.
We are one! We'll keep tight.
Kisses!
She arrived this afternoon at Uppsala
District Court, using the back entrance.
A 26-year-old woman
is suspected of murder,
alternatively conspiracy
to commit murder.
The dead woman's husband,
a pastor in the congregation,
is suspected of murder
alternatively attempted murder
and aiding and abetting
the said crimes.
The injured man's wife is,
on the basis of probable cause,
suspected of conspiracy to commit
murder and attempted murder,
alternatively, aiding and abetting
these crimes.
The investigation has shown
that the suspects
are in a romantic relationship.
If the motive was that
Helge and his mistress
wanted to get rid of Helge's wife
and her husband
then it was best
to get rid of those two.
So a possible motive became clear.
You can call me naive.
You can call me stupid.
You can say, you should know better.
From what I know,
I believe he is innocent.
Our congregation is full of love
for one another.
So you're saying their relationship
is no different from any other
in the congregation?
In our congregation we love each other
more than some see as normal.
- You have full faith in the pastor?
- Yes.
We're actually closer than ever,
but the atmosphere is obviously
This is a difficult time, but we believe
in God and we're not giving up.
- Hi there!
- Hi!
You were right about
Pentecostal congregations.
A pastor cannot divorce.
"Every divorce is a deviation
from God's divine plan."
- So there are rules?
- Yes, this seems to be the standard.
So I can understand why
the police suspected Helge.
A wife dying avoids divorce.
You can continue being a pastor
if your wife dies.
- But not if you have divorced her.
- Check this out.
- Oh! The interrogation?
- With Helge Fossmo.
- Mm.
- Sent by the police.
Yes.
Helge gave us written permission
so I sent it in.
- And it worked. Is that everything?
- Check it out.
17, 18, 19. That's all, right?
Why does he want us to see these?
He told us on the phone
that he has nothing to hide.
This means
we can examine everything.
Yes, we'll see how it went.
These contain stuff that's to
his advantage and stuff that is not.
Exciting. The police are the only
ones who have seen this material.
Well, his lawyer possibly.
We've got almost 40 hours here.
- We'll divide them between us.
- 20 each.
A fun weekend for us.
Do you have a DVD player?
I think I have one at home.
Case number, K774-04.
Date, 04-02-06. The time is 13:14.
Interrogating officers, Inspectors
Leif Spånbo and PO Sandström.
Interrogation location,
Uppsala Police Station.
Type of interrogation, 23:6.
Name of interrogated individual,
Helge Fossmo.
He is a suspect.
He has been informed of this.
His defense lawyer, Ola Nordström,
is present.
Account of events.
I traveled around
the whole country almost
in order to find out as much
as possible about Helge.
What was he like as a kid
and at school?
How did he behave in his youth group
and in the parish?
I wanted to find out everything
about Helge.
I even read the book
about the Pentecostal Church
to understand what it all meant.
At 16:36 on January 21 this year,
you sent a text message to Anette.
"Mine, mine, mine. You truly are
and that makes me very happy.
I love everything you are
and with everything I have.
We need to keep really tight now.
We are one."
What does "keep tight" mean?
To stay close in our hearts.
It has to do with unity.
It has nothing to do with leaks.
To stay tight, close to one another.
For each other, dependently.
To stay really tight,
I can understand that.
- But keep really tight?
- Yes.
Well, that was in fact what I meant.
The woman who was detained
two weeks ago was released today.
- Why was Anette released?
- She was no longer a suspect.
There was no reason to detain her.
She was involved in the sense
that she was Helge's mistress.
But she wasn't a part of this.
It never entered her mind.
I'd like to begin by telling you
that Anette was released.
She was released yesterday.
How do you feel about that?
Of course I'm very relieved
to hear that.
For several weeks after the murder,
the congregation showed unwavering
support for their friends in custody.
They refused to believe
that the pastor and nanny
could murder one of their own. But
the revelation that the pastor had lied
about his relationship with the woman
next door has devastated them.
He was responsible for
so many people's lives.
He took advantage of his position
and we're paying for that now.
And it's just so disgusting.
That's what we believed
in our hearts
that there was
no romantic relationship
involving Helge.
And now it turns out
that's not true
so he can't be a pastor any longer.
Because of what I said earlier,
today, I feel so naive and stupid,
but I did say what I believed
to be true. I trust the police.
Today, I thank God for the police.
It's
I'm glad that they brought this
to light, that he was exposed.
He was a wolf in sheep's clothing.
That's the truth.
Dearest friends.
What we must go through!
I love you so much.
You are all truly wonderful.
I'm glad that we're all here.
That we're gathered here together.
The situation is difficult.
It has been for some time now.
We know that.
People from the congregation
phoned me.
They want to come in
and tell us what they know.
Ten people showed up.
We were very interested to hear
what they had to say,
when ten of them came in.
But we were not so impressed
when they each had a note
with the same thing written on it.
And then the tide turned.
He used to be a saint in their eyes
and now he was the devil himself.
We assumed
he was somewhere in between.
P4 Uppland, Swedish Radio.
After 97 years the Philadelphia
congregation in Knutby has dissolved.
The decision was made
by the remaining members,
according to the newspaper, Dagen.
The congregation attracted media
attention at home and abroad
in connection
with the 2004 Knutby case,
when one person was murdered
and another wounded.
How are you getting on there?
I think we should try to find a way
to persuade them to talk to us.
I'm trying to find a way
to approach the subject.
Now that the congregation
has been dissolved,
maybe they have a different story
than the one they could in 2004.
This is what I wrote,
"We feel that we now have
a unique opportunity
to provide an informed, detailed,
more balanced and honest account"
We can omit a word there,
how it changed gradually over time.
I don't want to put this in writing,
but there's no leader
stopping them now.
I drive to Knutby.
I take a right turn
onto a narrow forest road.
As I drove along the road I turned off
my headlights and drive slowly.
I turned the car,
stopped and put on my
my disguise.
I put on my shoe covers, my gloves
and I loaded the gun.
I put the bullets, the remaining four,
in my pocket.
And then I go.
I walked towards
the utility room door.
I very quietly open the door
walk through the kitchen
Then I check my phone to see
if I had received any more
anonymous text messages.
And I'm hoping that I will see
that there's a text message
telling me
that I don't have to do this.
But there isn't.
Now I know what I have to do.
She told us in great detail
about text messages
that she had been receiving for months
prior to January 2004,
through which
she had been indoctrinated.
She received instructions via
text messages from an unknown person.
She believed they're from God,
or someone up there.
Then I received an anonymous
text message. When I opened it,
first it said sender.
I think it said unknown number.
When I opened it, the message said,
"What you know you must do,
you must do.
If you don't,
then it will be too late for you."
First I thought I had no idea
where this came from.
But of course I associated it
with the anxiety
and how I had felt,
that compelling feeling.
I also felt that I somehow
had to carry this out.
So, I told Helge.
Which I found very difficult.
But in any case
He didn't dismiss it,
but he thought that it sounded very
He considered it for a long time.
In some way I think that he thought,
"Well, maybe this is how it should be."
Sara says in several interrogations
that you received
anonymous text messages
that you then forwarded to her phone.
Well, I've sent text messages
to Sara's phone,
but I have neither received nor sent
anonymous text messages.
- And you're sticking to that?
- Yes, I am.
Helge was working closely
with the Lord God Father in Heaven.
He had everything he wanted.
He had money, women.
Everyone in Knutby
loved and supported him.
He had everything
he could possibly ask for.
He couldn't reach any higher.
I'm not sure if it was
from the phone tapping,
or if it was during a police interview
that he said
that the police would never manage
to crack him.
That was what he thought.
He was convinced that the police
would never get to the bottom of it.
It's not only the fault
of the police and prosecutor
that this wasn't properly investigated.
If I had told the truth in 2004,
then perhaps they would have
investigated this, but I didn't.
Even if I understood
after a while in prison
that what went on in Knutby
was wrong,
I was still very afraid
of the consequences
of betraying my leader.
She made me promise before God
that I would never reveal
that she was the one
behind the text messages.
And she went on to say
that if I ever broke that promise
I would lose my daughter.
So I didn't dare.
If this story ends in the way that
I believe and I hope that it will
Then?
Can I take you out to dinner
one evening?
It would be nice to meet
under different circumstances.
- If that happens, would you accept?
- Of course.
Of course! Who says no to a free meal?
Even if it doesn't turn out that way,
Helge, I'll accept anyway
and I'll pay for the meal.