https://samnytt.se/polisen-prioriterar-ned-ytterligare-brott/
Police are reeling under the workload of mainly immigration-related serious gang crime. There is a severe shortage of police officers and many so-called everyday crimes end up at the back of the queue or are not investigated at all. Now National Police Commissioner Anders Thornberg has announced that additional types of crime will be put aside to free up more of the scarce resources.
These are what are called "minor crimes" that are now being decriminalised in principle. In contrast to other measures of this kind, which have often been local, this time it is a national mobilisation for which the agency has centrally initiated a so-called special event.
The police in Halland announced a year and a half ago that they would stop investigating residential burglaries in holiday homes, crimes that are often committed by travelling gangs. The police in Stockholm already announced in 2018 that they were de facto decriminalising fraud against individuals, and a similar decision was taken here to make thefts where the value of what was stolen does not exceed a certain number of thousands of kronor prosecution-free. But local action has not been enough. Fewer and fewer people want to work as a police officer in the new crime climate in Sweden, and despite a sharp reduction in the entry requirements for police training, many places remain empty and many existing police officers are leaving the profession.
National Police Commissioner Anders Thornberg has now announced that the situation is being tackled at national level and is signalling its seriousness by launching a so-called special event. Thornberg does not want to specify which additional crimes will now be risk-free to commit across the country, only that murder and other serious violent crimes do not belong there. - We are not cutting back on threats to life and health, but we will have to cut back a little. So we will have to prioritise those who are exposed to less crime.
Passports for migrants will be a police priority
Alongside the most serious crimes, the measure also aims to allocate resources so that migrants can go on holiday to their former home countries. Now that the restrictions imposed as a result of the Covid pandemic have been lifted, that traffic is starting to pick up again on a wide scale. However, many migrants lack passports and a black market has emerged in which appointments with the Passport Office, which is under the control of the police, have started to be sold for expensive money in the civil society of Muslim and other immigrant groups. The advertisements are often in Arabic. Many immigrants' passports are also reported stolen after being sold to traffickers.
Government Television asks the National Police Commissioner if he can guarantee that all these people will be able to travel this summer as before, equipped with new Swedish passports. Thornberg promises to do what he can to make this a priority. It is even said to be one of the main reasons why the measures have been announced as a "special event" in which Migration Minister Morgan Johansson has also been involved. - I say we are doing our absolute best. We understand that we have a very serious situation right now and we will deal with it.