Published 11.15
The moderates want to double the punishment for men who expose women to violence.
– Today it can be a year in prison for crimes that in practice destroy people’s lives, says Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson.
Outside a lawyer’s office on Södermalm in Stockholm, Säpo guards are standing with earphones and surveying the situation.
Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson, Justice Minister Gunnar Strömmer and Finance Minister Elisabeth Svantesson will arrive soon.
In here is Rebecca Lagh’s law firm, a law firm that works almost exclusively with women who are victims of intimate partner violence. Last year, Lagh and her colleagues sat in a similar meeting together with the prime minister. The idea is to hear what those who actually work practically with the issue think is needed.
– A lot has been done against the perpetrators since then, including current contact bans even though the electronic monitoring is often introduced too late if at all, Rebecca Lagh began by saying.
Make an election promise
But she notes that there is still much left to do to help those escaping an abusive relationship.
Among other things, there is often a lack of protection for the women who finally find the courage to leave.
There should be a gathering house where the woman fleeing the violence gets one and the same contact person who helps her with all the practical things like contacts with the authorities, says Rebecca Lagh.
– And then we want people to look more at digital violence, where, for example, you are followed with GPS and the perpetrator appears everywhere you are. Or that you are constantly contacted via SMS. There, we want the authorities to understand how destructive it is, says Rebecca Lagh.
The moderates did not come to the meeting empty-handed, but with plans to fight the life-threatening violence against women in a similar way as they did with the gang criminals – with harsher punishments.
They say they now want to look at the possibility of doubling the punishment for certain intimate relationship crimes, especially when it comes to gross violation of women’s privacy, a crime that involves a man repeatedly subjecting the woman with whom he is or has been in an intimate relationship to criminal acts that violate her privacy.
– There are unreasonably low penalties for unreasonably serious crimes. The logic is simple: we take crimes against women as seriously as gang violence, the crimes that are seen and heard all the time, said Ulf Kristersson.
“No silver bullet”
The moderates also want to review whether it should be easier to be sentenced for gross violation of women’s rights and whether those who commit crimes against several different people should also be covered by the legislation.
Is tougher punishment the solution?
– We have learned through the fight against gang crime that one thing is not enough, there is no “silver bullet” (magic solution) that solves everything. But this can result in more suspected offenders being detained pending investigation and it gives the victim a period of safety. It also shows the seriousness of the crime, says Ulf Kristersson.
The woman can stay
Lawyer Rebecca Lagh says that during her years in the profession she has met many women who have been subjected to violence for a long time and where the punishment in the end does not end up being more than a few years in prison, if even that. The moderates’ proposal would mean that the minimum sentence for serious violation of women’s rights ends up being two years.
– They feel that; was this all he got for all he put me through? This could be a way to get the system to work more on the issue and if the man is arrested, the woman might not have to move. She can stay and the children can stay at school, she says.
Justice Minister Gunnar Strömmer believes that the seriousness of the crime must be reflected in the length of the sentence.
– This is one of our society’s biggest failures that has been going on for decades after decades, so it is clear that we must also attack it criminally, says Minister of Justice Gunnar Strömmer.
