– I think that you should do thorough and responsible work, and then next year will agree to make the compensation claim. That’s what Kristiansen’s defender Bjørn André Gulstad said on Thursday. Gulstad says that we are talking about several tens of millions. – Some of it goes to the recovery. Another part goes to the financial loss. And in the various parts there are many sub-items which, in sum, must justify the total claim, Gulstad explains to news about why the process of finding the correct compensation amount will take place over such a long period. The compensation is the part of the compensation sum that does not deal with the direct financial consequences this has had for Kristiansen. NOK 400 a day Defender Gulstad explains that the standardized part of this means that you will receive NOK 400 a day for each day you have been wrongfully in prison, but that this will be higher in Kristiansen’s case. – (NOK 400 a day) is not a strange compensation when they have ruined half your life, he says. – But how can one go about putting a sum of money on, for example, not being able to start a family life? – I ask the same question, and therefore I think that it is better to pay out 10 million too much than one million too little, Gulstad replies. Defense attorney Gulstad says that this job will be extensive and involve several expert groups. – How big will this “team” be? – At least it will be me and Brynjar Meling. In addition, there will be perhaps one or two paralegals, a secretary, then there will be external help as well, the defense counsel replies. Here he mentions economists as one of the expert groups. – We have to look at whether the state administrator is willing to pay for several lawyers, secretaries, economists and experts to review this. It will cost a lot, and take a lot of time, says Gulstad. The Minister of Justice says there will be compensation Justice Minister Emilie Enger Mehl (Sp) confirmed to news that there will be compensation. – It is expected that there will be compensation in the case, and I think that should only be missing when you have gone through something like that, she said shortly after apologizing to Viggo Kristiansen. Defends Arvid Sjødin during the processing of Kristiansen’s reopening case in the Borgarting Court of Appeal. Photo: Lise Åserud / NTB After he was released from the defense sentence last summer, 43-year-old Kristiansen lived at home with his parents in Kristiansand. Defense attorney Arvid Sjødin explained in the press conference that, despite having received several job offers during his period as a free man, Kristiansen has not agreed to this as the money he wanted to earn would have gone to pay the compensation claim from the judgment in 2001. He has thus had to live on payments from NAV to cover rent and living expenses. – But it cannot continue like this, says defender Gulstad. Will apply for an advance He explains that they will apply for an advance of a significant amount so that Kristiansen can buy an apartment and start life on normal terms. – If you want to get an advance in place, for example NOK 5 million, then you have to start working on it quite quickly. According to law professor at the Norwegian Police Academy, Morten Holmboe, an advance of NOK 5 million should not be problematic to implement. – There is no reason why it should take a year before he gets some money and can start his life, says Holmboe. – I actually think I can say that it (the sum) is obviously not too high. It is only a fraction of what the compensation will have to be, so it sounds completely reasonable, he adds. – It is quite obvious that there will be a large compensation, says law professor Morten Holmboe. Photo: Rahand Bazaz / news Could be Norway’s biggest compensation case There are two other compensation cases that the experts like to highlight for comparison. This is the Liland case from the 90s and the compensation case for Fritz Moen in the 2000s. In 1970, Per Kristian Liland was sentenced to 21 years in prison for the murder of two men. Liland was acquitted of the murders in 1994, and the following year he was awarded NOK 13.47 million in compensation. Today, the sum would correspond to over NOK 25 million. Fritz Moen was found innocent of the murders of Sigrid Heggheim and Torunn Finstad. In 2008, three years after his death, he was awarded what was the largest compensation in Norwegian legal history. In a settlement, the state awarded Moen’s estate NOK 20 million in compensation. Today, the sum would have a value of NOK 28.5 million. Defense attorney Gulstad believes there are both similarities and differences between Kristiansen’s case and these cases. – What distinguishes this from, for example, the Fritz Moen case is that Viggo Kristiansen was a very young boy when he was wrongfully accused of this. And that it has had extra big consequences for him precisely because it was at the start of his life, when he was supposed to build the foundation that the rest of us take with us. Law professor Morten Holmboe believes the compensation case against Viggo Kristiansen could be the biggest in Norwegian history. He says it would be arrogant of him to guess at the compensation amount as the defenders will be working on this over a long period of time. When asked whether to compare the compensation amount to what was paid out in the Liland and Moen case, he nevertheless believes it can be at least as high. – There can be arguments that there will be even more. Even if they were terrible acts for which they were wrongly convicted, it is probably even worse to be wrongly convicted for the Baneheia case with two little girls who were both raped and killed. He further adds that Kristiansen both served longer than Moen and Liland. – We are talking about amounts at least up to 25–30 million, and it could quickly be more.
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Applying for five million to work on the replacement of Viggo Kristiansen – news Norway – Overview of news from different parts of the country
