If the information services seem to believe in a terrorist attack, the police does not exclude the gesture of an unbalanced.
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Over the Revelations, Thursday, October 14, the profile of the alleged attack that made five dead and three wounded, the day before, in Kongsberg, Bourgade of 25,000 inhabitants southwest of Norway , started to be clarified. In the afternoon, the head of the Norwegian intelligence services (Polities Sikkerhetstjente, PST), Hans Sverre Sjovol, felt that there was “no doubt that the attack is a terrorist act”, even if the ‘Survey should specify the patterns of the killer.
Danish nationality, Espen Andersen Brathian, aged 37 grew up in Norway and spent most of his adult life in Kongsberg. According to the head of the regional police, Ole Bredrup Sæverud, the man, who had converted to Islam, was followed up, because of “fears of radicalization”. Mr. Sjovol also affirmed that the intelligence services “knew” the suspect, without specifying what information the PST had or whether special measures had been taken.
The Kongsberg Police was alerted Wednesday at 6:13 pm with witnesses, having seen a man, armed with a bow and arrows, shoot passersby, near a supermarket, causing panic scenes. The suspect was arrested thirty-four minutes later. According to the police, he wore “other weapons”, in addition to the bow, and he killed several of the victims at home. These are four women and a man, aged 50 to 70 years.
In the Norwegian media, one of his childhood friends claimed to contact the police from 2017. Espen Andersen Bråthen had published two videos on Facebook – one in English, the other in Norwegian. The shaved skull, fixing the camera, it presented itself as “a messenger”, carrier of “a warning”. “For all those who want to catch up, the moment came,” he said, before concluding, “Be witnessed that I am a Muslim”.
“seriously ill”
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His friend described it as “a bomb on the point of exploding” and assured he “needed help, but did not get it.” A close to the family affirmed at the NRK channel that it was “seriously ill mentally”, and this since adolescence, which “affected the lives of his loved ones to a high degree”. Unemployed, Espen Andersen Brathian lived alone in an apartment in Kongsberg and had “made back trips to the hospital”, according to Mr. Sjovol.
In 2012, he had been sentenced to sixty days in prison, to enter into a museum and have committed a flight. He was also sentenced for possession and use of amazing products. In July 2020, a court forbade him to approach his parents for six months, after he threatened his father to kill him. Thursday, Prosecuer Ann Irén Svane Mathiassen said he would undergo psychiatric expertise to determine if he could be considered responsible for his actions.
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