Polisen | Motverket

Investigations into Swedish policing, use of force, surveillance, registers, and police accountability.

• When the police are allowed to entice the crime: the legislative council referral on provocation, fictitious abuse images, and concealed vehicles

  The government's legislative proposal from September 7, 2026, provides explicit legal support for police and prosecutors to undertake actions that may lead someone to commit a crime, allows the police to produce and share fictitious child pornography images, and establishes a law on covert vehicles. Proposed effective date is March 1, 2027. The review distinguishes between what is proposed, who is authorized to decide, and the objections raised by the Parliamentary Ombudsman (JO), the Swedish Prosecution Authority, and universities.

• Real-time facial recognition: the law from July 1 and the images that have already been tested

  The Act (2026:806) and the Ordinance (2026:815) are effective from July 1, 2026. The police tested the system in June using material from the national camera platform. The review distinguishes between the thresholds of the law, test data on innocent individuals, and what is not Palantir.

• Five-year-old taken by police: police powers, possible offences and the child’s rights

  A court order authorised police to collect the child, but did not give them unlimited discretion. Motverket examines the requirements of a gentle and proportionate intervention, the child’s best interests and possible criminal liability if the limits were exceeded.

• The Police's Two Streams: Public Accounts, Strategic Communication, and Closed Corps Spirit

  Review of the police's public social media, communication budget, and framework agreement for strategic communication, contrasted with the closed Facebook group UMF where thousands of police officers spread mockery against critics and women.

• Surveillance Behind Bars: Kumla, Forensic Psychiatry in Växjö, and the Room That Must Not Exist

  The Parliamentary Ombudsman (JO) is investigating suspected illegal surveillance and misconduct at Kumla. In Växjö, two employees were dismissed following the discovery of hidden cameras at the forensic psychiatric facility. The review distinguishes between investigation and established oversight—and demonstrates why the protection of privacy is most fragile precisely when the state already holds the key.

• Nybro: two boys mildly injured after crash with police bus during a stop

  Update August 3: The injury status has been adjusted from serious/ICU to minor injuries according to Region Kalmar län's bulletin. The collision occurred during police control on August 2 and is being investigated by special investigations.

• Police vehicles in traffic accidents: how common during emergency driving?

  The VTI study commissioned by the Swedish Police Authority shows that pursuits dominate emergency response accidents, that ramming is the most common, and that one in ten police officers in external service has been involved in a serious accident during an emergency response.

• Lerum 2020: 16-year-old moped rider died after police followed – officer acquitted

  Alexander Storåker, 16, died in Lerum on May 12, 2020, when a plainclothes police patrol pursued the cross moped. The police officer was charged with causing another person's death and misconduct but was acquitted. The case highlights the regulations for the pursuit of unprotected vehicles.

• Sweden’s 2025 Ombudsman complaints: police cases rose by nearly 50 per cent

  Sweden’s Parliamentary Ombudsmen registered 15,429 new cases in 2025. Police complaints rose from 1,334 to 1,998, but a complaint is not a proven error. A source-critical review of the figures, the oversight gap and JO’s actual powers.

• Police violence, reports and violence: the statistics behind the review

  Special Prosecution Chamber, SU statistics, fatal police interventions and the older DN review on women violence as most common off-duty police offences.

• Police stun guns: stun guns, risks, TASER 7 and increasing use

  Review of police stun guns: model and make, volts, what the electroshock does to the body, medical risk groups, improper use and interactive statistics on coercion, firing and driving shocks.

• Armatech, Defensor and the police stun guns: the supplier, the owners and former ÖB on the board

  Review of the supplier ranks behind police stun guns: Armatech/AXON, Defensor Group, Flat Capital, SAFE4U and board details of former ÖB Sverker Göranson.

• The demands of police training: aptitude tests, lowered limits and the risk of quantity before quality

  Review of the admission requirements of police training, the UNIQ aptitude test, the National Audit Office's critique, Aftonbladet's 200 seconds-alarm and new proposed requirements 2026.

• Independent and extended confiscation: seizure, loaned car and when authorities seize property

  Examination of independent forfeiture, extended confiscation, confiscation of criminal proceeds, open cases and amounts, loaned cars taken by the Swedish Enforcement Administration and risks when seized goods disappear from the police.

• Palantir police: review of AI system, privacy and Swedish pension money

  What kind of police officer is Palantir? According to reports, Swedish police are using Palantir's analysis platform. Here you get what we know, why it's controversial, which Swedish authorities are concerned and what it means for your privacy.

• Police reconnaissance records (ASP): criticism, gypsies and what is meant by Z-register

  From the computerization in 1979 to the Scanian mapping in 2009—2013 and the IMY criticism in 2014: this is how the debate grew about police reconnaissance records, groupings such as gypsies and the unofficial term Z-register.

• Fasces in the Police Arms: the Ghost Bunch, the Rule of Law and the Fascist Associations

  The emblem of the Swedish Police includes crossed ghost bundles, fasces with bilas. The symbol has older roots in Roman law and state power, but has also been criticized for modern links to fascism.

• When gangs trained at shooting range: police as instructor and the control that burst

  DN states that a police officer worked as an instructor at a shooting range where people connected to rough gang environments trained. This raises larger questions about by-pursuits, gun environments and the police's own risk control.

• The Gotland affair and Peter Rätz: infiltrators, drugs and evidence that never became simple

  A careful review of what can be coated about the Gotland affair: the orchestrated heroin deal, the role of Peter Rätz, denials from police leadership and the issue of hidden evidence.