Subscribe
The police’s ability to intercept and bug people of interest was expanded last year, but now the Swedish government is making even more far-reaching proposals to let the police intercept and bug people in the fight against imported crime gang.
Those who believe that these proposals weaken personal integrity are right. But those who wanted to protect personal integrity should have thought about it before opening the Swedish borders wide open to all the world’s criminals. Sweden now has an extremely serious crime rate. It must be fought with all the force that a state with rule of law can muster.
Consequence of “generous” immigration
If Sweden is not to become a new Somalia or Lebanon, the police must regain its paramount role. Only then can law and order be restored. Accusations of a “police state” are shouted from the left. Yes, that is a not entirely wrong conclusion. But it is their fault that steps in that direction must be taken.
All those who wanted to let hundreds of thousands of people into the country without control, without prior preparation and without requiring the new arrivals to assimilate into Swedish society, are responsible for why the surveillance by the police and the rule of law must now be increased even more.
This is a direct consequence of “generous” immigration.
Previous tightening of the laws successful
The center-right government (EPP / RE) with support of the Sweden Democrats (ECR) is now going to the legislative council with new legislative proposals with the aim of giving the police even more preventive means of coercion. The intention is for the new laws to come into force on 1 July this summer.
On the website, the government explains that previous tightening measures have been successful.
“On October 1, 2023, changes to the law came into force that increased the ability of police and prosecutors to use preventive coercive measures to prevent certain serious crimes committed within criminal networks. Although the changes to the law have been in force for a relatively short time, they have already had an impact. Violent crime has been prevented and preliminary investigations into preparation for murder and serious weapons and drug crimes have been able to be opened.”
Therefore, additional means of coercion and power in the hands of police and prosecutors are needed to achieve even greater success.
Improving Police Efficiency
Secret interception of rooms and house searches will now be allowed to be used for preventive purposes against, among other things, espionage, terrorist crimes and serious crimes committed in criminal networks.
Things that have been intercepted in criminal investigations can be used as evidence in other prosecutions for more serious crimes, for example serious fraud, serious tax offences, serious subsidy offences, and serious smuggling.
The possibilities of obtaining information stored in other than mobile phones or computers, for example cloud services, can be searched in certain cases where foreigners pose a serious threat to Sweden’s security.
Legal certainty is a trade-off
Complaints about weakened legal rights always appear when law enforcement gets stronger muscles, and always from the criminals’ perspective. The criminals rights are violated. But now is the time to turn the argument around: How many shootings, explosions, fraud and violence should the decent public have to endure? It is now time to ensure their rights, that is to say to avoid being exposed to criminality which is deeply offensive to them.
In the legal council referral, the government writes: “The regulation of preventive coercive measures has been designed after a balance between, on the one hand, society’s need for effective crime fighting to protect citizens and, on the other hand, fundamental freedoms and rights such as the individual’s right to integrity and legal certainty in relation to the state.”
Therefore, in the new tools, the means of coercion, special requirements have been built into “legal certainty guarantees and control mechanisms that ensure that the granting of permits is legally secure and that the intrusion into personal integrity does not become greater than what can be accepted according to the form of government, the European Convention and the EU Charter of Rights. ”
One reason for maintaining legal certainty is that the innocent should not suffer. There is the final limit to how much tougher a rule of law can act.
The personal integrity of criminals disappears while more solved crimes mean strengthened personal integrity for the innocent. It is the balance that is now required. Sweden shouldn’t have ended up here, but now we are. Then law enforcement must be given the tools needed to protect the law abiding population.