The number of rapes within home care in recent years is remarkably high. This is according to criminologist Anders Östlund, who works as an analyst at the Swedish Police Authority. He was involved in planning a campaign portraying Swedish retired men as violent towards their wives; instead, it was discovered that home care poses the greatest threat to Sweden’s elderly women.
– This was something I discovered when I compiled this statistic, Anders Östlund tells Samnytt.

This November, the police are launching the campaign “Violence is Not a Private Matter”. The campaign encourages people to sound the alarm if they suspect there is violence in so-called close relationships.

Anders Östlund is one of those developing the campaign. He is a criminologist and works as an analyst at the Police Authority’s Region Mitt.

A Striking Discovery

The thesis promoted by the Police Authority is that violence often occurs within families and relationships, where the surrounding people do not expect such violence. In one video produced as part of this campaign, for example, an elderly Swedish man beats his wife.

Swedish pensioners subjected to violence by relatives are the police’s main focus.

Before the campaign’s launch, Östlund compiled statistics this spring on reported violence against the elderly. He went through the police’s case database, searching for women over 60 who reported being the victims of serious crimes.

It was then that he made a remarkable discovery.

– The single crime code with the highest number, meaning the most common, was for “women over 60, rape by stranger, indoors”, says Anders Östlund to Samnytt.

SEE ALSO: IVO: Sharp increase in sexual assaults within home care

– That stood out. I had to look into it, because indoor rape by an unknown perpetrator is quite an unusual crime when it comes to rape. Most rapes by unknown perpetrators happen outdoors, and those aren’t very common either.

Home Care Behind the Rapes

Anders Östlund clicks open one of the reports with an unknown perpetrator to see what the report text says. Then he reads another. And another. He quickly notices a pattern.

– I saw that home care and elderly care facilities most often came up, he says.

In total, there are 398 reported rapes against women over 60 from 2021 until the beginning of December this year. In the majority of the detailed cases examined by Östlund, the perpetrators were staff working in home care or at elderly care facilities.

SEE ALSO: IVO: This is how much sexual assaults have increased in elderly care

The police-employed criminologist emphasizes that these are figures not available in any publicly accessible report. Rather, they are his own findings, as he, due to his employment, has access to the police reporting system.

– These are internal numbers. The original purpose of the search was not to look for this. This was something I discovered while compiling these statistics, Östlund explains, referring to the fact he was actually working on the police campaign.

Harder to Prove

Of the 398 reported rapes of older women, 112 cases were reported as the perpetrator being known to the victim, while 286 were coded as unknown.

SEE ALSO: Woman dead after sexual assault in home care in Vänersborg

Östlund has not reviewed all reported cases but says that home care rapists are likely present in both categories. It all depends on whether the victim could identify the perpetrator or not.

– If it is a home care worker who may have visited them ten or twenty times before, then the question is whether he is unknown or coded as “other relationship”, he says.

– Many of the affected are senile and somewhat confused. They may not really know what happened to them or who did it. The stories are no less credible, but it becomes harder to prove.

An example is the Iraqi home care worker who on Wednesday was convicted of one rape but acquitted of another serious rape. The reason is that the court found it proven that the woman had been raped, but not specifically by the Iraqi man.

READ MORE: Government’s new judge Mohamed stops deportation of home care Iraqi who raped 100-year-old

Very Large Dark Figure

So, the result of the police campaign could be summarized as the biggest threat to Sweden’s elderly women seeming not to be their husbands or other relatives, but staff within health and elderly care. A message that appears to contradict the police’s ongoing campaign.

And Anders Östlund fears that the rape cases that come to the police’s attention are only the tip of the iceberg. This is because older people who are subjected to rape and other assaults often do not want to report it.

SEE ALSO: Home care Mahamad in Vänersborg says: “I was horny”

– It’s about the surrounding people needing to react, because many times, they don’t do it themselves. They may not be able to, dare to, or want to, he says.

– Many of them have limited ability, so they must rely on those around them. For example, on children, if there are any, or on home care or healthcare personnel they are in contact with.

Therefore, there are likely a large number of rapes against the elderly, committed by staff in home care and at elderly homes, that the police never learn about.

– The dark figure is huge. Guaranteed, says criminologist Anders Östlund.

SEE ALSO: Elsa, 84, raped by home care – “The toughest thing I’ve experienced”