Bjørn Olav Jahr – Who Murdered Birgitte?
The last minutes Gamle Sundsveg, on the night of May 6, 1995 In daytime, the road Gamle Sundsveg runs through a pleasant recreational area with nice bathing spots and grazing sheep. After nightfall a more dismal shroud falls over it. Total darkness reigns, word has it that you can buy drugs there, and it is a popular location for youngsters who enjoy cars and reckless driving. On the night in question the temperature was around 7 degrees Celsius. Birgitte Tengs arrived in Gamle Sundsveg some time between a quarter past twelve and one o’clock a.m. Some one may have driven her all the way. Or she may have hitched a ride, been dropped off somewhere and walked the final stretch on her own. Or she may have legged it all the way from Kopervik town centre. It’s a distance of four kilometres, but unlike most people, Birgitte wasn’t the least bit afraid of walking all alone along a dirt road at night. She liked to sing as she walked and had a penchant for old folk tunes. Perhaps she sang her last song ever as she walked along Gamle Sundsveg that night. Only the perpetrator knows precisely what happened next at Gamle Sundsveg. What we do know, is that Birgitte was assaulted on the last hilltop before she would have reached the residential area. A hundred metres from her best friend’s house, and only 500 metres from her own home. The perpetrator damaged Birgitte grievously, directing several blows to her head. She tried to defend herself against the punches and received wounds to her arms and hands. The perpetrator beat her till she bled and collapsed to the ground. Using some object that lent itself to chopping motions he slashed her face and head a number of times. She was dealt a deep slash close to the corner of her right eye. The others cuts were spread all over her skull. Most of them were identical in size: a couple of centimetres long and quite sharply defined. Birgitte’s right ear was badly torn. At one point, using an unknown object, he applied pressure to her throat for an extended period of time, blocking the flow of blood back to the heart and finally causing her to faint. He dealt her several wounds to the throat, denting the cross she carried around her neck in the process. It is unlikely that she ever regained consciousness after being suffocated.
1
We do not know whether she succeeded in bruising or hurting her assailant by punching or kicking or scratching him. It is highly probable, though: Birgitte was 172 centimetres tall and weighed 66 kilos. She had been training karate for several years and was a strong girl. And we have solid proof that she yanked and pulled his hair: At the moment of death her bloody right fist was clenched tightly around a number of hairs, some short and some long. There were hairs in her left fist too. The perpetrator most probably grabbed Birgitte from behind, lifted her by the armpits and hauled her down the dirt road. Her hood was soaked in blood and so was her hair. First he pulled her diagonally across the road, then diagonally back again. He stopped in front of a gate. It was fastened with a wire on one side and a length of blue rope on the other. He tried to force the gate open, and the rope on the left side snapped. Behind the fence there is an enclosed pasture. He dragged Birgitte in and left her behind some trees and juniper bushes, lying on her back with her head pointing east. It seems reasonable to assume that he was trying to hide Birgitte. But there may have been other motives. Did he wish to be undisturbed with her behind the bushes? At some point during the deed, Birgitte’s killer abused her sexually. This most likely took place after she was dead. He pulled down her tights and panties. A bloody fingerprint was later found on her left thigh, and he probably left it there. He forced something into her vagina. He didn’t leave any traces of semen. There was a large rock lying on the ground there. The perpetrator slammed Birgitte’s head against it. At some point he probably lifted the rock and grazed the right side of her face with it. By now, Birgitte was probably already deceased. She was badly disfigured, but her face was still intact. In all likelihood he pulled the gate shut before he left her. It is easy to picture him noticing something very important now: Birgitte’s bag, left on the road or in his car. He probably kicked the gate up again before depositing the bag next to Birgitte’s extended arm, behind her head. Then he departed from the crime scene. Or did he decide to stay?
2
«Chaos is also part of the process» February 20–22 1997, one year and nine and a half months after the murder Espen Espeseth hadn’t been totally honest. It wasn’t true that he enjoyed being interrogated. But he preferred it to sitting in his cell, where the air was stuffy and awful. He didn’t want them to notice that he was bored, he wanted them to regard him as a clever pupil. Detective inspector Stian Elle would repeat the same questions to the point of monotony, but even so Espen felt that they had developed a mutual understanding. Elle did occasionally say that he believed Espen had committed the murder, but somehow he also seemed to trust him. Sometimes Espen got the impression that Elle didn’t really believe he was guilty and that he was merely doing his job to keep the chief investigator Ståle Finsal happy. Espen didn’t sleep nearly as well as he led them to believe. He didn’t want to make a negative impression, didn’t want them to see him as a whiner. But every hour in the cell wore him down. He had always been very active, but now he suffered from terrible headaches. He felt restless and experienced chest pains. These made him suspect that he might be suffering from a heart condition. A doctor checked him and could confirm that his muscles were indeed unusually tense. Every day he asked if he could have visitors, but he was told that the police had to get to the bottom of the matter or at least have a better idea of what they were dealing with before there could be any question of receiving visitors. «I see that what you mean is that I won’t get any visitors until I confess», he said. Elle was honest enough to confirm his supposition, although they weren’t officially allowed to say that. Espen was very upset when he heard this. At 10 a.m. on Thursday the 20th of February Stian Elle and his colleague Lars Grindheim had a meeting with Arvid Sjødin to go through the case. Elle was very interested in what Sjødin would have to say. The previous evening the lawyer had had a long conversation with Espen. The police wanted Espen to trust Sjødin, so Finsal had asked everyone on the team to adopt a positive tone whenever they mentioned his name to Espen. Sjødin met their expectations. One of the things he had repeated to Espen was that everyone was convinced that the police had caught the right man. When Espen argued
3
that if the perpetrator had lain over Birgitte, he would have been covered with blood, the lawyer once again informed Espen that technical evidence might prove a fact, but that didn’t necessarily imply that it could rule anything out. The only really encouraging thing the lawyer could tell his client was that he would be free to study in prison. Before the interrogation started, Espeseth requested a few minutes alone with Sjødin. When Elle went in to Espen just after twelve o’clock, it transpired that Espen had written a note that night: He confessed to having killed Birgitte although he could remember none of it. Sjødin refused to let him deliver the note. He couldn’t admit to a murder if he couldn’t remember having committed it. Espen told Elle that his head was filled with chaos. «Chaos is also part of the process», Elle replied. And there was plenty of chaos to come. On the one hand Espen was eager to assume responsibility. His world had become quite compressed. Most of his communication was with one person, Stian Elle. Apart from that he spoke with Sjødin, Finsal and Grindheim. They all wanted him to assume responsibility. Ease his conscience. Shake off the negative workings of his mind. Look forward. Provide Birgitte’s next of kin with the answers they needed. On the other hand he had absolutely no recollection or memory of having caused Birgitte’s death. Was it really possible to repress a deed as gruesome as that? But again Elle knew what to do: «Yesterday we spoke about telling a story. How do you feel about that?» he asked. «That’s not a bad idea», Espeseth answered. He enjoyed writing. The idea was for him to view the whole affair from above – as if he were God – in order to gain a new perspective. He said that his thoughts floated freely when he wrote. He was an eloquent writer, and in high school he had often been the best student in his class. His assignment was to account for everything that happened from Kopervik. Where he imagined Birgitte to be, what she was doing. He knew that she had come up from Costa and walked to Becks. The next part was about the return trip home. Elle and Espen discussed various alternative options. She could have met someone in the pedestrian area, because there were plenty of people there. Or she could have met someone as she walked along the road. Or perhaps someone followed her? Or perhaps she walked where the elderly driver had observed her? Elle also observed that «if someone she doesn’t know is obtrusive, she might find that uncomfortable». They were busy writing the script for a film about the murder of Birgitte Tengs. The following day Stian Elle read through the script Espeseth had written. «Whom did you write it for?» he asked.
4
«For you», Espeseth replied. «For me?» «Typical me, writing so much … it could have been two pages instead of five …» «Let's start with Kopervik. Do you feel that anything is missing in your picture?» «Yes, a lot is missing», Espeseth confirmed. They discussed what the person who met Birgitte might have talked with her about. Sports results, perhaps? «Maybe she invites him home to her, but that doesn’t seem likely», Elle jotted down in his diary. He asked Espeseth to describe the street scene well enough for «the reader to envisage it». Among other things, he wanted to know where they met, why they chose the route they ended up taking, what sort of tone there was between them, whether she took him by the hand and how that felt for him. «Does the film audience know what’s going to happen in advance?» Espeseth asked. «It is important that you describe what takes place, and show how what eventually transpires, may have been unforeseen», Elle replied. «Events may have suddenly taken a very surprising turn.» The policeman fed Espeseth the key words «run», «breaking glass», «using force». «You mean messing around?» Espeseth asked. But Elle needed more. He wanted Espeseth to describe how «the two» behaved towards one another. He thought the screenplay was advancing too fast. «You need to use more time explaining the film, so that I understand and register everything that happens», Elle said. Espeseth was sitting with one leg pulled up into the chair. He wrote a few words, paused, read them to himself and continued. He would take breaks of 30 to 60 seconds before he carried on writing. Now and then he read what he had out loud to Elle. The Detective Inspector noted that Espeseth read with a sense of involvement. Now he wanted to know more about the crime scene: «We both know that they left tracks in the road and that she was found somewhere else. Why?» «Do you want me to describe how her head was smashed?» Espeseth asked. He sat up in the chair and looked Elle in the eye. Elle wanted to know where the story’s «he» went. «What is he thinking? What is he doing?» Elle said. Espeseth answered that he probably wanted to wash his hands before he went to bed, and perhaps he folded his clothes neatly for the next day. Before they ended that day’s session, Espeseth was given a new «home assignment»: Write about how the perpetrator fled from the scene.
5
The perpetrator moved his hands to places where they shouldn’t be, Espeseth had written in the script he handed Elle the following day. Following that there was a blank page before he described an escape route that went down Øygardsvegen and further on to Brekke, four kilometres from the crime scene, in the direction of Åkra. «He» had been fortunate enough not to be observed by anybody. His parents had been in Stavanger and hadn’t returned until the day after. The description of the escape obviously didn’t fit the investigators’ theory. Espeseth refused to write about what had happened before the escape – what they referred to as «the blank page». «You realise why that one page is empty?» Espeseth asked. «No, but I’m sure you will tell me that», Elle replied. «I don’t really want to go into it». «I understand why the page is empty», Elle said. He suggested that Espeseth could fill it in later. Espeseth asked if he had to. «No», Elle replied and asked him to elaborate on the escape instead. Espeseth described a perpetrator who was panicking and unable to think straight. The one thing that filled his head was how to get to Brekke. Espeseth had trouble describing what had happened after the perpetrator arrived at home. When Elle inquired about Saturday morning, Espeseth answered that the perpetrator tidied and cleaned the house and stuck his clothes in the washing machine. Elle got the impression that Espeseth was done with the «story». At a quarter to three that afternoon Ståle Finsal came to the police station to have a talk with Espeseth. He informed Espen that he himself was the story’s «he». Espen tried to protest. During the conversation he broke down and cried several times when his grandparents, Hege and his father were mentioned. But Finsal was generous enough to share some personal insights with Espen. The head of investigation talked about how hard life could be, but how one had to focus on the positive. Then he showed Espen a picture of «his beloved daughter». Around the same time, the Swedish psychiatrist Ulf Åsgård finished a report titled The Murder of Birgitte Tengs. Analysis of partial aspects. Åsgård had read a selection of the case documents and had conducted talks with Stian Elle and Ståle Finsal. According to Åsgård, Birgitte Tengs was the victim of a premeditated but failed sexual assault, which in some perpetrators could trigger a considerable rage. He claimed that a rapist attacking an unknown victim most probably would have just fled. The hypothesis that Birgitte could identify her assailant was substantiated by the extensive use of violence – in a state of frenzy – and the assumption that she had
6
arrived in Gamle Sundsveg in his company, and in good faith. Åsgård didn’t think it was plausible that Birgitte had hitch-hiked to the crime scene in a car, because if that were the case, the attack would probably have occurred at some more convenient location along the way. Åsgård made a detailed comparison of what Espeseth said under interrogations in May 1995 and what he said in January 1997. According to Åsgård, there were significant deviations. Åsgård also found it hard to believe that Espeseth supposedly had been worn out around midnight after sitting an exam in life saving, followed by handball training: A more or less top level sportsman who is exhausted after a school test and his almost daily training routine, and who normally stays out till around one on Friday and Saturday nights, that doesn’t sound very likely! From a psychodynamic point of view, assumed tiredness is normally a sign of anger. Our way of putting things is revealing. For instance, we say: I’m so tired of architects. What we really mean is: I’m angry with architects for their bad planning in this or that instance. The Swedish psychiatrist found it suspicious that Espeseth had sought contact with the fifteen-year old girl he supposedly had passed on his bicycle. He also saw something odd in what Espen had told about the last meal he had eaten on the night of the killing. In May 1995 Espeseth said he had eaten a bowl of Corn Flakes and gone to the toilet afterwards. In January 1997 he said that he had gone to the kitchen and fetched some fruit and yoghurt and taken it to his room. «These are two quite incompatible versions», Åsgård wrote. «Which means he has lied at least once. That indicates that we are dealing with a construction, an attempt to adapt to the routine.» Although Åsgård said that there was nothing that conclusively pointed towards Espen Espeseth having committed the murder on Birgitte Tengs, he thought it was «conspicuously difficult to find any strong arguments in favour of his innocence». Ulf Åsgård never met Espen Espeseth during the process of his psychological examination of him.
The defence’s trump card June 8-9, 1998 Icelandic psychologist Gísli H. Guðjónsson was widely regarded as one of the world’s foremost experts on the phenomenon of false confessions. He was head of the department of forensic psychology at The Institute of Psychiatry of King’s College
7
London. In Gulating Court of Appeal he turned out to be the defence’s trump card in the quest to have Espen Espeseth acquitted. On May 27 1998, Guðjónsson completed a 29-page report on Espen Espeseth. His conclusion was unambiguous: «On the basis of the present psychological evaluation, I was satisfied, beyond any reasonable doubt, that Espen Espeseth had made a false confession to the police in February 1997. His false confession was of the coercedinternalised type», Guðjónsson wrote. He would argue in favour of the same conclusion in court. A coerced internalized false confession occurs when the suspect starts to believe that he may have committed the crime he is accused of, although he has no recollection of having done it. Guðjónsson uses the term «memory distrust syndrome» to explain a memory malfunction where people develop a fundamental doubt concerning their own memory, which makes them highly susceptible to external information sources or figments of their own imagination. The syndrome can appear in suspects who from the outset have no clear recollection of the alleged crime – and therefore also may have committed it – as well as in suspects who have a clear recollection of not having committed the alleged crime. Espen Espeseth belonged to the last group, the ones who gradually, due to finely tuned manipulation by the interrogator, develop a lack of faith in their own memories and notions because they find themselves in a confused state of mind. Some would claim that the phenomenon is more or less identical to «thought reforming» or «brainwashing», where manipulative interrogation techniques confuse the suspect to the point where his self-doubt is so strong that he begins to adjust his notions of reality. Guðjónsson distinguishes between false memory and false conviction: According to the Icelandic psychologist, Espeseth developed a false conviction that he had killed his cousin. It was past four in the afternoon when Guðjónsson entered the witness box in Gulating Court of Appeal on June 8, 1998. He had sat patiently through Ulf Åsgård’s almost two day long deposition on why Espen Espeseth’s confession was to be believed: «If this is fiction, it is a masterpiece», Åsgård said before elaborating: «It is remarkable if someone telling an imaginary tale can evaluate the weight of a rock he supposedly never ever held in his hand.» He pointed to visual impressions and emotions connected to the event and talked about details that only the perpetrator could have knowledge of. The Swedish psychiatrist couldn’t see that there was anything to blame in the way Stian Elle had conducted his interrogations, either. On the contrary, he thought Swedish policemen could learn a lot from Elle: «Stian Elle is not a person who manipulates people. One could learn a lot from his careful approach. I find nothing to indicate that the accused has been tricked», Åsgård said.i
8
Guðjónsson couldn’t have disagreed more. His verdict on Åsgård’s report was as follows: «It is obviously not based on scientific principles. The analysis is speculative. I think the members of the jury could have done an equally good, if not better, job.» The forensic committee also criticized Åsgård, for having performed a psychiatric evaluation of Espeseth without even talking to him, and for having used his personal knowledge of Elle as reassurance that the interrogations had been conducted in an acceptable manner – without discussing their extensiveness and lack of any external impulses. On April 14, 1998, Gulating Court of Appeal had appointed Gísli Guðjónsson as expert witness with a mandate to determine: 1. Is this a false confession? 2. Is it an instance of repressed and hidden memory? In the case against Espen Espeseth he had no doubt. He emphasized that he rarely drew bombastic conclusions. «An unusually strong case», Guðjónsson said. This «so called confession» was unreliable. «In criminal cases where the confession is the main evidence, the police and prosecuting authority will often claim that under interrogation the accused provided so many details concerning the crime that he simply must have been involved. The argument is that no innocent person could have known so much about the case, and so his ”specific knowledge” is used as evidence against him. This is an argument that contains serious flaws», Guðjónsson argued. He said that there were a number of examples from English cases where the police, intentionally or unintentionally, had provided the suspect with information. At this point judge Steinar Trovåg interrupted him: «That’s enough for today.» There would be plenty more from Guðjónsson the following day. And there was a lot of expectation tied to his deposition. Dagbladet’s commentator Hilde Haugsgjerd wrote: «Today the jury in Gulating Court of Appeal may swerve to the opposite view in the question of guilt. Forensic psychologist Gísli Guðjónsson is going to argue his case and attempt to persuade the court not to trust the confession Birgitte’s cousin made to the police.» Gísli Guðjónsson had prepared himself thoroughly. In advance of the trial he had met with the prosecutors as well as the defence. He was guided along the route Birgitte Tengs was supposed to have followed, and also shown the crime scene. And he examined Elle’s office, where the interrogations of Espeseth had taken place, as well as the custody cells in Haugesund police station. Guðjónsson’s report revealed that Espen Espeseth had been subjected to interrogations for a length of approximately 180 hours between February 10 and March 19, 1997. During that time Espeseth made several self-incriminating admissions, whilst at the same time having absolutely no actual recollection of the murder.
9
In court Guðjónsson explained how Espeseth had been subjected to coercion and psychological manipulation by policemen who already held a self-confirming prejudice against him. According to Guðjónsson, the police’s approach was characterized by their single-minded and consistent attempt to amass incriminating evidence and avoid questions that might provide contradicting evidence. Judge Trovåg asked him to conduct himself more briefly and concentrate on delivering his conclusions. Guðjónsson listed ten psychological strategies that had been employed to force a confession out of Espen Espeseth. He substantiated his points with specific referrals to Stian Elle’s notebook: 1. Isolating him from friends and family. Guðjónsson thought this was a conscious means of putting pressure on him, and the possibility of easing up on the restrictions was used as a type of bait to induce him to confess. No visits «while there still were things that weren’t accounted for». 2. Exaggerating and overstating the strength of the evidence. Among other things, Elle had written in his notebook: «We have the best crime technicians in the country – what do the silent leads say – never disappear» and «how do you view the fact that there is increasing new information which may not point in your favour?» 3. Creating an atmosphere of trust and understanding of how things might have gone wrong. 4. Repeatedly challenging and undermining Espeseth’s own recollection concerning his alibi. When Espeseth started to believe that he had suffered a memory loss, he wasn’t believed. «Him not remembering was not acceptable. We wouldn’t buy that.» 5. Creating anxiety in Espeseth about his maintaining his innocence. If he spoke about «what really had happened», that would boost his credibility in court, and he wouldn’t be able to sleep at night unless he talked about «what he had done». 6. Inducing feelings of guilt in Espeseth and playing on his existing sensitivities. Making references to his alleged comments on May 17, 1995 concerning his being pleased that the victim was dead, or making references to previous incidents of indecent exposure. 7. Perhaps coaching Espeseth concerning salient details from the crime scene. 8. Recalling «repressed memories» by making Espeseth tell the story in the third person and utilising a film script. When Espeseth claimed that he couldn’t recall anything, this was ignored. 9. Implying that Espeseth might get a reduced sentence if he played with an open hand and was cooperative. 10. Handing the interrogation over to a colleague whose technique was more aggressive: «Correct that Ståle takes over and pushes him a bit».
10
Guðjónsson also noted how unfortunate it was that Espeseth’s lawyer, Arvid Sjødin, failed to provide him with the support he desperately needed as he was being interrogated. As a matter of fact, there were a number of entries in the policemen’s notebooks that indicated that Sjødin collaborated with the police to make Espeseth confess. The Icelandic psychologist pointed out that it can be terribly tough when you start doubting your own memory and the policemen at the same time express nothing but confidence in your guilt. It took Espeseth a few months to build his confidence back up to a level where he dared to deny having committed the murder. Although it is easier to induce people with a lower intelligence to give false confessions, there are plenty of examples of smart people doing the same. «We are all vulnerable to manipulation», Guðjónsson said. It’s only a question of locating a person’s weakness: Espen Espeseth’s weakness was his history of indecent exposure and the shame attached to it. «Faith can be misused. Sometimes people have too much faith in the police. I believe Espen Espeseth had blind faith in Elle. He was totally dependent on him. You don’t see it often, but it developed into a therapeutic relationship. Espen was ashamed of his sexual activities when he was fifteen. He had a need to talk. Elle noticed that and exploited it», Guðjónsson said in court. The critical point in the interrogations was the two-hour period Espeseth kept being asked to account for. «How long does it take to recount two hours of your life?» was Guðjónsson’s rhetorical question. He related the conversation he had had with Stian Elle before writing his psychologist report, and in which it transpired that the talks with Espeseth had revolved around him having to prove his innocence. At this point Guðjónsson was interrupted by the judge, who wanted to know if the interrogation of Elle had been recorded. Gísli Guðjónsson was a tranquil person, but now he felt obliged to point out that the judge kept interrupting him. And then he apologized and said that no, unfortunately he hadn’t recorded his conversation with Elle. «That is what this case is about», he continued. «Creating doubt and anxiety. That is psychological manipulation.» «I have to interrupt you again», Trovåg said. «We’ve been going through that notebook for days.» «Ok, I’ll do as …» «Just underline the factors you consider manipulative, instead of going through all this. A different approach. We’ll take a ten-minute break and let you sort it out.» Later, as Guðjónsson drew close to the final part of his statement, he addressed the jury: «I warn you: be cautious! We have several examples of intelligent people making demonstrably false confessions. It is merely a question of uncovering a person’s weaknesses and playing on these.» And, he added: «The police will often
11
say: ’he is guilty because he knew too much’, and that he knows things that only a perpetrator can know.» He repeated that the jury must be careful and that many people were convicted on similar grounds, even if they had no «special knowledge at all». When time came for him to read his conclusion, which also was included in the report, he couldn’t find it. As he shuffled through the papers containing his summary – he had planned to present them as slides – Steinar Trovåg started reading it aloud – faster and probably with quite a different pathos than Guðjónsson had intended to use. Lawyer Sigurd Klomsæt jumped up, he was outraged. Never before had he seen an expert witness being denied the opportunity to read his own conclusion. When Trovåg had finished reading Klomsæt gave the judge an indignated look: «A 19 year old man’s life is in the balance! In my 17 years as counsel for the defence I have never experienced anything like this.» Had he been allowed to use his own words, Guðjónsson could also have mentioned that, based on his psychological observations, he was convinced that Espeseth had delivered a false confession to the police in February 1997. He could have added that a fundamental problem concerning the self-incriminating admissions Espeseth had made to the police, was that he had confessed to having committed a crime of which he had no recollection at all. It was obvious that he, in the course of the extensive interrogations, had come to believe that he had killed Birgitte Tengs. Guðjónsson had no doubt that Espeseth had done his utmost to fetch up memories that he was convinced were in there somewhere, but without succeeding. While Espen Espeseth was in a vulnerable state of mind, he was subjected to psychological manipulation and coercion through drawn-out police interrogations, which finally resulted in his making a false «confession». Aside from that, Guðjónsson couldn’t find anything to indicate that Espeseth suffered from robust repression and psychogenic amnesia concerning the murder of Birgitte Tengs. He considered this highly unlikely and advised the jury to disregard it as a possibility. Later Gísli Guðjónsson would comment on his experiences in Gulating Court of Appeal. He told Bergensavisen: «The judge seemed to be taking the role of the prosecutor. I have never seen that before. The judge was quite harsh with the defendant, cross-examining him in a manner more in keeping with a prosecutor.» Concerning his own testimony, he said: «The judge hurried me through my deposition and made me shorten it considerably. I was forced to change my approach, and that’s a first time for me.» He had noticed that Trovåg kept glancing at his watch. At first he assumed that the judge was worried about keeping the schedule. However, the police’s expert witness,
12
Ulf Åsgård, had been allotted almost twice as much time to argue in favour of the confession’s veracity.
13