Orderud case

Background

On 17 July 1998, while heading to work at the Ministry of Defence, the Norwegian defense minister's personal secretary, Anne Orderud Paust discovered a charge of explosives under her truck. The 500g explosive device was of the type Solex. The incident was given "extremely high priority" with the Oslo police. On 12. August her husband Per Paust, a high level Ministry of Foreign Affairs official, stated that there had been an attempt to ignite a propane gas tank at the stairwell of their apartment in Skillebekk, Oslo. He discovered the 5-kilo tank with an open vent, outside his door which was doused in gasoline. Officials from the fire department claimed that the whole building could easily have been "blown apart". These two assassination attempts received wide publicity and caused a media sensation. In the end no one was charged or arrested in connection with either of the two incidents.

The couple then spent a few months in New York City where Per worked as a temporary Consul-General, returning to Norway in January 1999. Per Paust was then diagnosed with cancer and died after a short period of illness in May that same year. Around 15 May, an anonymous person called and warned the authorities that Anne Paust and her parents would be murdered. Despite extensive searches, the caller was never found, and one week later the same people were found dead.

Murders

On the night of 22 May, Anne Orderud Paust and her parents, Marie (b. 1915) and Kristian Orderud (b. 1918), were shot and killed in the parents' home, on the Olerud Estate in Sørum, Akershus. Hiding in the adjacent woods until the cover of nightfall, the assailant entered the house sometime between midnight and 5am by climbing on to the second floor porch and breaking the window on the veranda door.

Probably awoken by the noise, 84-year old Marie Orderud confronted the intruder as he was entering the house and was shot at close range and killed instantly. Meanwhile, their daughter 47-year old Anne, also entered the room and was likewise shot and killed in the same manner, both women were found in their nightgowns. The assailant then went to the couples bedroom where 80-year-old Kristian Orderud was lying. He was impaired by his old age and was unable to escape or otherwise offer any resistance to the gunman. He was executed from point-blank range. The gunman then proceeded to escape through the same back-door from which he had entered, the only visible trace being the broken door-window.

The next morning, Kristian's brother Hans came to visit, and upon seeing the broken door went in for a closer look. He then discovered the bodies of his family members and contacted the police. The killings happened just weeks after Anne Orderud Paust had voluntarily declined to be assigned close protection officers from the Police Security Service.

Investigation

Early in the investigation, the police felt confident that the assailant or assailants were familiar with the victims and that the victims probably knew their killer. The investigators theorized that the time of the killings had not been coincidental. Based on the fact that only a handful of people knew that Anne would be visiting on that precise time, the investigators concluded that the killer had the house under careful surveillance, and acting when seeing her car parked outside. The main theory is that Anne Orderud Paust was the main target of the killer or killers.

The police further speculated that the victims did not initially realize the danger they were facing, the location of the bodies in the estate's second floor indicated that they did not consider escaping when they faced their intruder, and in spite of the unexpected and dramatic break-in nobody made any effort to alert the police or others. One explanation may be that the victims initially did not feel the intruder to be threatening or did not see it necessary to contact the police. The fact that Kristian Orderud was killed while lying in his bed, indicated that the perpetrator was not a random predator without intimate knowledge of the family, but rather knew exactly who his victims were. This was backed up by the fact that nothing was missing from the house, ruling out a robbery.

In June, four people were charged with premeditated murder or complicity in to premeditated murder: Anne Orderud Paust's brother Per Kristian Orderud (b. 1954), his wife Veronica Orderud (b. 1972), Veronica Orderud's half sister Kristin Kirkemo (later Kristin Kirkemo Haukeland (b. 1973)) and her former partner Lars Grønnerød (b. 1958). The motive for the killings were according to the prosecution a conflict of ownership of the Olerud estate and farm. Marie and Kristian Orderud were registered as the owners of the farm even though their son for years had operated it and wanted to take it over. Prosecutors believed that all four were involved in the murder, but neither the investigation nor the subsequent trials gave answers to who actually carried out the brutal killings.

Verdict

On 22 June 2001, both Per and Veronica Orderud, along with Kristin Kirkemo was found guilty on all charges and each received sentences of 21 years in prison. Lars Grønnerød was found guilty of illegal weapons charges and sentenced to two and a half years in prison.

Aftermath

The murder of Anne Orderud Paust and her parents received media attention like that of no other criminal case in the country's history, with almost daily coverage in the month after the killings, and very intimate account of the accused individuals under the full name. The media coverage led to debate about the media's handling of the case and the police and the defenders' leaks to the media.

Balkan-theory

According to NRK Brennpunkt, reliable sources independently tie both Per Paust and Anne Orderud Paust to Norwegian intelligence services. Per Paust's death fourteen days before the Orderud murders, reportedly from cancer after short-term sickness, has been suspected by people close to him to in reality have been caused by poisoning. Per Paust had worked in Serbia during the 1999 NATO bombing of Yugoslavia, describing it in private as his most difficult task ever, with balancing acts between the two sides in the conflict and involved in work attempting to stop illegal weapons smuggling. Anne Orderud Paust in turn worked with managing threats against the Foreign Ministry.

Kristin Kirkemo, who was convicted for co-conspiracy to the murders, had in turn established close ties to Yugoslavian mafia in Oslo. The godparents to her son are considered by police to be part of Yugoslavian mafia involved in weapons trade, drug trade, and illegal gambling. Income from the mafia reportedly financed Kosovo Albanian guerilla activity. In early 1999 Norwegian police took part in a European-wide crackdown on Kosovo Albanian mafia, including Princ Dobroshi which has been proposed as background for the murders, although no direct link has been uncovered. Although overturned in the Eidsivating Court of Appeal, the Nes District Court initially deemed it proven that Kristin Kirkemo placed dynamite under Anne Paus Orderud's car in the 1998 assassination attempt.

A cousin to Per Orderud claims to have been in contact with criminal sources in Oslo, which alleges that two Yugoslavians from Sweden committed the murders in an ordered hit. Private investigator Tore Sandberg in 2009 produced the name of a suspected killer from Balkan who allegedly committed the murders along with two others.