Hagamannen. A city trauma awakening.

I was thinking when I said hello to him at my grocery store parking lot the other day, the uncle, I was thinking, how is it even possible to handle what will happen this week?

In media, and among people here in Umeå, he goes by the name Hagamannen. Roughly translated  “the man who is connected to Haga”. Haga is the quiet Umeå neighborhood where most of his rapes and extremely brutal abuse were executed. But his name is Niklas Lindgren, and the man I said hello to at the parking lot his uncle. This I know because the extended family lives a couple of villages down the road from me. This I know because Hagamannen’s little daughter was best friends with a girl close to me. This I know because Niklas Lindgren was an ordinary family man going to PTA conferences in the same school as I did when my sons were younger. But he was also a beast holding a city in horror for years and finally convicted in six cases on a scale from attempt rape to attempted murder.

1998-2000, six women and a 14-year old girl reported assault and abuse in the Haga neighborhood to the police, in three cases aggravated rape. No one in Umeå was unaffected by Hagamannen during those years. Women learned how to hold their key rings as weapons while walking home, never alone. Men learned how to switch sides at the sidewalk walking behind a woman, not to frighten her. Parents put their daughters in taxis or picked them up, dropped them off. A whole city watched over it’s shoulders for years.

Then, for five years, it was quiet. What happened, did he move? But nowhere in Sweden the same pattern showed up. Was he in jail for some other crime? Was he dead?  Probably one of those things, because someone performing that sort of behavior doesn’t just stop all of a sudden. The constant tension in Umeå eased out a bit.

Then, in 2005, it happened again. This time an extremely violent rape. 

The women all reported the same description of the man. 25-35 years old, about 5,6 (170 cm) tall, ordinary Swedish by origin looks. The police was working from the theory that the man was a lonely outsider probably unemployed who came home to nobody after his nightly raids, brutally destroying women. A ghost picture sketch haunted us day and night and we became very observant of every mans feet, Hagamannen’s were unusually small.

14 000 names were in the investigation, 3000 men were interrogated and 777 had their DNA taken. March 29 2006 a man was arrested. Niklas Lindgren. A metal worker at a garage in Haga, living quietly with his family in a small village outside Umeå. Going berserk after parties at work, raping women. Sometimes 2-3 assaults in only a couple of hours. Once, a rape with excessive violence close to the University hospital. His child had just been delivered.

In July 2006 Niklas Lindgren was sentenced to prison for 14 years. On Tuesday July 28 he will be released on parole after having served 2/3 of his sentence, 9 years. He is at high risk for relapse and is deemed dangerous. Still, that’s the law.

Here in Umeå an old trauma is awakening. And a new one is happening. Niklas Lindgren wants to start his after prison life in Umeå where his family connections are. And he is allowed to do that. This upcoming week, probably, he will be back. Still dangerous. Umeå will start watching over it’s shoulder again.

It’s horrible. It’s all horrible. What was and what is. But, saying hello to his uncle the other day I am thinking, how… I can’t even find the words. How will they handle this? How can they handle this? Your flesh and blood. Rightfully hated and feared by a whole city. I can’t wrap my head around it.