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Man jailed for throwing stone at policeman in Sweden's Easter riots

TT/The Local
TT/The Local - [email protected]
Man jailed for throwing stone at policeman in Sweden's Easter riots
A demonstrator throws a stone in Rinkeby in the riots that followed Rasmus Paludan's Koran burning. Photo: Henrik Montgomery/TT

A 30-year-old man has been jailed for six months for throwing a stone at a policeman during one of the riots that swept Sweden over Easter.

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The man was found guilty of "violent rioting" and "attempted violence against an officer" for his behaviour during a riot in the Stockholm suburb of Rinkeby on Good Friday. 

The sentence by the Solna District Court marks the first ruling connected with the unrest, which followed a series of Koran-burnings carried out by the Danish far-Right activist Rasmus Paludan. 

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Although the man was found guilty of taking part in the riot, the court ruled that there was no evidence he was an organiser or instigator of the violence. 

“Many people were active and the crowd rushed back and forth for a long time. There has been no indication that [his] actions had any effect on the crowd ", the court wrote in its judgement. 

Although he threw a stone, it did no damage as the policeman managed to duck in time. 

READ ALSO: Swedish police say riots are ‘extremely serious crimes against society'

The police had requested SEK 10,000 in damages, but the court refused to award any, arguing that violence was to be expected at such a large riot. 

"This was a situation where the police had a clear reason to expect to be met by some violence, and can be assumed to have been prepared for this," the court wrote.

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