The proposal means that a crime victim who has been awarded damages does not first need to claim damages from the perpetrator in order to receive compensation from the Crime Victim Authority.
It should be sufficient that a judgment on damages can no longer be appealed. However, it must first be investigated whether the crime victim can receive compensation through insurance.
The investigator Johan Danelius also proposes extended possibilities for seizure of the perpetrator's assets to enable the crime victim to receive damages. Certain compensations, which are currently exempt from seizure, such as compensation for deprivation of liberty, are proposed to be subject to seizure.
Parents to pay more?
According to the government's directives, the investigator was also to review whether parents' liability for damages caused by their children through crime should be tightened.
Today, guardians have strict liability for damages caused by their children under 18 years of age through crime. The liability applies regardless of whether the parents are considered negligent or not. However, it is limited to one-fifth of a price base amount, which this year corresponds to 11,760 kronor per damage occasion.
The investigator does not believe that the limit should be higher. If the government still wants to raise the limit, he proposes an increase to 19,600 kronor.
We generally believe in criminal policy that it is important to emphasize parents' responsibility for their children, says Minister of Justice Gunnar Strömmer (M).
On the other hand, the investigator proposes that parents' liability for damages caused by crimes committed by their children should also include pure property damage, such as money lost in fraud. Today, liability only applies to personal and property damages.
Noted case
The investigation also proposes possibilities for the state to refuse or reduce compensation for a person who was deprived of liberty but was later convicted of a less serious crime than in the original judgment. The background is a man who served a prison sentence for human trafficking and two cases of aggravated assault, but had his prison sentence reduced.
He then received 840,000 kronor in compensation for suffering, since he had been imprisoned for 14 months too long, which was higher than the damages he was sentenced to pay his victims.
