On Friday, Henrik Landerholm was acquitted by Attunda District Court of the charge of negligence with secret information. The court considered that Landerholm had been careless but that it was not a matter of deliberate risk-taking.
I was personally surprised by the outcome for some reasons, says Jörgen Holmlund, military teacher at the Department of War Science.
”Has been careless”
Landerholm has said that he did not consider the documents, which he forgot on a conference center, as protected. But Holmlund points out that the development of a NATO strategy together with American interests with links to Turkey suggests that they were extremely sensitive at the time, even if they did not have a formal secrecy stamp.
That the information was sensitive, that it was disclosed and that Landerholm had been careless could have been enough for a conviction.
But now the court has taken a position and thinks for some reasons that it does not quite meet the gross carelessness required to convict him.
Wilhelm Agrell, professor emeritus in intelligence analysis, thinks, on the other hand, that the verdict is reasonable.
He has been careless and forgotten the documents. It is another thing than if he had sat at a café table in Stockholm and waved the documents and said that "here I have secret information". That would have been much more blatant.
However, it reveals a lack of security culture within the country's highest leadership, Agrell believes.
One has not had proper routines, and then such mistakes are made all the time.
It naturally affects the trust in the Government Offices, the government and the head of government themselves. It is connected to how Landerholm was hand-picked for this position and how one has built up this function quite unsystematically.
”Not had proper routines”
Neither Holmlund nor Agrell believes that the carelessness will affect other countries' trust in Sweden to any great extent.
There are much worse cases with spies who have entered the protected organizations and leaked information and that is much more serious, says Agrell.
That individual folders or documents are forgotten or left on a desk in connection with negotiations, I do not think is entirely uncommon. What is unusual is that someone is prosecuted for it – and also that a person at this level, says Holmlund.
