It is a seemingly relaxed Jonas Falk in jeans and a T-shirt who takes a seat next to his lawyer in the security chamber of the Stockholm District Court. Behind the glass on the spectator bench, several relatives are seated, including his parents.
Falk is charged with attempted gross extortion and gross arson. A 61-year-old woman, a relative of Falk, is also charged with aiding and abetting attempted gross extortion.
Jonas Falk has been detained in Sweden since October last year after being extradited from Spain.
In October, two explosions were carried out simultaneously, and Kuylenstierna received threatening messages that alluded to the explosions.
According to prosecutor Anna Stråth, Falk continued to orchestrate the extortion via a phone he had access to in detention. However, he is not charged with the explosions.
Images of explosives
According to the prosecutor, it was Jonas Falk who was behind the extortion, which began in 2023. The anonymous threats were sent via WhatsApp and email.
A message ended with "have a nice Sunday" – and a photograph of IKEA boxes full of explosives. A message threatened to "blow everything around you to pieces".
This is personal, says the prosecutor during her presentation.
The extortion is rooted, according to the prosecutor, in an investment in a company linked to Kuylenstierna that Falk made with the help of his relative in 2009. The money, however, was lost.
The prosecutor claims that the money, through complex company formations, can be linked to "Operation Playa", the massive cocaine bust in which Jonas Falk was identified as the main suspect in 2010. He was, however, acquitted in the Court of Appeal.
The defense attorney: Only circumstances
Jonas Falk denies the crime. He admits to having forwarded certain information about the case, but not to promote extortion.
Among the prosecutor's evidence is an extortion message found on Falk's computer, which Falk himself claims he did not write.
My client claims that he did not write that. I mean that when you examine the evidence in the case, there is support for what he says, says his defense attorney Tobias Enochson to TT.
Falk also claims that he has nothing to do with the unfortunate investment that led to the extortion.
The evidence consists essentially only of suspicious circumstances, what is usually called circumstantial evidence, says Enochson.
The trial is expected to continue until mid-June 2025.
The extortion against Joachim Kuylenstierna and three other high-ranking individuals at the listed investment company Fastator began in October 2023.
Kuylenstierna then received demands for 100 million kronor for a "debt" – as well as hundreds of photographs of colleagues, several together with family members in a home environment. The extortionist threatened to harm the individuals and destroy Kuylenstierna's business.
In November 2023, a message arrived stating that the extortionist had given the "green light" to his people. The same evening, a group of young men went to one of the executives' homes and threw a petrol bomb against a garage wall.
In late October last year, a gate was blown up at an address on Gärdet in Stockholm, where a relative of Kuylenstierna was registered. A failed hand grenade attack was carried out on Skeppsbron in Stockholm.
Last year, several people, some with ties to the Vårbynätverket, were convicted of mapping and arson. Additional individuals are charged with the explosions last autumn. The prosecutor claims that it is Jonas Falk who is behind the extortion.
