RSF offers its condolences to Kim Wall’s family
Reporters Without Borders (RSF) is deeply saddened by the confirmation that Swedish journalist Kim Wall died while doing a story on Danish inventor Peter Madsen and his home-made submarine, and offers its condolences to her family and colleagues.
Update: Peter Madsen was sentenced to life imprisonment on 25 April for the premeditated murder of the journalist Kim Wall, as well as for assaulting her sexually and for the indecent handling of her corpse. He can still appeal against his conviction.
Madsen changed his story several times. Prosecutor Jakob Buch-Jepsen said it was hard to imagine a crime more serious. Presenting his final arguments on 23 April, he said: “Two people go to sea. One comes back. The other ends tortured, killed and dismembered, discovered later, cut in pieces. A case so horrible and disgusting that, as a prosecutor, one is at a loss for words.”
Wall set off with Madsen in the Nautilus, the world’s biggest home-made submarine, on the evening of 10 August and never came back. Madsen was rescued when the Nautilus sank the next day but there was no sign of Wall. He arrested on a manslaughter charge on 12 August.
Normally based in New York and Beijing, Wall, 30, had worked for the New York Times, the Guardian and Libé.
RSF pays tribute to the diligence with which the Danish authorities have investigated the case in order to solve the mystery of Wall’s disappearance.
Ranked 4th out of 180 countries in RSF’s 2017 index, Denmark’s record on respect for press freedom is one of the best in the world.
Denmark
