01x01 - Episode 1

[bunniefuu]

The Prime Minister
of Sweden, Mr Olof Palme,

has been assassinated.
Police have closed off

the entire capital city
of Stockholm.

They have few clues.
His m*rder remains unsolved.

The m*rder is an open
wound for the nation.

So, here they are.

This is a heavy one!

There is a huge amount of material.

These boxes changed
everything for me.

Stieg Larsson, one of the
world's greatest crime writers,

had spent a decade
secretly investigating

the assassination
of our Prime Minister.

When I saw the
information he had gathered,

and all the connections,
all the leads,

I realised I had
to pull at the threads

that Stieg Larsson had left behind.

It was a battle
for control of the world.

Their greatest threat
was Olof Palme.

As I dug deeper,

I realised this was much bigger
than I could ever have imagined.

We are definitely being lied to.

If it looks like a cover-up,
if it smells as a cover-up...

...it is a cover-up.

We're heading
pretty far north in Sweden.

The north of Sweden, it's... It's
just a completely different world!

The trees are higher,
the forests are deeper,

and you come closer
to the wilderness.

Up here, it can get to minus 30,
and the darkness...

The darkness gets to you.

The big questions,

would Putin use
nuclear weapons in retaliation?

And if so, what would NATO do?

'In many ways, the ripple effects
of the m*rder of Olof Palme

'are still playing out today,

'more than three decades after
he was assassinated.'

Are we really on the edge
of full-scale, nuclear w*r?

I was 21 years old
when he was k*lled.

It was in 1986.

The whole world was
in a Cold w*r turmoil.

And here, we had this
genuinely progressive,

even radical alternative,
stepping out on the world stage,

daring to argue for another way.

You cannot reach security
by increasing the arms race.

And piling ever larger
quantities of weapons.

You have, as I've said, to
try to reach security together.

Olof Palme embodied hope.

That belief in progress.

His innate modesty.

His charm, his fluency,
just came through.

This generation
don't know who he was.

Olof Palme spent his
life trying to free you.

And he gave his life,
trying to free you.

He had a huge influence
in international politics.

Much larger than the role of Sweden.

People listened to him,
from all sides.

Whether they liked him or not,
they listened.

How would you like
to be remembered by people?

I don't mean that
you're gonna die tomorrow.

But what would you like the first
line of your obituary to say?

The moment people begin to
think of their obituaries,

they start to be scared,
they don't dare to do things,

and they lose their vitality.

The Scandinavian
nation is in shock tonight.

This assassination has shaken the
very foundations of Swedish society.

I don't think this thing
can happen in Sweden.

We are not used to this sort of
violence in this country.

What dawned on us was that
there were forces in the dark

that we didn't know of.

All these
years later, still,

there is a fog of doubt

about who actually
k*lled Olof Palme.

That mystery still exists.

It's become
a national sport of Sweden,

to solve the m*rder
of our Prime Minister.

"Palme virus", that's what
we call it. The "Palme virus".

The obsession of people trying
to research the Palme m*rder.

You wouldn't want to get
the Palme virus, trust me.

You'll see the cabin soon.

'When I started this, I had
no idea where it would take me.

'I never thought it would
take over my life in this way.

'And I never thought I would
cross that many lines.'

Need to turn the power on...

There you go, and then
I'm gonna go for the water.

'When I was young,
I believed the official story.

'We were told it was
this insane, lone k*ller.

'And I believed it,
because everybody said so -

'the media, the police,
the politicians.

'And then gradually,
when I got into this story,

'I realised that
that's just not true.'

So, come on in here and I'll
show you some of my research.

I've got stuff from things
that I asked from the police.

These are research files, my files.

I have everything that I scanned.

All the recordings, I keep
on separate hard drives here.

I usually record either if I
have a meeting or a phone call.

The police
tried to get me to say things

that I really didn't see.

Obviously, the police,
they're not doing anything,

so someone else has to, because
it's still an unsolved m*rder.

It's pretty crazy, because I'm
actually trained as an architect.

So, I have no reason to do this.

I'm not a detective or a journalist
or anything like that.

But come over here, because this...

These boxes are the ones that
actually changed everything.

This is where it started.

It's 2013.

There is a storage facility
on the outskirts of Stockholm,

where I'm hoping
there is archive material

on a building that
I've been researching.

There is a room,
packed with cardboard boxes.

Behind the first pile of boxes,
I look at one,

and it says,
"Stieg Larsson's archive."

My heart starts pounding.
The archive of Stieg Larsson,

Sweden's most famous crime novelist,
the father of "Nordic noir".

Author of The Girl
With The Dragon Tattoo.

Over 100 million books sold.
Movies with Daniel Craig.

After he died of a
heart attack in 2004,

his papers were put away,
packed into boxes and forgotten.

I take down one of
the really heavy boxes.

It says, "The assassination
of Olof Palme."

The hairs on the back
of my neck stand up.

Crime writer Stieg Larsson
has spent 10 years

trying to solve the m*rder
of our Prime Minister.

At first, I didn't know what to
do with all of this information.

And I was a bit wary of
getting dragged into this.

But I'm reading the
handwriting of Stieg Larsson,

and I'm jumping into his world,
when he was doing the research.

'Before any of his
books were published,

'Stieg was actually
working as a journalist.

'I managed to get permission from his
colleagues to borrow all his files.'

This is the original map that he did,

only two days after the m*rder.

He got the assignment to do this.

He was actually one of the persons,
I would say in Sweden,

that knew the most
that soon after the m*rder,

and that's when he became obsessed.

'Stieg definitely
caught the Palme virus.

'He was a hoarder and a workaholic
and you can see it on his archive.

'It's so much material.

'Papers he wrote,
articles he collected.'

"Palme m*rder*d.
Shot to death on a street."

Dossiers, maps, diagrams.

Networks of people.

There are police tip-offs,
MI6 information, CIA information.

And I'm thinking, f*cking hell!

So, more than three
decades after the crime,

'I'm starting to wonder
if the answer to this mystery

was hidden somewhere, deep down
in Stieg Larsson's archive.

This is one
letter written less than

three weeks after the m*rder,
and Stieg is writing it to someone

called Jerry, in London
or in England at least.

And it says, "The assassination of
the Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme

"is one of the most unbelievable
and amazing cases of homicide

"I have ever had the
unpleasant job of covering.

"First of all, what happened and
what is known about the k*lling?

"A couple of minutes past
11 o'clock on the night of Friday,

"28th February, Mr Palme
left the Grand Cinema

"in the company of his wife and son.

"The visit to the cinema
had been decided upon

"some time during the day of Friday,

"but their plans were
not common knowledge.

"The Prime Minister had
told his security guards

"that he would not need them
for the evening.

"Outside the cinema, Mr Palme and
his wife say goodbye to their son

"and decided to walk their way home.

"The son noticed a man
following the couple,

"but could not see
any details of his face.

"The couple headed south, down
the main street, named Sveavagen.

"A second witness
noticed the man following

"and said that in front of the PM,
another two men were walking.

"His impression was that
they made a group,

"and concluded they
were Palme's security.

"The following is established through
testimonies of several witnesses."

That night, me and my friends
had been to a concert.

I parked at this cash machine,
two metres from the lights.

"The Prime Minister and his
wife walked down Sveavagen,

"crossed the street,
and continued

"towards the junction
with Tunnelgatan."

My friends are standing
in line for the cash machine.

Then I see on the other
side of the street,

in front of the shop window,
a guy standing there.

Like he's on the lookout.

I just got that feeling.
He's waiting for something.

Then, there came a man and a woman.

And this guy put his hand
on the man's left shoulder,

and took up something.

"The b*llet entered her coat at one
shoulder and exited at the other.

"Somehow, only scraping her back."

His wife was screaming
and went down on her knee.

And the guy was standing
there watching them, to see...

...if he had succeeded, I guess.

This guy, when he moved,
he was very, very controlled.

He appeared like he was
well trained, military.

He just vanished into the alley.

The k*ller made his escape
along what appears to have been

"a well-planned route of escape.

"Up the stairs at the
end of Tunnel Street,

"which disabled any pursuit by car."

And I sensed
the tragedy of it all.

Of this brutal, horrific crime,

on the streets of Stockholm,
affects everybody.

All the people that
witnessed the crime,

the rescue service, the police.

How it's an attack on
the Swedish democracy.

I will never
forget that night.

I'd gone early to bed.
My phone rang...

This is the Secret Services.

Lisbeth Palme has asked us
to call you and inform you

that Olof Palme has been m*rder*d.

She wants you to come
immediately to the hospital.

My name is Ulf Dahlsten, and
in 1986, I was Chief of Staff

to the Prime Minister, Olof Palme.

It's the first m*rder of
this type in our democracy.

It was totally unexpected.

Protests, anything. But m*rder? No.

I went to the hospital,
to visit Lisbeth Palme.

She was obviously in shock.

She had a big bandage on her back.
She avoided being k*lled

by turning when the shot was fired.

I will never forget that,

because there was blood
all over her clothes.

I don't know if it was her
blood or it was Olof's blood.

The whole thing was
absolutely shocking.

She had even shoes that
were filled with blood,

and that when she was walking,

you got these
footstep prints in blood.

The confirmation of
his death only reached us

when we came to the hospital.

The night that my father was k*lled,

I was thinking, how
can I get through this?

It's been difficult to deal with the
fact that he died the way he did.

For me and my family, my brothers
and mother, and for this country.

Because his death was
so dramatic and tragic.

I know that my father
liked these pictures.

By 1969, I'm 11.

And we moved into this
house earlier the same year.

And this is also the
time when my father was

elected Chairman of the
Social Democratic Party,

and Prime Minister.

I remember him like
a very warm person.

Full of humour, and
also being very brave,

to confront societal injustices,
wherever he saw them.

For me, it's difficult to
imagine that things like that

just happen out of the blue.

It's very difficult to have
any, any clear view what...

You know, who or why.

Good evening. Sweden
is in a state of shock tonight.

Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme,
shot and k*lled.

Police have closed off the
entire capital city of Stockholm.

They are looking for
the assassin right now.

Stieg wrote,
"We have a dead Prime Minister

"and a k*ller that's seemingly
vanished into thin air."

Police have launched the
biggest manhunt Sweden's ever seen,

but so far, they have
no idea who the k*ller is

or what his motive was.
The more I look through

Stieg's files, the more I start
feeling that he was actually

pursuing a parallel
investigation to the police.

I think Stieg was obsessed
with finding the truth.

Because he could see
what the police were doing

would turn this into
a complete catastrophe.

I woke up in the morning. I was
off duty and I turned the radio on,

and I heard this serious music.

Olof Palme has been shot on
Sveavagen during the night.

My name is Sonny Bjork, and I was
scene of crime officer in 1986.

So, I called my unit and they said,

"Please come to
investigate the crime scene."

We are on Tunnelgatan,

where Olof and
Lisbeth Palme was shot.

It's right here on the sidewalk,
where you see the plate.

When I got to the crime scene,
it was a very small area

that was roped off.

This is not good, it's a lot
people walking around here,

and possibility to
contaminate the crime scene.

Destroy evidence like
shoe prints and so on.

I would say it was a big mistake.

So, we immediately understood
we have to enlarge this area.

And put a cordon further
north, and also south.

There's a possibility
that you have the b*ll*ts

remaining on the crime scene.

We used metal detectors
all over the area,

but it's a lot of metal
here all the time,

so it was beeping
more or less permanently,

and we didn't find anything.

The first b*llet was
found on the other side.

We didn't find it.
It was a journalist

who found the first b*llet.

He came here
before us in the morning,

and found the b*llet, then
gave it to the police officers.

This is the column where
the second b*llet was found.

It was found about here...

The b*llet was found by a dog,
buried in the snow.

We missed that one.
Of course, it's also embarrassing

that we didn't find the first
b*llet or the second b*llet.

Police tonight
found the b*llet they believe

k*lled the Prime Minister,
and revealed it was

a .357 Magnum projectile,
normally fired from

a Smith Wesson revolver,
one of the most powerful

handguns in the world.

The problem is that when
the b*ll*ts were sent down

to our National Forensic Laboratory,
they were trying to match

the b*ll*ts to each other
and they cleaned them,

and probably washed away blood,
body fluid, tissue and so on.

It's difficult, because there
is so little physical evidence

that could link a
person to this k*lling.

Yeah, it's some kind of sadness.

That we were not able
to clear the case.

DAHLSTEN:12 hours after the m*rder,

we learnt that a
regional police chief

wanted to take over the
m*rder investigation himself.

In charge of
Sweden's biggest m*rder hunt,

Stockholm's police chief,
Hans Holmer,

who told the world's press
today he had no hot clues.

At the moment, would it be fair
to say you have no idea whatsoever?

No, it's the typical
situation for the moment

when you start a big
m*rder case like this.

You have to be patient and
impatient in a sort of mixture.

He had been the head of
the Secret Services before,

but he had never ever been close
to a m*rder investigation himself.

He was tall,
he was good looking.

And he got lots of letters
from ladies around the country!

He would become a hero,
if he solved the case.

My name is Ann-Marie Asheden,
and in 1986,

I was working as a special
reporter at a newspaper.

My chief editor got the idea,
it would be interesting

to have a reporter
speaking to Holmer

and then publish a story
when the m*rder was solved.

I started meeting with
Hans Holmer once a day,

and I recorded everything.

Holmer is under
pressure all the time.

From the media, from the government.
From everybody.

Hans Holmer never
really interested himself

for the scene of the crime,
what really happened.

What do the witnesses say?

The police did not talk
to all the witnesses,

and didn't even take
notes of their names.

Stig Engstrom is a witness who
contacted the police several times,

to ask to be interviewed.

Stig Engstrom is a graphic designer
at the insurance company Skandia,

that is situated very
close to the crossing

where Palme was assassinated.

He was working late that evening.

He leaves work, and he
stumbles on the crime scene.

He is not invited to the
reconstruction that the police made.

And that made him very disappointed.

Hans Holmer considered him
an attention-seeking person.

Early on, my mother
lost trust in the police

because the information
that she gave to Hans Holmer

was not properly documented,
or used in the investigation.

Hans Holmer did not
write down or process

the information that she gave him.

The world
mourns a man of peace.

There was massive security
in Stockholm for the funeral

of Sweden's m*rder*d
Prime Minister, Olof Palme.

I had suppressed
feelings for so many days.

And I know exactly when I let them
out, and that was at his funeral.

Then I allowed myself to feel,
allowed myself to cry.

I can still... feel very strongly
about that moment, actually.

Political representatives
from over 100 countries

attended the civil memorial,
to a man renowned for his work

toward nuclear disarmament
and world peace.

It was a personal loss for me

and it was a loss for
the rest of the world.

Olof Palme believed in the things
that he was talking about.

Freedom, and anti-imperialism.

The funeral, with a
massive presence of world leaders,

made me proud of my father.

But also, it told us why
he was so opposed as well.

Because he was
upsetting the status quo,

with his activism on
the international scene.

The crowd was huge.

I think everybody was
moved by the sheer...

...desperate sadness of it all.

To Stieg, it was not
only a matter of solving a mystery,

but it also was a
question of democracy.

If it was possible to k*ll
the Prime Minister of Sweden

and get away with it, you
could actually k*ll democracy.

And if he would solve the m*rder,
he would also save democracy.

A massive manhunt is
continuing in an effort to find

the g*nman who assassinated
Prime Minister Olof Palme.

So, there are quite
a few signs of what Stieg

thought about the investigation. For
instance, you have here a headline,

"Sherlock Holmer", obviously pointing
to the head of the investigation,

Hans Holmer. Stieg writes,
"There was hardly a lead

"that was not bungled
one way or another."

This is the sort of m*rder
weapon we are looking for.

It's a revolver,
Smith Wesson .357.

Investigators say the
ammunition was armour-piercing,

- copper coated.
- They now believe the
g*nman was a professional hit man

who did not act alone.

Months two and three
in the investigation,

Hans Holmer was depressed.

They didn't get any good lead.

They didn't move forward.

Then in May, they get a new lead.

That changes everything.

PKK is a Kurdish,
Marxist-Leninist organisation

that didn't hesitate
to use violence.

Their many enemy was Turkey,

but they were stamped as a t*rror1st
organisation by Palme's government.

A new witness tells the police
that they were celebrating

because Palme had been m*rder*d.

He thought that the best way
was to make a big raid,

and take in a lot of
people and make them talk.

The police fetched all those people
and took them to the police house.

They started to question them,
and after a couple of hours,

the prosecutors decided
to let everybody go.

There is no substance
to this theory at all,

and yet he became convinced of it.

Are you any more hopeful
now than you were 3-4 months ago,

that you might the m*rder*r
of the Prime Minister?

No.

So, the raid led to nothing.

It was a
shockingly bad investigation,

that left a lot of blanks.

And it was a scandal.

'It was sort of in the air,
that he had to go.'

That year that he was in charge
is considered a lost year.

I don't think he was stupid at all.
I think he was rather intelligent.

I think he knew what he was doing.

It's my conviction that he was
not there to solve the crime,

but to give it a politically
acceptable solution.

It was obvious from some of
the files in Stieg's material

that he was suspicious of what
the role of the police actually was.

He's thinking that maybe
it's even an active decision

not to solve the m*rder.

So, it's the time when
he starts his belief

that there was a
conspiracy behind it.

So, this was definitely something
that he was researching.

'But at the time, the investigation
was going in a different direction.'

In early 1988, there is a
new head of investigation,

Hans Olvebro. In one of
the first days in the office,

he says, "This is not a conspiracy,
it's a lone k*ller."

His world was the street,
and for him, it was natural

to look for a m*rder*r
among known criminals.

And they focus on a guy
named Christer Pettersson.

The unidentified
man reportedly has three

previous convictions, including
a fatal stabbing near the spot

where Palme was gunned down.
Someone gave a tip to the police

that you should look into that guy.
He's violent, he has k*lled before.

He was a petty thief,
robber, drug addict.

And tonight,
prosecutors in Sweden

are now saying a man in custody
probably assassinated

Prime Minister Olof Palme.

They arranged a line-up with Lisbeth
Palme, the wife of Olof Palme.

But she had been told by
the prosecutor beforehand,

they were investigating
an alcoholic.

And the first thing she said was,

"Well, it's easy to see
who's the alcoholic here."

Because the line-up consisted
of policemen and firefighters,

who did not look like alcoholics.

And she identifies him, saying,

"He's similar to my
description of the m*rder*r."

She was helped by the prosecutor,
which was completely outrageous.

The case against
Christer Pettersson is only that

he is a drug dealer that
lives close to the cinema

where Olof Palme went that night.

And he was at an ill*gal
gambling club in the neighbourhood.

No-one had seen him at Sveavagen,

or the corner where
the k*lling took place.

Then when it becomes
his turn to speak,

says that he is just a pawn,
that he's a scapegoat.

That there are
bigger things going on.

A court in Stockholm has
sentenced a 42-year-old vagrant

to life imprisonment for the
m*rder of Sweden's Prime Minister

Olof Palme three years ago.

Petterson denied
that he was anywhere near

the scene of the m*rder.
Most of the evidence against him

was circumstantial. Even
the prosecutor admitted

it could find no clear-cut
motive for Palme's k*lling.

My mother was convinced
it was Christer Petterson.

At that time, I believed
they had got the right guy.

But then over the years,
I had to re-evaluate my position.

In November '89,
after almost 11 months in jail,

the High Court says that the
case against him is unreliable,

and he's released.

'The police were pushing this
theory about the lone k*ller,

'and it all ended up in
this complete failure,

'with the acquittal
of Christer Petterson.'

I could see Stieg was exploring
something much bigger.

If it wasn't a lone wolf,
it meant it was organised.

And in that case, by who and why?

When you go through all the files,
there were actually several witnesses

that saw clear signs that
this was not just a lone k*ller.

And that it was a very much organised
set-up to k*ll our Prime Minister.

This was 1986,
there were no mobile phones around.

So, any sighting of a walkie-talkie

would be something
out of the ordinary.

So, there were at least 36 witnesses
that saw men with walkie-talkies

in the night of the m*rder.
There were sightings just next to

the apartment where Olof Palme
and his wife lived.

On the way to the cinema,
where they took the underground.

And then, close to the place
where they were actually shot.

Palme had called off
the security for the night.

They were not the security,
so who were they?

There are so many signs that
this was not just a lone k*ller.

Here is actually something
that is really interesting.

It's one of the warnings
that was handed in

eight days prior to the m*rder.
It says, "Olof Palme is dead."

This was handed in to the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs

by a right-winger
called Anders Larsson,

a person that Stieg Larsson had
been researching before the m*rder.

And the second one was handed in
by an equally interesting person.

Ivan von Birchan,
a mercenary from Yugoslavia.

In the month before the m*rder,
he called into the police,

and said that he had been
offered a huge amount of money

to sh**t Olof Palme.

Stieg Larsson knew of both
these people before the m*rder.

He had been researching the circles
that both of them were part of.

I soon realised that I
had to step into his shoes,

and try to connect the threads.

And in the end,
hand it in to the police.

But there is one problem,
Anders Larsson is already deceased...

But one possibility remains,
and that's Ivan von Birchan,

the mercenary from Yugoslavia.

He's still alive, and
he's living in Sweden.

Yes, hello.
My name is Jan Stocklassa.

Am I talking to Ivan von Birchan?

My name is Ivan von Birchan,

and in 1986,

I was asked by CIA
to k*ll Olof Palme.