Murders in Sweden and Denmark shock Lithuania

VILNIUS - Late last year a gang of three young Lithuanians killed and robbed two people in Scandinavia. The shock waves from the news are still being felt across Lithuania.

All three murderers, Ovidijus Kilkus, Mindaugas Butkus and Valdas Trumpis, are in their 20s and are from the small town of Kupiskis, situated east of Panevezys. They left Lithuania for Sweden by car looking for jobs and hoping to earn money there.

On Nov. 19, they mugged and killed 65-year-old Gosta Andersson. His hands were tied behind his back and he was left in the trunk of his car to die from cold and starvation near a remote parking lot.

Later they went to Denmark, where they robbed and killed Allan Toft Dideriksen, 27. Danish police caught the three Lithuanians. Dideriksen was killed in a similar manner as Andersson. The murder in Sweden was unveiled by comparing the two crimes.

The three "tourists" are now in Danish custody. They have confessed to both killings.

All Lithuanian television channels showed pictures of Kilkus, Butkus and Trumpis being led by Danish policemen. The channels competed to get interviews with Danish and Swedish police officials.

Reporters from "Lietuvos Rytas TV," a 50-minute program shown on channel TV3, went to Kupiskis to speak with the mother and brother of one of the murderers. Relatives were in shock and couldn't explain the behavior of the three young men. Neighbors described them as polite fellows from good families. Kupiskis police said that they had never been involved in criminal activities before. The three men's mothers wrote an open letter to the Danish media asking the "Danish nation" to forgive Lithuania. At the time, the "Kupiskis Three" had been accused of killing Dideriksen, but the murder of Andersson had not yet been disclosed.

Bishop Jonas Boruta, secretary general of the Lithuanian Roman Catholic Bishops' Conference, says that the roots of the young men's crimes are in the social problems of impoverished provincial towns. These problems impel them to leave and try their luck in the West.

"One Danish newspaper asked its readers, 'Are we doing everything to improve the social situation in the country of these three young men?' Denmark is a secular country, but this is a very Christian point of view," said Boruta.