Lawyer: Sweden Attack Suspect 'Admits to Terrorist Crime'

VOA News
11 April 2017 (7:14AM)

The lawyer for the main suspect in Friday's truck attack that killed four people in Sweden says the man "admits to a terrorist crime" and accepts he will be arrested.

Johan Eriksson spoke Tuesday before a Stockholm court at hearing for 39-year-old Uzbek national Rakhmat Akilov.

Authorities say Akilov drove a stolen truck into a crowd at the Ahlens department store in Stockholm. In addition to the four people killed, the attack also injured 15 others. Akilov was arrested early Saturday.

He had been known to intelligence services since last year when he disappeared before he could be deported after his application for asylum was rejected. Authorities knew he had pro-extremist sympathies.

Police say they have arrested a second person in connection with the attack, but have given no further information.

Photos taken at the scene Friday showed the vehicle was a truck belonging to beer maker Spendrups, which said its truck had been hijacked earlier in the day.

Witnesses say the truck drove straight into the entrance of the Ahlens Department Store on Drottninggatan, the city's biggest pedestrian street, sending shoppers screaming and running. Television footage showed smoke coming out of the store after the crash.