Copenhagen court convicts man of 34-year-old New Year’s Eve murder case after DNA match with son

Henrik Krogh Rasmussen, 54, has been found guilty by the Copenhagen City Court for the 34-year-old murder of Hanne With on New Year’s Eve 1990. He has been sentenced to 11 years and six months in prison.

Rasmussen was arrested in February this year based on DNA traces found on Hanne With’s pants. The police, in collaboration with the Forensic Genetics Institute in Copenhagen, conducted an investigation of the traces this year, utilising familial searching. This meant that the DNA trace from the pants was matched against the police’s DNA register. In the registry was DNA from Rasmussen’s son, leading the police to him.

The special prosecutor in the case, Søren Harbo, expressed satisfaction with the verdict. “Now a preliminary end has been put to this – especially for the relatives of Hanne With 34.5 years later,” he said. “A long prison sentence has been meted out for a very violent and brutal murder. We can only conclude that the work of the incredibly skilled police investigators with new investigative methods makes sense. Their work can lead to convictions.”

Defence attorney Mette Grith Stage represented Rasmussen during the case. After the verdict, she voiced her dissatisfaction. On the last day of the trial, she had argued that her client should not be sentenced to more than ten years in prison if found guilty. “In my opinion, it should result in a shorter sentence than the usual 12 years when so much time has passed,” she said outside the court.

She added, “It is of course terrible that this young woman has been killed. But the considerations are not the same when so many years have passed. It’s something different if one is to receive a sentence after one year compared to after 30 years.”

After the verdict, Rasmussen has requested time to consider appealing the case.