Doctors in da Costa case seek state compensation

The two physicians convicted then acquitted in Sweden’s infamous 1984 da Costa murder case are now applying for ex gratia compensation from the government, Swedish public broadcaster SVT reports.

Lawyers Thomas Olsson and Filip Rydin have submitted requests for the discretionary payouts—granted “by grace” without legal obligation—on behalf of forensic pathologist Teet Härm and general practitioner Thomas Allgén. Both men were initially convicted of murdering Catrine da Costa before their acquittal, though courts maintained they had dismembered her body.

Allgén, now 76, told SVT the decades-long stigma has been devastating. “Almost everyone who didn’t know me, or was even slightly skeptical, assumed I was guilty,” he said. The 2024 SVT documentary Dokument inifrån later revealed the evidence against them was critically flawed, prompting then-Justice Minister Morgan Johansson (S) to call it “the worst miscarriage of justice in Swedish history.”

Allgén described receiving an outpouring of public support after the documentary aired. “People—both old friends and strangers—have written to tell me to keep fighting. That means more than anything,” he said, adding that the hardest part of the past 40 years was “losing my daughter.”

Current Justice Minister Gunnar Strömmer (M) confirmed in April that any ex gratia application would be “thoroughly reviewed.” Sweden has previously awarded such compensation—most notably €90,000 each to two brothers wrongly convicted in the 1998 “Kevin case” murder, who were exonerated 20 years later.