Thomas Quick

Thomas Quick (born Sture Ragnar Bergwall, on the 26th of April 1950 in Korsnäs, Falun, Sweden) one of Scandinavias most notorious serial killers with over 30 confessions, although only eight convictions. He is a child molester and committed his first known murder at the age of 14. He is also know as "Sätermannen". Quick has now changed his name back to Sture Bergwall.

Early years

Thomas Quick grew up with six siblings, one of them his twin sister, in Korsnäs outside of Falun in Sweden. As a child he got infected with TBC and was hospitalized for some time. Quick said he was molested as a child by his father and his very strict mother. At the age of 14 he started to show homo- and bisexual tendencies and started to approach younger boys. This was reported to the Child Welfare Committee. According to his autobiography, "Kvarblivelse", he was abused by his father as a child. However, his brother, Sten-Ove Bergwall, denies this in his book "Min bror Thomas Quick: en berättelse om det ofattbara" ("My brother Thomas Quick: A story of the incomprehensible").

He showed artistic leanings, mostly for acting and was described as imaginative but also as manipulative. After his high school years Quick became more and more religious and decided to become a priest. This, however, collided with his sexual disposition and he started to work at Falun Hospital instead.

The Sentences

Quick was first sentenced to closed psychiatric care in 1970 after he tried to molest 4 young boys at a children's clinic in 1969 where he was working. Initial charges of attempted manslaughter were dismissed by the district court.

In 1974 he became a suspect in the murder of one of his male lovers in Uppsala but since he still was receiving psychiatric care he was never charged.1990-1991 Quick was sentenced to closed psychiatric care for armed robbery. During the therapy he started to confess some 20 murders in Sweden and Norway between 1964 and 1990. Some of the confessions led to the solving of an 18 year old murder considered to be unsolvable and a murder in Växjö in 1964. The 1964 crime was at the time no longer punishable, but with the information given by Quick the case was closed as he had information never published about the crime.

Quick was sentenced for 8 murders at six different trials:

* Charles Zelmanovits, Piteå 1976, Sentence in 1994 - no forensic evidence but a confession
* Johan Asplund, Sundsvall, 1980, Sentence 2001 - No body, no forensics but confession
* The Stegehius couple, Appojaure, 1984, Sentence 1996 - No forensics, but Quick gave information which was never disclosed to the public. Though Quick took part of some information before the trial.
* Yenon Levi, Tourist, Rörshyttan, 1988, Sentence 1997 - No forensic evidence, but Quick gave information which was never disclosed to the public. Though Quick took part of some information before the trial.
* Therese Johannesen, Drammen, Norway, 1988, Sentence 1998 - No forensic evidence
* Trine Jensen, Olso, 1981, Sentence 2000 - No forensic evidence
* Gry Storvik, Oslo, 1985 - No forensic evidence, confession, semen found in victim not belonging to Quick.

Quick's confessions

In the years following 1990, when Quick was sentenced to closed psychiatric care, he started to confess to several unsolved murders. His first murder, according to his own accounts, occurred in Växjö in 1964, when Quick was only 14 years old. The victim, Thomas Blomgren, was described by Quick as being the same age but not as strong and tall as himself. The second alleged victim was Alvar Larsson, whom Quick claimed to have murdered at Sirkön in the lake Åsnen outside the town of Urshult. According to Quick's sister he never left Falun at the time of this murder.

The credibility of Quick's confessions has been widely debated in the Swedish media since 1993. Sometimes he is referred to as a serial killer and sometimes a compulsive liar. There have been doubts about the reliability of his statements since some of the confessions have been proven to have been made up. Sometimes the victims have turned up, alive and well.

Quick also claims to have butchered and eaten one victim although the corpse was untouched when found. Another dubious circumstance about the crimes is the fact that no witness has ever seen Quick at the crime scenes, even though 10,000 people have been interviewed.

Critics of the confessions and the trials claim that Quick never murdered anyone, but that he is a compulsive liar. Among the critics are the parents of a child he confessed to having murdered in the late 1970s. In response to these accusations, Quick himself wrote an article for the Swedish newspaper "Dagens Nyheter" in 2001, in which he said that he refused to co-operate further with the authorities concerning all open murder investigations.

In November 2006 Thomas Quick's trials were reported to the Swedish Chancellor of Justice by a retired lawyer, Pelle Svensson, on the behalf of two of the murder victims' relatives, who wish to have the trials declared invalid and, presumably, have Quick retried.

Several principles in the field of law and psychiatry, among them Swedish police professor Leif G.W. Persson [http://www.dagbladet.no/nyheter/2003/04/02/365488.html] , journalist and writer Jan Guillou [http://www.dagbladet.no/nyheter/2002/09/02/347684.html] and secret sources in the Swedish police [http://www.bt.no/innenriks/article317044.ece] all claim that Quick is mentally unstable, but not guilty in many, if any, of the crimes he has confessed. They all describe the case as the "most scandalous" chapter of Scandinavian crime history. Calling it the most blazing example of incompetence, naivete and opportunistic work within the police and judicial system.

The psychology of Thomas Quick

Most of the material concerning Quick has been classified, but the conclusions and diagnosis have been published. According to the diagnosis Quick suffers from schizophrenia-like symptoms. A forensic psychiatric evaluation conducted in 1970 revealed that Quick suffered from a sexual perversion named 'pedofilia cum sadismus'.

Quick himself said he had another personality by the name of "Ellington" who takes control over him during murders. When "Ellington" takes control, Quick does not remember anything, it only slowly comes back to him afterwards.

In 1991 during another psychiatric evaltuation Quick was diagnosed with a personality disorder and borderline symptoms, severe lack of impulse control and sexual perverted behaviour with sadomasochistic features.

References

* Bergwall, Sten-Ove, "Min bror Thomas Quick: en berättelse om det ofattbara". Stockholm : Rabén Prisma, 1995. Swedish.
* Quick, Thomas, "Kvarblivelse". Stockholm : Kaos Press 1998. Swedish.
* [http://www.dn.se/DNet/jsp/polopoly.jsp?a=590231 Article in Dagens Nyheter on the report to the Chancellor of Justice] , November 20 2006