Swedish police received tip-off in Rahman case

Swedish police received tip-off in Rahman case
Swedish police received a tip-off two years ago that a colleague of Joy Rahman's had disappeared in Bangladesh.

Rahman, cleared of a murder charge in Sweden in 2002, was arrested last month on suspicion of murdering the treasurer of his own charitable organization.

A man who himself had worked for Rahman’s organization passed on the information to police in Sollentuna, Sveriges Radio reports.

“When this treasurer was found we did of course have a good think about it since this guy had quite a good understanding of the case. It tallies well with the information he conveyed two years ago,” a spokesperson for the police told Sveriges Radio.

Rahman served eight years of a life sentence following a 1994 conviction for a murder in Sätra, south of Stockholm.

Sweden’s Supreme Court later granted him a new trial and he was acquitted in May of 2002.

Rahman and three other men are suspected of murdering the treasurer of Rahman’s aid organization three years ago. Rahman built up the charity using funds from the record-large damages settlement he received from the Swedish state after he was freed by the Supreme Court.

Rahman, who worked as a personal-care aid, was sentenced to life in prison in 1994 for the murder of a 72-year-old woman in Sätra. The was one of the public sector home care agency’s patients. She had been strangled with a noose and the murderer then tried to burn the body, but the flames later petered out.

The Supreme Court granted Rahman a retrial in 2002 and he was exonerated by the Stockholm Court of Appeal following a new hearing.

Having been deprived of his liberty for eight years, he was awarded 10.2 million kronor ($1.7 million at current exchange rates).

At the time, it was the largest damages claim ever awarded in Sweden.

Rahman used a large part of the money to build up the Joy Rahman Welfare Foundation, which provides healthcare and micro-loans to the poor in Rahman’s birthplace of Gopalgonj.