When Ulla and Torbjörn Fogelberg in the small Swedish town of Lessebo got older, the municipality appointed a trustee to help them with the economy.
– They handed over all things to the trustee. And they became more demented as time went on, remembers their son Fredrik Fogelberg.
When his father died, Frederick began to examine his parents' finances. He immediately realised that large amounts of money were missing, he tracked how his parents money was transferred regularly to the trustee's own account.
”Something's not right”
– It took seconds to see that this is an organised theft. There is a pension payment to my parents, then an even withdrawal of the exact amount to another account. And so it goes on. We have calculated that approximately 1.2 to 1.3 million crowns was taken by the trustee.
Frederick made a complaint to the Administrative Board. They reviewed all the reports and came up with sharp criticism of the guardian. He had to resign from his post.
The municipality did not report
But the municipality chose not to notify the police action. It is not their job, says current guardian Gunilla Arvidsson.
– It is not our task to do it, she says.
Lessebo municipality is not alone. SVT mapping of all the controls over the last four years shows that 26 millions crowns are lost, unaccounted, from accounts to be managed by trustees. In only one of these cases, the municipality reported it to the police.
Trustees had more assignments
If the municipality had filed a police report it would have been an independent investigation to establish what has happened. The trustee also had more missions, but neither of those cases was ever investigated. SVT has been in contact with some people who had this very same trustee and they claim they’ve also lost money. But nobody from the municipality have ever contacted them about this.
– We have not initiated additional investigations. We are looking forward, says Gunilla Arvidsson.
Sues municipality
Fredrik Fogelberg now sued the municipality, to try to get back his parents lost money.
– The municipality did nothing. I'm not very happy about it. I am not.