Swedish authorities have declined to deport a migrant who sexually assaulted 11 women in less than two weeks.
The man, named as Said Rendi, carried out the attacks between January 28th and February 11th in the city of Uppsala, and is said to have jumped the women from behind and then fled the area while wearing a surgical mask to hide his identity, Nyheter Idag reports.
Mr Rendi was eventually arrested because the car he used is owned by the municipal government, which he uses it to look after a young autistic boy who was with him at the time of his arrest. The car’s GPS coordinates are tracked by the local government and they linked him to all 11 attacks, according to prosecutors.
Nine of the incidents were considered sexual assault while two were considered more serious, with one involving Rendi attempting to push his finger into the anus of one of the victims.
Rendi was convicted by the court but only sentenced to a suspended sentence, 60 hours of community service, and a fine to be paid to the victims, despite attempts by the prosecutor to classify the two more serious incidents as attempted rape. The court also denied requests to deport him.
Prosecutor Pontus Melander said he will likely appeal the ruling as he said he felt the crimes were not classified correctly.
The migration-background origin of the attacker in the case matches the statistics released by Swedish broadcaster SVT last year, which indicated that up to 85 per cent of rapes committed by people unknown to the victim were by individuals from a migration background.
Earlier this year, the Swedish government announced it would be publishing a new official study on the relationship between migration and crime — the first since 2005.
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