Steen of Snaphanen has been a good friend for almost thirteen years, since my first trip to Copenhagen in April of 2007, when he put me up in his flat.

Steen is an accomplished photographer and manages the most popular blog in Denmark. He is also a dissident — he speaks out about immigration and Islamization, publishing uncomfortable truths that give the Danish political establishment heartburn.

Steen was arrested and interrogated last May because he posted a link to a site that linked to the video of the murder of two young Scandinavian women in Morocco, who were killed by mujahideen. To assist them in their enquiries, the police confiscated Steen’s computers and other equipment.

That was eight months ago. Steen has not been charged, and the police still have his equipment. He has written a letter to them, demanding the return of his work tools, and posted about it yesterday at Snaphanen.

Steen’s ability to put pressure on the police is limited. All he can do is publicize what happened, and urge his colleagues among dissident bloggers to do likewise. I recommend mirroring this post (or writing your own) on websites and forums, in order to help bring pressure to bear from outside Denmark.

Michael Jalving is the most popular blogger at the Jyllands-Posten website. Mr. Jalving also wrote yesterday about Steen’s plight. Many thanks to Signe for the translation:

Free Steen Raaschou’s computers, photographs and SD-card

The blogger Steen Raaschou was arrested last year for doing his job. Copenhagen police still have not returned his seized work tools. Why?

One of my friends from the Danish writing community, the blogger Steen Raaschou of Snaphanen.dk, who taught me quite a lot about Sweden, courage and photography, was woken up early in the morning back in May of 2019 by a squad of police officers. Apparently they were not in the wrong place, since they arrested and interrogated him because five months earlier he had shared the recording of the bestial assassination of the two Scandinavian girls in Morocco. The same way they arrested Jeppe Juhl, then a parliamentary candidate for the party Nye Borgerlige, and another blogger for Jyllands-Posten, Jaleh Tavakoli.

Both the authorities and the mainstream media treated the murders as unmotivated bad luck — not jihad. Steen Raaschou corrected the misunderstanding by linking to a site that linked to the jihadists’ video.

The arrest was bizarre. And it seemed not coincidental that it happened just before an election.

The 68-year-old blogger had his home ransacked during the arrest and a lot of electronic equipment was seized. It remains confiscated.

It must be added now, as Steen himself has done, that §264d of the law is quite fair. Depending on how it is interpreted.

[Jalving quotes the paragraph. Steen has not violated anyone’s privacy.]

The accused, as I understand it, has not been charged with anything. But the authorities still refuse to return two computers, an external hard drive with ten years of photographs, an SD card, etc.

What is going on with the police? What is the cause of this treatment? Is it simply bureaucracy? Or is there really someone in the Danish police that loves to harass people who do not like Islam?

In that case the words of Ulrik Høy (R.I.P.) after the arrest are yet relevant: “Arrest me too! Preferably along with Lars Hedegaard, so we can have a game of cards in the prison cell”.

Now, Steen Raaschou writes to the police, and I quote:

To whom it may concern:

In four days it will have been eight months ago that you arrested me as if I were a dangerous terrorist, and seized my work tools. Let me tell you what you already know: You do not have time for 68-year-old unpunished persons like me […] The interrogating officer said that day to Jeppe Juhl: “We greatly regret this, but it is political, you know.”

I do not blame low-ranking police, but it must be said that higher up in the system are people who abuse the judicial system politically against people like me.

I do not care if I am convicted, but I do care about the other treatment I received, and I can assure your superiors that I will make this case very well-known to the public. By my own pen and via my many contacts in the media.

I do not want to blame low-ranking police, but your superiors must know that they will not be happy when I begin to make this case public.

And I want my tools back now, thank you. And I mean now!

Kind regards,
Steen Raaschou.

I completely understand Steen’s anger, and that is why I chose to write this. The good man is caught in no-mans-land, where he has no options other than to make noise. It is not for fun, darn it, that he and other observers are trying to inform the public about things out there in reality, among other things, topics having to do directly or indirectly with the rise of Islam.

Police — if you really want to look after the citizens, then free Steen Raaschou’s work tools. Now!