Peter Madsen goes on trial accused of sexually assaulting, torturing and murdering Swedish journalist on his submarine

A Danish builder of submarines and rockets went on trial on Thursday accused of sexually assaulting, torturing and murdering the Swedish journalist Kim Wall after she joined him on board his home-built submarine for an interview in August last year.

The accused, Peter Madsen, pleaded not guilty as the trial opened at Copenhagen district court in what prosecutor Jakob Buch-Jepsen has described as a “unusual and extremely brutal” case. Madsen is charged with murdering and dismembering Wall, along with a charge of sexual assault without intercourse of a particularly dangerous nature.

He has admitted dismembering her body on board his submarine and dumping her body parts in the sea.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Prosecutor Jakob Buch-Jepsen arrives at court in Copenhagen. Photograph: Mads Claus Rasmussen/AFP/Getty Images

Interest in the trial, which has seen 100 journalists from more 15 countries register to attend, also reflects the colourful profile of Peter Madsen, whose nine-year push to send himself into suborbital space on his own self-built rocket has made him a minor celebrity both in Denmark and internationally.

Buch-Jepsen started the 12-day trial by reading the charges while Madsen, wearing glasses and a dark shirt, watched the prosecutor from his seat beside his defense lawyer. The defence lawyer, Betaina Hald Engmark, then formally entered a not-guilty plea to the murder charge.

“The accused denies voluntary manslaughter, but admits violating the law about indecent handling of a corpse,” his lawyer Betina Hald Engmark said in court. Under the Danish penal code, manslaughter is used to describe the deliberate killing of a person and there is no distinction between manslaughter and murder. Involuntary manslaughter is used when the killing is not intentional.



Buch-Jepsen plans to push for a life sentence, the most severe punishment possible in Denmark and one normally reserved for those who have killed multiple victims or children.



The prosecution believes Madsen killed Wall to fulfil sadistic sexual fantasies, tying her up and beating and stabbing her, and then either strangling her to death or beheading her.

Buch-Jepsen will run through the evidence that the murder was pre-planned, including the saw, knife, plastic strips, and metal tubing Madsen brought on board.

He told the court that Madsen had scratches on his underarms and Kim Wall’s blood flecked on his left nostril, though his DNA was not found on her body.

Madsen himself will on Thursday afternoon take the stand, the first time the 47-year-old will be able explain in court why he claimed in a pre-trial hearing that Wall’s skull had been shattered by a metal latch falling on her head.

This claim was disproved a month later when Wall’s head was discovered without skull injuries by police divers in October.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Police technicians board Peter Madsen’s submarine UC3 Nautilus on a pier in Copenhagen harbour, Denmark. Photograph: Jacob Ehrbahn/AP

Madsen has since confessed to sawing off Wall’s limbs and head, but he has so far continued to insist that she died in an accident, claiming she died of asphyxiation in the submarine’s cabin while he directed the vessel from the surface.



The trial will be held over 12 days in March and April, with the verdict expected on 25 April, but may be delayed if days are postponed due to a strike planned by court employees.