victim
The person directly harmed by a crime — injured party and witness in Danish law
A victim is the person who has directly suffered harm as a result of a crime — whether that harm is physical, psychological or financial. In Danish criminal law, the terms 'offer' (victim) and 'forurettede' (injured party) are used largely synonymously, and there is no separate general statutory definition of the concept in Danish law. The official Danish delimitation instead takes its starting point in the definition set out in the EU Victims' Directive, and in practice corresponds to the group of persons regarded in Danish law as injured parties.
In the courtroom, the victim occupies a particular dual role: the person may appear as the injured party, with the rights that this entails, while at the same time being summoned as a witness to give an account of the course of events. This combination means that the victim's statement is often central to establishing the facts of the case, but that the person does not necessarily have party status in the same way as the defendant.
In a true crime context — including cases such as those concerning Louis Linde Nielsen and Janne Krohn, Anna Klemens, Kevin Ibraimovski and Werner Mazurek — the victim is typically the person whose fate constitutes the central fact of the case. The identity, life story and specific circumstances surrounding the injury or death are decisive for understanding both the nature of the act and the subsequent trial.
Chapter 66 a of the Danish Administration of Justice Act (retsplejeloven) governs the rights of injured parties during criminal proceedings and forms the primary legal basis for the victim's position in the Danish justice process. It lays down rules on, among other things, information, the right to a support person, and the possibility of giving a statement under special arrangements.
