Former psychiatrist Sharok Ezazi (59) charged in major drug operation
The 59-year-old Sharok Ezazi, former psychiatrist and multiple-times convicted criminal, is charged with serious drug-related crime and organised crime. He is being held in custody for four weeks.
Former psychiatrist arrested in Sweden and extradited to Norway in drug case
The Norwegian citizen Sharok Ezazi (59), former psychiatrist and one of Norway's most notorious convicted criminals, is now being held in custody at Sem prison with restrictions on mail and visits, according to Google News DK — Crime. The arrest is the result of a major drugs investigation led by Kripos, Norway's national criminal investigation service.
On Tuesday evening last week, Ezazi was arrested at Landvetter airport in Gothenburg. On Monday this week, he was extradited to Norwegian police, who had issued a Nordic arrest warrant for him. According to reports, Kripos had him under investigation over an extended period.
Charged with serious drug-related crime and organised crime
Kripos charges Ezazi with serious drug-related crime as well as with the penal code's provision on organised crime, which can double the maximum penalty for a given offence by up to six years' imprisonment.
Police prosecutor Ingvild Myrold explained on Tuesday to VG that Kripos had over time investigated what they assessed as a network that imports, stores and distributes drugs in Norway.
"Our understanding is that this is an international network," said Myrold.
When Ezazi was remanded in custody for four weeks on the same day, the court order stated: "The court finds, on the basis of the extent of the seizure, that the accused is part of a larger network consisting of persons over whom the police do not have complete overview."
Ezazi's defence counsel, barrister Victoria Holmen, emphasises that her client denies criminal liability.
"He denies any connection to drugs and has stated that he wishes to explain himself to the police. We await the police taking the initiative to conduct an interview," says Holmen.
Also charged in the Lørenskog case
In May this year, Ezazi received a notification from the Øst police district that they have for years secretly investigated him and charged him with murder or complicity in the murder of Anne-Elisabeth Hagen, the wife of billionaire Tom Hagen.
She disappeared from the couple's home in Sloraveien in Lørenskog on 31 October 2018 and has not been seen since. The case is regarded as one of the most extensive police investigations in Norwegian legal history.
On the day of her disappearance, Hagen's mobile telephone stopped moving at 10.07. One minute later, base stations registered Ezazi's mobile telephone in the immediate vicinity of the scene.
Ezazi denies any connection to the Lørenskog case.
"I have never known either Anne-Elisabeth or Tom Hagen, and I have nothing to do with the case," he said in an interview with Dagbladet in June.
He has explained that he drove to a fitness centre in Strømmen on the day in question, and that the registration of his mobile telephone therefore has a natural explanation.
"It is correct that I drove past the place where Anne-Elisabeth Hagen was abducted. But that does not mean that I have anything to do with the case," he told Dagbladet.
A long criminal record
Sharok Ezazi is originally from Iran. In the 1980s, he moved to Turkey, where he began studying medicine. At the age of 24, he arrived in Norway as an asylum seeker and completed his medical degree at the University of Oslo.
In 2005, the then psychiatrist was sentenced to six and a half years' imprisonment in the so-called Lucia case and permanently barred from practising medicine. The Lucia Foundation appeared outwardly as a non-profit organisation that offered, amongst other things, housing and care for adult psychiatric patients, with Ezazi as director.
From 2003, VG published a series of exposés about the foundation, including connections to persons with serious criminal backgrounds as well as suspicious financial and social security-related matters. The court concluded in the judgment that the business operation bore "the hallmark of organised crime", and that Ezazi had exploited his medical profession to obtain unlawful advantages.
Following the Lucia judgment, Ezazi had himself registered in the population register in Sweden. In 2010, he was convicted in a Swedish case concerning the smuggling of approximately 10 million cigarettes into Sweden. This conviction was, however, quashed when a co-defendant subsequently changed his statement and admitted to having lied about Ezazi's role. Ezazi was subsequently fully acquitted.
In autumn 2015, Ezazi was charged in the so-called Lime case, an extensive criminal case complex connected to the grocery chain Lime, which is described as Norway's largest human trafficking case. He was convicted of human trafficking in the district court, but acquitted on this count in the Court of Appeal in 2021. Finally, he was convicted of breach of working environment law and fraud.
During the investigation of the Lime complex, a separate financial criminal case against Ezazi was uncovered. In that case, Borgarting Court of Appeal sentenced him in 2019 to four and a half years' imprisonment, confiscation of 16 million kroner and lifetime disqualification from business activity. The disqualification specified that he was barred from "the right to be managing director or hold any other leading position in any company, and the right to sit on the board of any company".
Back in Norway
In 2022, Ezazi reported moving back to Norway from Sweden. He is today registered in the population register at an address in Lørenskog — the same municipality from which Anne-Elisabeth Hagen disappeared in 2018.
Source: Google News DK — Crime (da)