Stefan Holm suspected of assault at Book Fair – incident triggered by eight-year-old comment
Former high-jump star Stefan Holm was informed of a suspicion of assault at the Book Fair in Gothenburg. The alleged victim is journalist Emil Persson from the Fördomspodden podcast.
Holm grabs journalist by lift at Gothia Towers
Former high-jump star Stefan Holm was informed on Saturday of a suspicion of assault at the Book Fair in Gothenburg, as he confirmed to Gothenburg Post. The alleged victim is journalist and presenter Emil Persson, known from the Fördomspodden podcast and Fördomsshowen on SVT.
The incident took place on Saturday afternoon near the lift to the Heaven 23 restaurant in Gothia Towers.
"He comes out of a lift that I'm standing waiting to get into and then he grins right in my face. And then unfortunately I lose it, and I grab his shirt and other things," Stefan Holm told GP.
The background is a statement that Persson is said to have made in a television programme eight years ago, when he joked that Holm and his then 14-year-old son should be murdered.
"I have, as I said, been carrying this around for eight years and felt very bad about it, and then of course I shouldn't take it out on people, but I did," Holm said.
GP confronted Holm with information that he is said to have put Persson in a chokehold. He partially denies this.
"I didn't perceive it as putting him in a chokehold, because I didn't really get a grip on him that way, but the accounts differ in that case."
Holm states that he has waited eight years for an apology and that he had never met Emil Persson before.
"You don't behave that way towards a child. But when you go after my son who is also a minor, then you have crossed every boundary that exists. Emil Persson apparently doesn't understand this and then, unfortunately, it happens like this."
Emil Persson has reported Holm to the police and was brief in a comment to SVT.
"I have reported him to the police, it is best to await the investigation," Persson told the television channel.
This is not the first time Stefan Holm has been involved in such a matter. He was reported to the police for assault in 2024, when he was working as a substitute teacher and physically moved a pupil. That preliminary investigation was closed.
Source: Göteborgs-Posten