Danish murderer who killed journalist on board home-made submarine is apprehended ‘after escaping prison by threatening guards with a fake bomb’
- Peter Madsen staged a dramatic escape from prison in Denmark this morning
- He was apprehended and surrounded by police on a roadside near the prison
- Madsen was jailed for life in 2018 for the gory murder of journalist Kim Wall
The Danish murderer who killed a journalist on his submarine was apprehended after trying to escape from prison today, local media says.
Peter Madsen threatened guards by claiming he was carrying a bomb during his escape attempt this morning.
He was later seen sitting upright by a roadside surrounded by a massive police presence a few hundred yards from the prison in Albertslund.
Snipers had their guns trained on Madsen during the stand-off on the cordoned-off street while police negotiators arrived to speak to the 49-year-old killer.
Snipers point their guns at Peter Madsen as he sits on a roadside today after trying to escape from prison in Denmark
Madsen was surrounded by a massive police presence after trying to escape his life sentence for murdering journalist Kim Wall in 2017
Danish armed guards on the scene today after Peter Madsen dramatically tried to escape from his life sentence for the 2017 submarine murder
Danish inventor Peter Madsen (left) was jailed in 2018 for the gory murder of journalist Kim Wall (right) on his submarine in a Copenhagen harbour
Police dogs and trained negotiators were also on the scene as authorities tried to bring Madsen under control after the escape attempt at 10am this morning.
Witnesses described seeing guards sprinting down the residential street as the stand-off unfolded.
Danish police confirmed that a man had been stopped after attempting to escape’ without giving Madsen’s name.
According to Denmark’s Ekstra Bladet, Madsen has previously been kept in isolation because guards suspected he would try to escape.
Madsen was sentenced to life in prison in 2018 for the gory murder of Swedish journalist Kim Wall who was sexually assaulted and dismembered on the submarine.
Wall’s mutilated body was found in August 2017 after she boarded the home-made submarine in Copenhagen to research a piece on the eccentric inventor.
Police divers then recovered a weighted-down bag containing her head, other body parts and her clothes.
Madsen was rescued from waters between Denmark and Sweden shortly before his submarine sank.
Investigators later recovered and searched the sunken submarine.
Madsen changed his version of events several times, initially claiming Wall was alive and that he had dropped her off on a nearby island.
He later said she had hit her head on the submarine’s hatch, before changing tack again and claiming that she was suffocated by an accidental gas leak.
But forensic tests found that she had either been strangled or had her throat cut – and that around the time of her death, Madsen had stabbed her in her breasts and genitals with a knife or screwdriver.
Danish judge Anette Burkoe said it was a ‘cynical and planned sexual assault and brutal murder of a random woman, who in connection with her journalistic work had accepted an offer to go sailing in the defendant’s submarine’.
More to follow.
The home-made submarine ‘UC3 Nautilus’, which was built by Danish inventor Peter Madsen and is where he killed Kim Wall in 2017