The infamous Clark Olofsson died, who gave rise to Stockholm syndrome when robbing a bank

He took hostages – that his friends were – for six days. The victims even wanted to escape with the Swedish, who died Thursday after a life between crime and prison.

Clark Olofssonone of the most famous criminals in the history of Sweden and one of the protagonists of the robbery that gave rise to the term “Stockholm Syndrome”, died at the age of 78 in a hospital in the country, the family confirmed on Thursday.

Olofsson, who had been free for seven years, spent half his life in prison for numerous crimes, ranging from attempting murder and theft to aggression and drug trafficking, but the most famous of all was the call “Caso de Norrmalmstorg”an assault on a bank where the hostages formed a relationship of complicity with its abductors, giving rise to the popular psychological term “Stockholm syndrome“.

The robbery

Jan Erik “Janne” Olsson entered the Kreditbank branch in the central square of Normalmstorg, in the Swedish capital, on August 23, 1973, hooded, armed with a machine gun and explosives.

Olsson made three employees hostage And it imposed the police conditions: three million Swedish crowns, a car and free traffic to leave Sweden.

The criminal also demanded that Clark Olofsson, who was arrested at the time and with whom Olsson had won in prison, was taken to the bank branch.

Authorities agreed with part of their requirements and took Olofsson to the bank, where another hidden employee was discovered and became part of the hostage group in the security safe.

They remained there for six days, during which kidnappers and hostages threw the cards and formed a strong emotional bond. They even accepted a proposal, rejected by the authorities, to flee with the criminals, stating that they trusted them “blindly.”

When the police released the hostages in an operation where no one was injured, they refused to leave before the attackers, afraid of a possible retaliation of the police, and embraced the farewell.

The “NorMalmStorg case” gave rise to several books and a movie, and three years ago, the Netflix platform launched a series inspired by the life of Olofsson, which served penalties in several countries and renounced Swedish nationality, which would recover later.