The city court in Bergen granted a request from prosecutors on Thursday to keep the man charged with murdering three people on a bus in the mountains of Norway a month ago in custody for another four weeks. Police plan to question the 30-year-old defendant, an asylum seeker from South Sudan, next week.
The man has so far refused to answer questions over the stabbing deaths of 55-year-old Valdresekspressen bus driver Arve Haug, 19-year-old student Margaret Molland Sanden, and 53-year-old Brahim Khouya of Sweden, citing mental illness. The accused, whose claim for asylum in Norway had been rejected, was holding a knife when he was apprehended on the bus at Årdal on November 4.
The suspect was transferred from a Bergen psychiatric hospital to regular prison two weeks ago, however, and the Bergen city court viewed him as mentally capable of standing trial after being presented with no evidence to the contrary.
He was ordered held in full isolation for the first two weeks of his next four-week custody period. He won’t be allowed communication with the outside world for the entire period.
newsinenglish.no staff
