Marius Borg Høiby, the troubled son of Norway’s Crown Princess Mette-Marit, was back in police custody on Monday. He was arrested during the weekend after threatening a former girlfriend once again, just before his trial on 38 earlier criminal charges is due to begin on Tuesday.
The Oslo Police District confirmed to state broadcaster NRK and other Norwegian media on Monday afternoon that Høiby was arrested Sunday night. He’s been charged with threatening one of the same women he’d attacked earlier, this time with a knife. He’s also charged with inflicting bodily harm and for violating the restraining order that was earlier issued to protect her.
NRK reported that Høiby’s victim is the same woman that he attacked in August 2024 and whose apartment in Oslo’s fashionable Frogner neighbourhood he vandalized during a late-night rampage. That set off a police investigation that led to additional charges of rape, other forms of sexual assault and various legal violations allegedly carried out by Høiby over several years, often allegedly under the influence of cocaine.
The list of charges against Høiby, now age 29, kept growing and was up to 38 just before his trial was due to begin in the Oslo County Court on Tuesday. It’s due to last for seven weeks, has attracted international media attention and was still scheduled to begin as planned, even though Høiby is now in jail after his most recent arrest.
The Oslo County Court granted police requests to keep Høiby in police custody after his arrest on Sunday. The court ordered he be held for at least four weeks, until March 2, while police continue to investigate the new charges against him. After that a court will likely be asked determine whether his custody should be extended.
“The court believes there is probable and reasonable cause to suspect him of the three posts in the preliminary charges” filed on Monday against Høiby, read the custody order from the Oslo County Court released late Monday afternoon. “It is more probable that the defendant is guilty than not guilty of the charges.”
The court also agreed with the police and prosecutors that there was a danger of repeat offenses by Høiby. His defense attorney, Ellen Holager Andenæs, was tight-lipped about this latest development in the long-running Høiby case but confirmed that her client is now in jail, on the eve of his trial on all the previous charges.
Høiby had mostly avoided police custody during the course of the investigations against him over the past 17 months, even though they collectively could result in a prison term of 16 years. Police also believe he broke the law 17 times after he was first arrested in August 2024.
One legal expert following the case, Kjetil Kolsrud, told newspaper Aftenposten last week that “it’s natural that many wonder” why Høiby wasn’t already sitting in prison pending his trial. Police and prosecutors have also made it clear that Høiby wouldn’t get any special treatment as a member of the royal family. His mother, meanwhile, is now in trouble of her own: Crown Princess Mette-Marit had to admit and elaborate over the weekend to a three-year relationship with the convicted American sex offender Jeffrey Epstein before Epstein is believed to have committed suicide in prison.
Kolsrud, a lawyer who also runs the website Rett24 that follows major legal issues in Norway, noted that the threshold for holding defendants in custody is “quite high” in Norway, even when there’s a danger of repeat offenses. Criminal defendants in Norway can only be held prison if the court agrees there is a real danger of tampering with evidence, repeat offenses or that the defendant will flee the country.
Police arrested Høiby three times during the months immediately following his assaults and vandalism in his girlfriend’s Frogner apartment. He pleaded guilty to those charges, but was only briefly held and has denied guilt in most of the other charges filed against him. Police wanted to hold him in custody for at least two weeks on new rape charges in November 2024, because of danger he’d destroy evidence, but the court decided he could only be held for up to one week with prohibitions against visitors and external communication apart from with his own lawyers. He was set free after seven days later.
NewsinEnglish.no/Nina Berglund
