Morten Michelsen’s life ended at the age of 39. Three days before Christmas, he was shot and killed by the police in his own apartment in Bergen, the second largest city in Norway.

Michelsen suffered from a severe psychiatric disorder and had just been discharged from the hospital. After triggering the fire alarm in the building where he lived, Michelsen confronted four armed police officers with a knife in his hand at the door. He was immediately shot and fatally wounded.

Michelsen had a habit of making audio recordings of his life and carried a live audio recorder with him in his final hours. This provided us with unprecedented insight into the events inside the apartment.

The heart-wrenching recording became the starting point for a three-year-long and ongoing investigation by Bergens Tidende.

Reconstructing the past to change the future

Our primary goal at the outset was to reconstruct the events leading up to the fatal shooting, using 3D technology to take our readers through Michelsen’s last hours alive. Could the shooting have been avoided? What made the situation escalate so badly?

Municipal building records and floor plans were combined with our own 3D scans to create a 3D model of the building and the street outside. Audio and video were analysed and placed on a digital timeline, and scenes were recreated in the 3D model based on interrogations and reconstructions from the investigation.

In our search for photos, we also contacted witnesses and knocked on several hundred doors in the neighbourhood, which consists of people with different languages. Therefore, we created flyers in four languages with a QR code that directed people directly to our tip portal.

Our first story in the series, Three Shots in Ibsens Gate, quickly became Bergens Tidende’s most-read news feature story of 2023.

In our research, we examined hundreds of pages from the investigation that had been conducted by The Norwegian Bureau for the Investigation of Police Affairs. This material revealed that the police officers involved had not been kept separate after the shooting of Michelsen.

On the contrary, they were taken to the police headquarters together. There, a so-called “defuse” was conducted, with all the officers present. Behind closed doors they were allowed to discuss and process their experiences and impressions.

Years earlier, the office of the attorney general of Norway had made clear that officers involved in incidents like this one, being subject to investigations by the Bureau for the Investigation of Police Affairs, must be kept apart until they have been interrogated. The investigations must not be compromised by the risk of coordinated testimonies.

Digging deeper

What had happened in the Michelsen case was obviously in violation of this principle. We decided to expand our investigation, to involve all fatal police shootings in Norway since 2010.

We were surprised by what we found, and so was the attorney general: In each and every deadly police shooting covered by our investigation — seven in total —  the police officers had been given the opportunity to discuss among themselves before giving testimony to the investigators. We also revealed that the local police guidelines varied wildly on this subject.

The attorney general has since stated that the police practices exposed by Bergens Tidende may constitute a violation of the European Convention on Human Rights. As a result of our reporting, the first national police guidelines have now been put in place for officers being the subject of an investigation.

Also, the attorney general has announced that they are considering revising the circular regulating these issues. The minister of justice has acknowledged that the system must be fixed for the sake of the public’s trust in the investigations.

Morten Michelsen’s parents, Lasse and Vibekke Michelsen, are still mourning their only child, blaming the police for their loss. They never had any confidence in the investigation that was conducted and strongly disagreed with the official conclusion that the officers involved could not be blamed for their son’s death. They welcome the new and stricter guidelines.

“This would never have happened without Bergens Tidende’s work. It would be fantastic if it leads to more civil rights and a strengthened rule of law,” said Michelsen’s father, Lasse Michelsen.

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