Two former home care workers of Syrian descent, Ghazi Jamal Eddin and Mohammad Kher Alhasan in Örebro have been convicted of filming and humiliating elderly people in their care, a case that has prompted Swedish MEP (Sweden Democrats/ECR) Charlie Weimers to call for the deportation of those responsible.
One of the culprits, Eddin, a 22-year-old Syrian man, was found guilty of 36 counts of offensive photography and seven counts of molestation after recordings showed him verbally abusing vulnerable residents while carrying out his duties. According to the district court, he repeatedly filmed elderly people in their own homes without their knowledge or consent, often targeting victims suffering from dementia, before sharing some of the recordings with others.
“It has been a question of people who in many ways are in a defenseless position,” the district court wrote.
The court also stressed that the offenses took place in victims’ homes, “a place where they should have the right to feel safe.”
Several incidents of verbal abuse formed part of the convictions. In one case, the man loudly sang and told an 86-year-old woman, “I’ll f.ck your god’s sister” in Arabic. During another incident involving a 92-year-old woman, he shouted that she “looks like a monkey.” In the recording, he can also be heard saying in Arabic: “Eat shit! Whore!”
The court also convicted him of molestation for his treatment of a 98-year-old woman after prosecutors alleged he grabbed her, struck her with a plastic glove, and lifted her by the armpits so she was hanging straight up. Although acquitted of assault, the court described the conduct as “particularly serious.”
The court, however, ruled that the man could not be deported as the offences he committed were not serious enough to warrant it.
Following the conviction, Charlie Weimers criticized the decision not to deport Eddin, arguing that the crimes represented severe violations committed from a position of trust. He said the case illustrates what he described as “a serious systemic failure,” adding that Sweden’s elderly deserve “care of the very highest class” after a lifetime of contributing to society.
The Sweden Democrats MEP argued that his party supports the deportation of “criminal and maladjusted immigrants” and said the protection of elderly people should always take priority. Weimers concluded his statement with a direct appeal to authorities to “detain and deport Ghazi and Mohammad.”
The Swedish case is not isolated. There seems to be a pattern where (mostly Muslim) immigrant workers/staff of immigrant background working in Europe’s social and health care services abuse nationals of the country that generously took them in.
