One year after the mass shooting at Campus Risbergska in Örebro on February 4, 2025, where ten people were killed, 150 crime victims have received compensation totaling 7.6 million kronor. Police officers who arrived first recount their intervention that halted the ongoing violence. The school has returned to everyday life, but the trauma remains close beneath the surface.
On February 4, 2025, an alarm sounded at 12:33 for an ongoing shooting at Campus Risbergska in Örebro. Six minutes later, the first police patrol arrived with officers Maja and Hugo, whose names are anonymized. They ran toward the entrance, met a blaring fire alarm, and found large cartridge casings in the corridors. They soon located the shooter, described as a dark-clothed, light-skinned man with weapons, near a person lying on the ground with moving feet. Maja later recounted: 'We interrupted the ongoing deadly violence with our lives intact – I didn't think that would happen for a while.' They could not shoot due to the risk to the person on the ground and thick doors, instead continuing the search. Via radio, they learned the perpetrator, 35-year-old Rickard Andersson, was dead. Officers searched the 17,000 square meter school for three hours for a possible second shooter, while classroom doors were locked or barricaded. Hugo described sweeping the corridors: 'All classroom doors are locked or barricaded.' Ten people were murdered, seven women and three men, five were shot and injured, and hundreds were barricaded inside. One year later, in February 2026, the Crime Victim Compensation Authority has distributed 7.6 million kronor to 150 victims and urges more to apply. At the school, everyday life has returned to the corridors, but SFI principal Åsa Björkman, who fled the staff room, has worked to restore operations. Teacher Lasse Nilsson says: 'The community we have is very strong,' but adds: 'It's very fragile.' A book by Nicolas Lunabba, 'Not Your Prime Minister,' reflects on the event in the broader context of racism and politics, though police and politicians initially emphasized that the act had no ideological background.
