“A shooting means a great risk of new shootings in the coming weeks, as there is probably a counterpart who wants revenge,” Manne Gerell, a gang violence researcher at Malmö University, told TT.

The fatal shooting in Rinkeby on Christmas Day was the sixty-second in the country this year. The increase in deadly conflicts is at a historically high level, Gerell said.

“We have an increase of 38 percent compared to last year and 30 percent compared to the worst year we have registered. It is rare to see such big changes. Although these are low numbers, from 45 to 62, it is a very large increase,” he added.

“Something has happened”

There is no clear answer to why so many people have been shot dead this year. One hypothesis is that the gangs have been pressured by the large crackdowns that the police have carried out against the drug trade in the country.

“Something has happened. It has gotten worse, but it is hard to say why,” Gerell added.

According to media reports, the man who was killed on Christmas Day was a key person in a criminal gang group in Rinkeby.

The murder of such a person can lead to a vacuum and a question about who will take over the position in the gang.

“The more important a person is in the criminal world, the greater the risk of consequences when they disappear. In the Järva area, a couple of people who were very active in conflicts have ended up in prison, and that may be one of the reasons why it has been quite calm there in the past year,” Gerell noted.

Difficult for the police

But the fact that a gang leader ends up in prison can also lead to bigger conflicts, Gerell pointed out.

He accentuated that the police have had a difficult time arresting criminals for violent crimes. Instead, they used the drug trade as a way to get the people prosecuted and thus off the street.

This, in turn, can lead to more battles between people who want to take over.