On 3 September 1991, the siblings Aase Helene and Arne Odvar Nordby, aged 78 and 74, were murdered by multiple stab wounds across their bodies and then were robbed in their home in Tistedalen.
[1][2] In spite of a massive and prolonged criminal investigation, which included the arrests of two innocent persons, the case seemed destined to remain unsolved.
[4] One year later, on 1 September 1992, a 71-year-old pensioner in Tistedalen, Per Rød, was hit in the jaw with an iron bar, then stabbed to death and dumped in a compost pile in his garden.
The victim's car was found in a remote area and his hunting rifle was no longer hanging on the wall in his living room.
By now the police had four unsolved murders on their hands, as in the interim, on 23 December 1992, a 54-year-old food store manager named Karl Johan Hagevik was found shot in the back of the head in his car.
[9] Public prosecutor Lasse Qvigstad presented the accused as a cold and calculating man who murdered his defenceless victims, then took his time to look for valuables in their homes.