There have been many headlines in recent years.

Young boys placed in juvenile facilities run away and commit serious crimes.

Often on behalf of criminal gangs.

Two boys, 14 and 15 years old, were recently arrested on suspicion of having fired over 25 shots through an apartment door in Stockholm.

Both were on the run from HVB homes when they became part of the ongoing wave of violence in the capital.

The case is not unique.

SVT Nyheter has gone through a series of cases from recent years that give an insight into how young boys placed in HVB homes go about the gangs' affairs.

- It's a tough environment where you only succeed if you deliver.

If you fail your mission, you are gone.

They trigger each other to commit worse and worse acts to prove themselves, says Therese Skoglund Shekarabi, municipal police officer at Järvafältet in Stockholm.

The supervisory authority Ivo states that young people with criminal behavior have increased in the country's HVB homes.

This entails an increased risk of threatening and violent situations, escapes and relapse into crime.

Boy recruited to kill

A rewritten case from 2020 concerns a then 16-year-old boy who ran away from an HVB home in Dalarna - and who only days later tried to shoot a man to death at a bus stop in Järfälla.

Since the police were able to read the criminal networks' secret messages in the communication service Encrochat, it became clear how the boy was recruited to kill.

"Your friend has formed a real soldier who looks like a really nice little kid," writes a leader in the network.

The 16-year-old, who had a drug addiction and hung out in criminal environments, became an easy recruit.

He was later sentenced to three years in closed youth care for the attempted murder and the gang leader behind the scheme to 18 years in prison for incitement.

The police: "It's calculated"

It was not the first time that the boy had run away from an HVB home.

SVT's mapping shows how young people who have been under the social service's radar for many years are placed in HVB home after HVB home only to continue committing crimes.

- It is stated that they use young people who have already been placed or convicted, who can continue to commit crimes "for free", without any additional penalty.

It is calculated, says police officer Therese Skoglund Shekarabi.

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