Fredrik Ludvig Fasting Torgersen (born 1 October 1934) is a Norwegian convicted of murder.
Torgersen's 1958 conviction to life imprisonment for the 1957 murder of the 16 year-old girl Rigmor Johnsen in Oslo marked the beginning of one of the most controversial cases in Norwegian criminal history. Serving 16 years in prison before being released, he has continuously claimed his innocence.[1] His calls for resumption of proceedings were denied by the Supreme Court of Norway in 1976 and 2001, and again by the independent Norwegian Criminal Cases Review Commission in 2006.[1]
The case was the subject of a play by author Jens Bjørneboe (Tilfellet Torgersen, 'The Torgersen Case'),[2] and Torgersen himself has written several books.[1] Several public figures in addition to Bjørneboe have claimed that Torgersen is innocent, notably the former chairwoman of the Norwegian Authors' Union Ebba Haslund,[3] professor of jurisprudence Ståle Eskeland and professor of medicine Per Brandtzæg.[4] The case was prominently visible in Norwegian public debate both in the 1950s, the 1970s and the 1990s and in recent years. In the spring of 2008, in a letter to Minister of Justice Knut Storberget, 279 experts within medicine, odontology, physics, chemistry and other sciences , questioned the evaluation of evidence in courts and requested a review of the use of science in courts to avoid miscarriage of justice, see http://www.peaceispossible.info/brevtiljustisministeren.html On the basis of claims of grave errors in fact and judgment by the Norwegian Criminal Cases Review Commission, the conviction of Torgersen will be reviewed again in 2009-10, http://www.nrk.no/nyheter/distrikt/ostlandssendingen/1.6342189.