Brno, Aug 14 (CTK) – The defence lawyer of Kevin Dahlgren, a U.S. national sentenced to life for four murders in Brno, is filing a petition for an appellate review with the Czech Supreme Court in search of a softer jail sentence or a security detention instead of imprisonment for Dahlgren, Czech Television reported on Monday.
As an argument, the lawyer, Richard Spisek, gives Dahlgren’s psychical condition.
The petition does not challenge the verdict on Dahlgren’s guilt.
“We want our client not to be placed in a prison to serve his sentence, but directly in security detention, or to be possibly given a softer than life sentence,” Spisek told CTK.
Dahlgren, then 20, killed all members of a family of his relative, the father, the mother and their two sons, including a juvenile one, in whose house in Brno he temporarily stayed, in May 2013.
Afterwards he left for Austria and boarded a flight for the USA. On arrival in Washington, the U.S. police arrested him based on a warrant issued by Czech authorities. The U.S. bodies eventually approved his extradition to the Czech Republic.
A Czech court sentenced him to life last year.
Spisek suggests that Czech courts withdraw from punishing Dahlgren and place him in security detention. He leans on Czech experts’ opinions saying that Dahlgren has a personality disorder but is not mentally ill.
On the other hand, U.S. experts found Dahlgren mentally ill.
Spisek told CTK that Dahlgren is aware that lodging a petition for an appellate review will delay his chance of applying for being extradited and serving his prison sentence in the USA.
Nevertheless, the extradition to the USA remains Dahlgren’s goal, Spisek said.
The Supreme Court may either cancel the verdict and return the case to lower-level courts to deal with it anew, or it can make a decision on its own.
The average time the Supreme Court decides on petitions for an appellate review in criminal cases is 40 days.
