Hate crime legislation in Sweden

Criminal Code of Sweden (1962, as amended 2018) (excerpts related to hate crimes) (English)

 

Chapter 29 Section 2

In assessing penal value and circumstances tending to aggravate the offence, in addition to the provisions prescribed for each individual type of offence, special consideration shall be given to whether:
(…)
(7) a motive of the offence was to insult a person, an ethnic group or another such group of people by reason of their race, skin colour, national or ethnic origin, creed, sexual orientation, gender identity or other similar circumstance, or
(…)

 

Chapter 16 Section 8 [threats]

Any person who in a statement or communication that is disseminated threatens or expresses contempt for a national or ethnic group or other such group of persons with allusion to race, skin colour, national or ethnic origin, creed or sexual orientation or gender identity, shall be sentenced for agitation against an ethnic group to imprisonment for at most two years or, if the offence is minor, to pay a fine.

If the offence is grave, a sentence of imprisonment for at least six months and at most four years shall be imposed.

In judging whether the offence is grave, special consideration shall be given to whether the communication had a particularly threatening or insulting content and was disseminated to a large number of people in a way that was likely to attract particular attention.