The murder of a 36-year-old celebrity drug dealer and associate of the biker gang community on Tuesday was probably an execution, police say.
Andreas Dybdahl was found in the entryway of his apartment building after being shot four times in the head, chest and side. There were no signs of a struggle, and it appeared that Dybdahl opened the door to his assailant wearing only his underwear before being shot at close quarters.
“By shooting him so many times it seems clear that someone wanted him dead,” a source with knowledge of Copenhagen’s drug underworld told Jyllands-Posten newspaper on Wednesday.
Speaking to tabloid Ekstra Bladet, Lau Thygesen, head of Copenhagen Police’s organised crime unit, said, “the manner in which it was committed, the sheer determination, shows that he was wanted dead”.
Dybdahl was first discovered an hour later by a shocked neighbour as he was leaving the building. After calling for help, some manual labourers out on the street attempted to administer CPR. Dybdahl died shortly after arriving at Rigshospitalet.
Dybdahl was officially registered at an address on Kenny Drews Vej in Sydhavn but had been living at a ground floor apartment on Rentemestervej 34 for a period of time.
Several of his neighbours in the building told the tabloid Ekstra Bladet that they had noticed the new resident and one neighbour described him as a “nice man”, and as “someone who seemed like they ought to be living in Rungsted”, a wealthy coastal village north of Copenhagen.
But who executed Dybdahl? It’s a question that Copenhagen Police’s gang unit are now working on. The 36-year-old was primarily known to police for drug crime and it seems obvious to search for the motive and assailant here.
“He was otherwise only really known for small things,” Thygesen told Ekstra Bladet. “So it could be that the motive is drug-related. You risk making a lot of enemies if you deal with that sort of thing. But it could have happened because of all sorts of other reasons: drugs, jealousy, debt.”
He added: “He was clearly a well-liked person with a large extended network. We do not get the impression that he had many enemies so right now we don’t have a motive.”
Solving the crime is not made any easier by the fact that Dybdahl was a known criminal with a large network. He was among the drug dealers who a few years ago were convicted in the celebrity drug scandal involving the businesswoman and socialite Rigmor Zobel.
Zobel was cleared of having bought ten grams of cocaine from Dybdahl but in her witness statement she admitted that he had sold her cocaine in smaller quantities, and that they were good friends. Zobel was given a 20,000 kroner fine for possession of six grams of cocaine.
Dybdahl is the second dealer linked to the Zobel case to have been gunned down.
On 15 June, 2010, Kenneth Vigeholm, 41 – who also testified during the Zobel case and explained how he had delivered cocaine to her – was shot at three times while on a walk with his wife and two dogs.
Vigeholm survived, but according to Ekstra Bladet, remains in a coma.
According to Jyllands-Posten, Dybdahl was also the host of a series of parties in an apartment located in a fashionable and newly built residential area in Sydhavn which were attended by a range of celebrities. Dybdahl was friends with the rapper Jokeren and helped run his fashion label Flamingo, while other prominent rappers L.O.C. and Niarn both mourned Dybdahl's passing on Twitter.
Jyllands-Posten’s sources allege that Dybdahl knew people in the biker gang Hells Angels, though he did not attend their parties.
