Gang War: Pusher Street (2025) s01e04 Episode Script
Episode 4
1
[mysterious music playing]
[Christensen] I never hid.
I've never had an unlisted
number or address protection.
I decided when it started
that I wasn't going to do that.
At one point I realized
I was being followed.
BJARNE CHRISTENSEN
FORMER OPERATIONS MANAGER
I'd been trained
to detect that type of stuff,
and I started picking things up.
Someone tried to assault me on the train
on the way to Copenhagen.
My house has been trashed twice.
The first time was a summer morning.
Cars suddenly slammed
on their brakes in the street.
There was a clicking sound, then all
the windows facing the street exploded.
During that time, I was always armed.
I always brought my HK home with me.
I kept it by my bedside at night,
so I could reach it.
What started out as a hippie dream,
ended up as a brutal nightmare.
[The Wholesaler] If there's demand for
something and there's money to make,
people like me will swoop in
and capitalize.
[Larsen] On one side are the drug dealers,
and on the other side
are the combat-ready cops.
When we strike, we follow through.
- [people screaming]
- [tense dramatic music playing]
[Larsen] And in the middle
are the Christianites.
SHAME
I felt like a hostage caught
between drug dealers and cops.
[man] What the hell are you doing?
They wanted to hurt each other.
It was It was war.
We thought, "Fuck them."
I've been in situations thinking,
"You're dead, you won't survive."
[Lykke] We got to the point that
we had always feared.
[gun blast]
Someone was shot dead in Pusher Street.
That killing became the final straw
in decades of fighting over Pusher Street.
GANG WAR
PUSHER STREE
[mysterious music playing]
[Norton] If you take stock
of the criminal underworld of Copenhagen,
it becomes apparent that
some major changes are on the way.
In the wake of the Nordic Biker War,
which ended in the late nineties,
there was a vacuum of power
CARSTEN NORTON
AUTHOR & JORNALIS
which created opportunity
for new factions to form.
Back then, they were referred to
as immigrant gangs.
Today, we'd call them street gangs.
- [distant siren blaring]
- [tense dramatic music playing]
[Sandberg] New players will start
to emerge in the scene, you know?
And that will always be the case.
BRIAN SANDBERG - PODCAST HOS
& FORMER HA MEMBER
There will always be competition,
especially in crime.
You can't fight that.
There's never a lone ruler.
[Norton] If you asked the police,
immigrant gangs had, for years,
been involved
in supplying the bikers with cannabis.
There was a suspicion
that a large portion of that cannabis
was being traded in Christiania.
In the past, it had been assumed
that the biker gangs
were playing a crucial role
in getting the cannabis sold
in Christiania.
But during the Nordic Biker War,
the immigrant gangs realized
they could do it without the bikers,
they could do things on their own.
They could buy an entire crop
for themselves, from Morocco.
They could get it sold around the city.
When you have that kind of capacity,
you start looking at all the money
being made on Pusher Street and wonder,
"What do we have to do
to get a piece of this market?"
[Sandberg] All of the cannabis
was coming in from the countries
where the immigrant gangs are from.
Of course, these gangs
wanted to establish a
a presence in Christiania.
I mean, everybody wanted that.
[siren blaring]
A shooting tonight in Christiania.
Preliminary reports indicate one killed,
three wounded.
[Norton] At one point, various members
of the street gangs went to Christiania
to express their desire to have
a presence there with their own stalls.
And at the very least,
they wanted to supply stalls
and, in that way, secure for themselves
some kind of financial gain.
This was initially met with refusal,
which the gangs didn't take lying down.
They chose to respond rather harshly.
[quiet dramatic music playing]
The most violent
and extreme incident that occurred
in the wake of the rejection
was a shooting in the square
in front of the Community Kitchen.
Wild and indiscriminate gunfire broke out,
and resulted in a person
getting shot and killed.
We heard the shots from the youth center.
[rapid gunfire]
They were. running around the square,
shooting blindly at people.
[rapid gunfire]
It was scary that someone lost their life.
CARLO
CHRISTIANITE
Uh Just like that.
[person screaming]
[woman] Sit down, sit down,
sit down, sit down, sit down.
[echoing scream]
[reporter] Whether the motive is a rivalry
between drug dealers is uncertain.
I believe the shooting
was an act of revenge,
for something that had happened
the day before.
That whole incident
was kind of a launching pad
for the ramping up of violence.
Not just between the police
and drug dealers,
but also internally, among those of us
who liked to go to Pusher Street.
No suspect was identified
and the case remained unsolved,
but law enforcement
strongly suspected the gang scene
of being responsible
for what had happened.
[melancholic music playing]
Looking back at that period of time,
now with the benefit of hindsight
as well as the knowledge we have
of what happened to Pusher Street,
it's fair to say that the incidents
that occurred at that time
were an omen that portended the battle
over Pusher Street that later unfolded.
[tense music playing]
[people shouting]
[man] What are you doing? Hey!
It was an extremely violent time
in Christiania, in 2006 and 2007.
ALLAN BEIER
FORMER POLICE OFFICER
It was a period of extreme volatility.
- Whoa, whoa, Lie down! Hey! Hey!
- [people shouting]
[Norton] Around this time,
Christiania and its citizens
were subjected to pretty much
daily police raids, on Pusher Street.
There were officers raiding stalls,
sometimes even knocking over
and removing stalls,
and making a lot of arrests.
[people shouting]
[Bille] It was very violent.
KARL BILLE
ARTIST & MUSICIAN
In my opinion, senseless violence.
[man] What the hell are you doing?
[Norton] It was very clearly
an environment under intense strain.
I was the site commander,
and I became the figurehead.
They came at me with all they had.
[people shouting]
Bjarne Christensen was a notorious
on-site commander with the police.
He was loved by many of his officers,
but absolutely reviled on Pusher Street.
There was tension
every time he set foot in Christiania.
One time, a few of us, like all us young
people, decided to band together out there
because Bjarne had been, um, a little
too rough over the last several months.
NIKOLAJ
FORMER GOFER
Someone got the idea
to throw a bucket of shit on him.
[ethereal music playing]
So the plan was to, um,
we left out a bucket to be used
by everyone and anyone.
And we encouraged people to contribute.
The day came
where Bjarne and his boys arrived.
[dramatic music playing]
[Christensen] We were out there on patrol.
I'm walking around
with a number of colleagues.
There are a lot of people.
[Nikolaj] We seize our chance.
And then things move fast.
[people chattering]
I had this bucket of shit
poured all over me.
It got dead quiet.
[ominous music playing]
They're waiting
for the old man to lose it.
Something is happening.
[dramatic music playing]
Uh, then my buddy yells
[man] Bjarne, you smell like shit!
[snickering]
JØRN BALTHER – DOCUMENTARY
FILMMAKER & CHRISTIANITE
He stood there with shit dripping off him,
trying to keep a straight face.
[Christensen] I was boiling inside,
but stayed poised.
I wiped it off my visor
and continued patrol.
TONNY KLUCK
FORMER DRUG DEALER
He wiped it off and put it back on.
It really, really reeked.
[people shouting]
[Nikolaj] He took it well.
I'll give him that.
He kept his pride.
We thought he'd sic the boys on us.
But he didn't.
All the Christianites were standing
there, waiting for me to lose my temper.
Looking back, I definitely think
we won that little battle.
We didn't take the bait.
And I kept my cool.
Old dude's tough.
In all honesty, I don't think I would've
handled it the way Bjarne did.
[crowd chanting]
You smell a bit like shit!
You smell a bit like shit!
You smell a bit like shit!
You smell a bit like shit!
[Christensen] Eventually we leave
and go to the police station,
to get ourselves cleaned up.
When we pulled in,
it was completely quiet.
Then one of my colleagues says,
"It's true, Bjarne,
you do smell a bit like shit."
Then everyone starts laughing.
That gave me my last nickname.
Since then, we called him Shit Bjarne.
[Nikolaj] It became his trademark.
[Christensen] I heard that all the time.
I took the whole thing like,
"Okay, the people respect you a little.
They might like you
since they pulled that stunt."
[moody dramatic music playing]
[Norton] In the latter half of the 2000s,
the police had been at it for a while
with daily raids
and their zero tolerance policy.
The authorities started realizing
that it wasn't having an effect,
and none of the underlying problems
were improving.
So it was time to turn to other tools,
other tactics, in order to fully realize
the government's so-called
"normalization" process.
And that's when the buildings really
became an important area of interest.
[Christensen] Our operations
grew significantly.
We started on Pusher Street,
but Christiania as a whole
needed to be normalized.
That meant demolishing
illegally constructed buildings.
[dramatic music playing]
The most prominent of them
was Infohuset.
That was where most of the dealers
and the other stall owners lived.
Members of the biker gangs
also lived there,
and as residents of Christiania,
they were allowed to sell cannabis.
[Norton] Infohuset is a property
in Christiania,
located in the area called Prærien.
It is a relatively large open area
facing Bådsmandsstræde
and Prinsessegade.
It's an illegally constructed property.
And during this time period,
it is believed by police
to house some of the heaviest players
dealing on Pusher Street.
[contemplative music playing]
Infohuset is life in the lap of luxury.
The few times I've been in there,
they are like luxury apartments.
Gold taps, drop-in tubs,
and that kind of stuff.
It's just a regular brick house.
[Christensen] It is very well know to us,
to everyone really,
that drug dealers and various members
of Hells Angels live there.
We all know that.
They don't contribute anything to society.
They're living a life of luxury.
A lot of them were on welfare.
And there was piles of cash lying around.
That builds resentment.
Bjarne is ridiculous.
No biker has ever lived at Infohuset.
That's a police fabrication.
Its total bullshit.
[Christensen] That house had to go.
An arrangement was made,
with the demolition team
that I would get to be the first person
to swing the wrecking ball.
[Larsen] The police are well aware
that no one in Christiania
is interested in their buildings
being demolished.
The atmosphere is intense and resentful.
Their plan is to start out gently.
[ominous music playing]
[Christensen] On the east edge
of Christiania there was a building
called The Cigar Box.
The Cigar Box was an illegal building
that had caught fire.
It burned down, and there were
just a few charred beams left.
OLE LYKKE
CHRISTIANITE
The Cigar Box was mostly
burned down at that point
and definitely not worth very much.
[Christensen] We decided to start
by clearing out The Cigar Box.
There was nothing to object to.
Clearing out that place
wouldn't be a problem.
[Norton] The Cigar Box
would become a turning point
in the police's fight
against Pusher Street,
the drug dealers, and the Christianites.
The Palaces and Properties Agency
was the institution
that designated a building
for demolition and removal.
The Cigar Box was a property from which
Christianites had evicted residents.
[tense music playing]
That day, the police thought
they were headed out
on just another routine operation.
[Balther] We didn't want
The Cigar Box removed.
You got the impression
that it really wasn't about the building.
No, it was about asserting power
over Christiania.
[Lykke] The early stages of demolition
were seen by the Christianite community
as the starting point
for the abolition of Christiania.
It was like the beginning of the end.
[Christensen] We went in
early in the morning.
There weren't that many of us.
Technical Services cut up the beams
and drove them away.
It was going well at first,
until people started showing up.
[people chanting]
Police control breeds the violence!
More and more came.
Ein, zwei, drei! Nazipolizei!
That created an agitated
and hostile atmosphere,
so we started patrolling.
Police control breeds the violence!
Then the rocks started flying.
The police pressed toward Pusher Street.
[chuckles] And let me tell ya,
that was when the shit really hit the fan.
- [people shouting]
- [man 1] What the fuck are you doing?
[man 2] Stop it!
[man 3] You fucking assholes!
- [people shouting]
- [officer] Calm down!
I mean the pepper spray was flowing
and people were in tears.
[tense music playing]
People got thrown to the ground,
got lacerations and started bleeding.
[people shouting]
It was a truly unnecessary
and ugly situation.
Wakey-wakey, on your feet. Hello?
It was violent, very violent.
It just kept going.
A few people from Christiania,
myself included,
maybe 20 or 30 of us,
we got all the trash containers together.
We got them from alleyways
and the streets.
We dumped them all on Torvegade
and we set it all on fire.
[siren blaring]
It took it from there.
Me and a buddy were riding around
with a megaphone.
More and more people joined in.
Word traveled fast around town.
[Lykke] This was right after
Ungdomshuset was shut down.
A lot of people were furious
with the police
and were more than ready to fight them.
[Nikolaj] I had heard
there were people in Jutland
who saw it on TV
and came to Christiania to help.
That escalated
into full-blown fighting in streets.
[siren blaring]
Fires, burned-out cars,
and all that kind of stuff.
Molotov cocktails
and lots of tear gas.
[Beier] Christiania was completely
blanketed in gas.
They threw so much tear gas.
This created problems for my colleagues,
and we needed to make space
in order to operate.
[explosion]
[Nikolaj] We wore gas masks.
I mean, we just pick up the gas canisters
and throw them right back at the police.
[chuckles] The tear gas didn't work on us.
[Beier] It was a wild, intense experience.
It was dark and all I could see
was Christianites in dark clothing,
running left and right, all over the
place, hiding behind sheds, behind bushes.
We were under attack
and I couldn't see anything
At one point I issued an order
to my tear gas gunner.
I told him, "This is too dangerous.
If you see someone and they
are holding a rock in their hand,
you have permission to just shoot them
with the gas canister.
That's an order."
[man] The cops are in the cars.
The cars are on fire.
At night, the police
start gaining the upper hand,
and they push the rioters away from
Christianshavn and into Christiania.
[Nikolaj] We're starting to lose ground.
The police are closing in.
They're moving, one step at a time,
slowly down Prinsessegade
until they manage to push us back
so far that we have to retreat.
It's, uh, five six AM.
Me and three others, uh,
we run down Pusher Street
down to Nemoland.
All of Nemoland is full of cops.
With shields.
They're all in battle formation.
They start beating
against their shields, going,
"Dom, dom, dom, dom."
They start marching,
and then they call out, "Hit them!"
I was scared shitless.
[ominous music playing]
[Christensen] The crowd
was starting to grow.
The Christianites and anarchists knew
when they cast the first stone
that once they did A, B would follow.
[Nikolaj] There aren't any places
to run. They came from
every entrance from everywhere,
with over 300 men.
The only option I have
is to run to Stjerneskibet,
which they have surrounded too.
I climbed out a window.
We laid on the roof for five hours,
until the danger had passed.
[dog barking]
I can't believe no one saw us,
but no officer would have thought
we'd be dumb enough to hide on the roof.
[contemplative music playing]
[Norton] With the police's
violent conduct in Christiania
and other parts of the city,
public opposition starts brewing
against beating protesters
and activists with batons.
As footage
from those operations circulate,
more and more people
voice discomfort and outrage.
This spurs considerations that it might
be time to turn down the heat a little,
as people start questioning whether
such force is necessary or proportional.
[Beier] Our extreme zero-tolerance
approach only resulted
in increasing confrontation.
There were a lot of fights
that could have been avoided.
It's the job of the police to de-escalate
and we should have prioritized dialogue
to prevent unnecessary clashes.
We were supposed to go high,
when everyone else goes low.
We didn't do that.
We went along with their dirty fights.
That's what caused the escalations.
We engaged in show-of-force tactics,
pushing into crowds
rather than opening communication.
Unit pride and quick tactical wins
was all that mattered.
There were so many fights that could
have been prevented if we,
as police officers,
had tried to talk things down.
But we didn't, not at all.
[dog barking]
When I look back
at my own behavior during that time
and how confrontational I was,
I can reflect and understand very clearly
that it wasn't very professional.
I didn't properly exercise
my duty-bound authority.
I wasn't trained well enough
to know how to deal with all of that.
I just had to rely on my own skills
to somehow resolve it.
We have our armor until it wears out,
and then we fall back on our humanity.
[siren blaring]
To think that tearing down
The Cigar Box, of all places,
had that kind of effect, I mean
That was intense.
[man] What's going on?
Hey, man!
[Norton] If you look back
at that three-year period
where Bjarne Christensen
had daily patrols in Christiania,
he became, to the people of Pusher Street,
the very face
of that confrontational style of policing.
Local sentiment connected those methods
to Bjarne Christensen himself.
[people shouting]
The authorities started to consider
whether the police strategy
was really what was best for the area,
and to weigh the idea
that some important things
might need to change moving forward.
In 2008, a shift happens
to the police effort in Christiania.
The ideas about how to handle
and go about it.
There was a realization that the rigid
and ruthless zero-tolerance policy
couldn't stand alone
in the way that it had.
The police strategy changes,
and with that the daily confrontations
with the citizenry come to an end.
The police start to practice
a more classic form of investigation,
targeting the kingpins directly
as opposed to the population at large.
[contemplative music playing]
[Christensen] After clearing The Cigar Box
people in the various government agencies
and ministries got cold feet
about the operation.
Once they saw the reaction and fallout
from clearing that one dilapidated site,
they left it alone.
They gave in to mob pressure,
that's how I see it.
They capitulated.
They weren't willing to take on the fight
that it would have become.
To do our job properly, we would have
continued to use a lot of resources,
fought hard, and fought a lot.
We were told,
"This is the last time. Make it count."
What happened? It fizzled out.
Then you're disappointed and sad.
You go, "Six years wasted."
We accomplished nothing.
[Beier] I had been okay with the job
I had been doing in Christiania
and doing what needed to be done.
But then I became a part
of the realization
that zero tolerance and ruthlessness
were not the way to go.
We all believed that we'd stick it out
till the bitter end.
It just didn't happen.
So I said to myself,
"If they ask you to do it again,
the answer is no."
- Get outta here!
- That's right, take your crap with you.
[Larsen] Even though Bjarne Christensen
and the zero-tolerance approach were out,
there was still a police presence
in Christiania.
But now they practiced much
less confrontational methods.
JESPER VESTERGAARD LARSEN
JOURNALIS
For example,
they don't arrest cannabis smokers.
Shortly after that, the weed market
grew back very quickly.
[upbeat music playing]
The stalls got a boost,
and people started to name them
and market them and build them
into real brands.
MATILDE
CHRISTIANITE
[Norton] The Christianites' acceptance
of cannabis sales
stemmed from the fact that cannabis
is an ingrained part of the spirit
of Christiania itself.
There was a bond
between the Christianites and the dealers.
A lot of the drug dealers
were Christianites during this period.
[Mathilde] One time I got a flier from
this dealer who had photographed himself,
partially masked,
and there was a QR code.
It really seemed like an advertisement you
might expect from a legitimate business.
I thought, "Wow, this has suddenly
become extremely commercialized."
[Kluck] People can relax
and be themselves.
That's a good reason to
bring better weed across the border.
Make sure customers
get a better selection,
better pot, better joints.
[Mathilde] Some stalls
were more popular than others.
Usually the stalls that had like Christmas
garlands and such were the busiest.
It felt like any other market.
There was an ordinary kind of calm to it.
[Kluck] We even had a few concerts
at that time. Free to attend.
Eat a hotdog,
listen to music, drink a beer
It was great.
A calmer Christiania
attracts an older crowd.
[contemplative music playing]
Back in the day, I traded pot
for hashish in Christiania.
THE WHOLESALER
Now a days, there's much higher quality
stuff. The product is a lot more refined.
So eventually,
I started my own cannabis cultivation
and sought out some old contacts,
from my previous operations.
From the Netherlands, actually.
I built it up to a relatively large site,
with, um
three or four thousand plants.
I delivered 12 to 13 kilograms
to Christiania once every four weeks.
I think I charged
35,000 per kilo.
[Norton] One of the key hypotheses
of law enforcement during this period
was that the Hells Angels play
a dominant role in Pusher Street.
The police said that they believed
the biker club controlled about 80%
of Pusher Street's market.
They wanted an investigation
to document what was going on.
POLICE
[Lykke] As Bjarne
and his police officers withdrew,
the cannabis market came roaring back.
It It returned
in a much different form.
This return was very clearly directed
and run by the Hells Angels.
Very clearly.
[intriguing music playing]
It becomes clear that the biker gangs
have a strong presence in the market.
Bandidos and the Hells Angels
had that market in the 2010s.
We went out there, we found the stalls
had all been packed up.
But there were still people there.
You know, those biker types.
And it became very to clear to us
when we spoke with them
that these guys
were definitely part of those gangs.
[siren blaring]
[ominous music playing]
Meanwhile, there was
a full on war going on
between the immigrant gangs
and the Hells Angels.
It was about immigrant gangs
trying to get into the cannabis market.
Hells Angels,
in particular, really fought back.
We ended up in a situation where
there was gang warfare in Copenhagen.
[siren blaring]
[dog barking]
[Sandberg] There was
a big gang war in the 2000s.
There's this sense that,
yeah, you're at war with each other,
but it's an ongoing evolution.
New kids come in
and want a piece of the action,
and you know, that has to be dealt with.
The question is always: is it better
to fight it or is there room for both?
There are several violent encounters that
pop up between criminals in Christiania.
[ominous music playing]
[Nikolaj] There's a lot of tension,
you can feel it.
My boss told me
not to go around the city.
And to you know avoid going to clubs,
because you might end up
in the wrong place at the wrong time.
A lot of these clashes are likely due
to immigrant biker groups
who are trying to get into the lucrative
cannabis market in Christiania.
[tense music playing]
[Beier] I've been following the situation
in Christiania closely for many years,
and the severity of violence has increased
exponentially as time has gone by.
[Lykke] Both Bandidos and Hell's Angels
established hard-hitting youth factions.
For Hells Angels
it was called AK-81.
If there was trouble,
a certain group would show up
like some kind of guard squad.
[Norton] The bikers realized
they might be facing a new enemy
that they hadn't really seen coming.
In short, they were taken by surprise.
And they thought the situation called
for new recruits.
But they also saw that they might
have trouble attracting young people.
At this point in the 2000s,
they were hanging on to old ideals
with long hair and motorcycles.
Their image felt increasingly out of step
with younger generations,
which made it difficult
to bring in new blood.
One of the ways they tried to get around
this was by establishing a support group
for young people who were curious.
Around this time, some of the key
members of Hells Angels,
namely Jørn "Jønke" Nielsen
and Brian Sandberg,
they ramped up the new group
and renamed it AK-81.
This was a letter and number code
that meant "Always Ready Hells Angels."
Jønke said AK-81
was just "a group of strapping lads."
It was, "a crew of eager young men."
And you have to admit,
he was right about that.
In practice, they functioned
exactly as the description implied.
These people were recruited
as a type of goon squad
in the conflict with the street gangs.
What's remarkable
is the way the use of firearms
comes so prominently into the picture.
[tense music continues]
There's shootings and deaths.
And what became
very clear to us, as police,
was this intense battle
over the illegal cannabis market.
The uptick in violence made it clear how
ruthlessly that market will be defended.
The cannabis market held such value
and was such a big business
that these biker groups were ready
to fight and kill each other over it.
[ominous music playing]
[gun cocks and rapid gunfire]
In 2009, there was an outright
assassination outside Grå Hal.
There was an immigrant guy,
who was sitting in a car.
And someone associated with AK-81
came and shot him.
[rapid gunfire]
[dramatic music playing]
The gang war came very close
to Christiania as well.
[Norton] Although the police
didn't have a strong visible presence
in Christiania at this time,
they still had their eyes
on Pusher Street.
[tense music playing]
[Mathilde] The police were still present
in Christiania
and I would encounter them
in my everyday life.
There certainly weren't those
big conflicts like I had seen before,
but I would still see arrests being made.
[Nikolaj] You don't talk to police.
You don't say anything.
When you're in custody, you go silent.
You don't offer a defense.
You keep quiet.
Whatever you say, they can build a case.
So just keep your mouth shut.
[Norton] As the investigation
against Pusher Street intensified,
the police set their focus
on finding out who the kingpins were.
They cast a wider net and started
looking at the supply chain
going into Christiania.
This raised more questions about
how the street trade actually operated
and who was connected to whom.
The inquiry's scope widened conceptually,
from the handful of street sellers,
to the broader picture
of how product and people moved
throughout the market.
In 2012, police start a new investigation
of Pusher Street
and establish a new unit.
Its formation marks a shift
towards a more concentrated focus.
The new unit
is named Task Force Pusher Street,
and its purpose is exclusively targeted
at Pusher Street.
[Beier] Task Force Pusher Street was
created to conduct basic investigations
with surveillance, document investigation,
interviews, wiretaps.
All the classic investigative tools
are at their disposal.
The unit coordinated those methods
to pursue leads.
[contemplative music playing]
[Lykke] The police came back
with a new operation.
They mostly did surveillance,
but they also had undercover cops
buying cannabis from dealers
to collect material
for their investigation.
[Larsen] After the police stop
the confrontational approach
to challenges on Pusher Street,
some of the dealers start to feel
like they're free again.
But they're dead wrong.
[dramatic music playing]
MARCH 13, 2014
Police went out in force, hitting 150
addresses across the country.
[Norton] In March 2014,
Task Force Pusher Street
launched the single
largest operation in the group's history,
called Operation Nordlys.
More than 80 people were arrested
and the scale of this operation signaled
how concentrated
the investigation had become.
The overall purpose of the operation
was to demonstrate
that police would strike,
specifically against the Hells Angels.
Their aim was prove that the biker group
had been playing a controlling role
in Pusher Street.
Pusher Street in Christiania
was combed through
in the largest-ever police
operation targeting cannabis sales.
In March 2014,
police conducted Operation Nordlys.
They arrested around 80 people
associated with the cannabis market.
[man] The police found
hundreds of kilograms of cannabis,
cash, vehicles and weapons.
[dog barking]
[Beier] I wasn't part of Operation
Nordlys, but I'm familiar with it.
The investigation went specifically
after the bagmen
who had their origins in the biker groups,
and the pushers
working the stalls in Christiania.
The operation targeted both the
supply-side players tied to the bikers
and the street-level dealers.
[man] The many detainees
have been or are being arraigned.
Among them are five members
of the Hells Angels,
many of them top men.
[Mathilde] I really only remember
that Operation Nordlys was huge.
I was just, at home,
and then I got a call from my in-laws
saying that there had
been this massive raid.
They came at five AM. They rammed
the door, and cops flooded in.
[Mathilde] I talked to several of my
girlfriends whose fathers were arrested.
They built a big case
with agents in plain clothes
who went around filming.
[Mathilde] There were cameras in places
that no one knew about:
up on the rooftops and even in apartments.
They had been placed around town
in secret, to document the drug dealing.
[Kluck] Hidden cameras.
They got a whole lot of footage.
They built a case on it.
[interviewer] Was there footage of you?
Yeah, there was.
I don't remember how much, but a lot.
[intriguing music playing]
When they led me out to the car,
I saw them in all the apartments.
So I knew it was a big case.
[Bille] All of the old dealers,
they just disappear.
The guys who make sure the people
behave themselves are gone.
The entire infrastructure is gone.
It's a tragedy. A tragedy.
ON THE NEXT EPISODE
"Allan, two of your colleagues
have been shot in Christiania."
[gun cocks]
[gunfire]
An officer is in critical condition
after being shot in the head
while on patrol in Christiania.
Is he dead or alive?
[Lykke] The place is crawling
with armed police.
They are not to be trifled with.
[officer] Show me your hands!
The tension grew so fast, like overnight.
[Bille] Everything just became so brutal.
It got very rough.
[shouting]
[Lykke] A series of violent events.
- [people shouting]
- [dramatic music playing]
It was an uncomfortable place.
THE HELLS ANGELS MC AND
BANDIDOS MC WERE PRESENTED
WITH AND OFFERED TO COMMEN
ON THE ALLEGATIONS,
BUT HAD NOT DONE SO
AT THE TIME OF PUBLICATION.
[tense dramatic music playing]
[mysterious music playing]
[Christensen] I never hid.
I've never had an unlisted
number or address protection.
I decided when it started
that I wasn't going to do that.
At one point I realized
I was being followed.
BJARNE CHRISTENSEN
FORMER OPERATIONS MANAGER
I'd been trained
to detect that type of stuff,
and I started picking things up.
Someone tried to assault me on the train
on the way to Copenhagen.
My house has been trashed twice.
The first time was a summer morning.
Cars suddenly slammed
on their brakes in the street.
There was a clicking sound, then all
the windows facing the street exploded.
During that time, I was always armed.
I always brought my HK home with me.
I kept it by my bedside at night,
so I could reach it.
What started out as a hippie dream,
ended up as a brutal nightmare.
[The Wholesaler] If there's demand for
something and there's money to make,
people like me will swoop in
and capitalize.
[Larsen] On one side are the drug dealers,
and on the other side
are the combat-ready cops.
When we strike, we follow through.
- [people screaming]
- [tense dramatic music playing]
[Larsen] And in the middle
are the Christianites.
SHAME
I felt like a hostage caught
between drug dealers and cops.
[man] What the hell are you doing?
They wanted to hurt each other.
It was It was war.
We thought, "Fuck them."
I've been in situations thinking,
"You're dead, you won't survive."
[Lykke] We got to the point that
we had always feared.
[gun blast]
Someone was shot dead in Pusher Street.
That killing became the final straw
in decades of fighting over Pusher Street.
GANG WAR
PUSHER STREE
[mysterious music playing]
[Norton] If you take stock
of the criminal underworld of Copenhagen,
it becomes apparent that
some major changes are on the way.
In the wake of the Nordic Biker War,
which ended in the late nineties,
there was a vacuum of power
CARSTEN NORTON
AUTHOR & JORNALIS
which created opportunity
for new factions to form.
Back then, they were referred to
as immigrant gangs.
Today, we'd call them street gangs.
- [distant siren blaring]
- [tense dramatic music playing]
[Sandberg] New players will start
to emerge in the scene, you know?
And that will always be the case.
BRIAN SANDBERG - PODCAST HOS
& FORMER HA MEMBER
There will always be competition,
especially in crime.
You can't fight that.
There's never a lone ruler.
[Norton] If you asked the police,
immigrant gangs had, for years,
been involved
in supplying the bikers with cannabis.
There was a suspicion
that a large portion of that cannabis
was being traded in Christiania.
In the past, it had been assumed
that the biker gangs
were playing a crucial role
in getting the cannabis sold
in Christiania.
But during the Nordic Biker War,
the immigrant gangs realized
they could do it without the bikers,
they could do things on their own.
They could buy an entire crop
for themselves, from Morocco.
They could get it sold around the city.
When you have that kind of capacity,
you start looking at all the money
being made on Pusher Street and wonder,
"What do we have to do
to get a piece of this market?"
[Sandberg] All of the cannabis
was coming in from the countries
where the immigrant gangs are from.
Of course, these gangs
wanted to establish a
a presence in Christiania.
I mean, everybody wanted that.
[siren blaring]
A shooting tonight in Christiania.
Preliminary reports indicate one killed,
three wounded.
[Norton] At one point, various members
of the street gangs went to Christiania
to express their desire to have
a presence there with their own stalls.
And at the very least,
they wanted to supply stalls
and, in that way, secure for themselves
some kind of financial gain.
This was initially met with refusal,
which the gangs didn't take lying down.
They chose to respond rather harshly.
[quiet dramatic music playing]
The most violent
and extreme incident that occurred
in the wake of the rejection
was a shooting in the square
in front of the Community Kitchen.
Wild and indiscriminate gunfire broke out,
and resulted in a person
getting shot and killed.
We heard the shots from the youth center.
[rapid gunfire]
They were. running around the square,
shooting blindly at people.
[rapid gunfire]
It was scary that someone lost their life.
CARLO
CHRISTIANITE
Uh Just like that.
[person screaming]
[woman] Sit down, sit down,
sit down, sit down, sit down.
[echoing scream]
[reporter] Whether the motive is a rivalry
between drug dealers is uncertain.
I believe the shooting
was an act of revenge,
for something that had happened
the day before.
That whole incident
was kind of a launching pad
for the ramping up of violence.
Not just between the police
and drug dealers,
but also internally, among those of us
who liked to go to Pusher Street.
No suspect was identified
and the case remained unsolved,
but law enforcement
strongly suspected the gang scene
of being responsible
for what had happened.
[melancholic music playing]
Looking back at that period of time,
now with the benefit of hindsight
as well as the knowledge we have
of what happened to Pusher Street,
it's fair to say that the incidents
that occurred at that time
were an omen that portended the battle
over Pusher Street that later unfolded.
[tense music playing]
[people shouting]
[man] What are you doing? Hey!
It was an extremely violent time
in Christiania, in 2006 and 2007.
ALLAN BEIER
FORMER POLICE OFFICER
It was a period of extreme volatility.
- Whoa, whoa, Lie down! Hey! Hey!
- [people shouting]
[Norton] Around this time,
Christiania and its citizens
were subjected to pretty much
daily police raids, on Pusher Street.
There were officers raiding stalls,
sometimes even knocking over
and removing stalls,
and making a lot of arrests.
[people shouting]
[Bille] It was very violent.
KARL BILLE
ARTIST & MUSICIAN
In my opinion, senseless violence.
[man] What the hell are you doing?
[Norton] It was very clearly
an environment under intense strain.
I was the site commander,
and I became the figurehead.
They came at me with all they had.
[people shouting]
Bjarne Christensen was a notorious
on-site commander with the police.
He was loved by many of his officers,
but absolutely reviled on Pusher Street.
There was tension
every time he set foot in Christiania.
One time, a few of us, like all us young
people, decided to band together out there
because Bjarne had been, um, a little
too rough over the last several months.
NIKOLAJ
FORMER GOFER
Someone got the idea
to throw a bucket of shit on him.
[ethereal music playing]
So the plan was to, um,
we left out a bucket to be used
by everyone and anyone.
And we encouraged people to contribute.
The day came
where Bjarne and his boys arrived.
[dramatic music playing]
[Christensen] We were out there on patrol.
I'm walking around
with a number of colleagues.
There are a lot of people.
[Nikolaj] We seize our chance.
And then things move fast.
[people chattering]
I had this bucket of shit
poured all over me.
It got dead quiet.
[ominous music playing]
They're waiting
for the old man to lose it.
Something is happening.
[dramatic music playing]
Uh, then my buddy yells
[man] Bjarne, you smell like shit!
[snickering]
JØRN BALTHER – DOCUMENTARY
FILMMAKER & CHRISTIANITE
He stood there with shit dripping off him,
trying to keep a straight face.
[Christensen] I was boiling inside,
but stayed poised.
I wiped it off my visor
and continued patrol.
TONNY KLUCK
FORMER DRUG DEALER
He wiped it off and put it back on.
It really, really reeked.
[people shouting]
[Nikolaj] He took it well.
I'll give him that.
He kept his pride.
We thought he'd sic the boys on us.
But he didn't.
All the Christianites were standing
there, waiting for me to lose my temper.
Looking back, I definitely think
we won that little battle.
We didn't take the bait.
And I kept my cool.
Old dude's tough.
In all honesty, I don't think I would've
handled it the way Bjarne did.
[crowd chanting]
You smell a bit like shit!
You smell a bit like shit!
You smell a bit like shit!
You smell a bit like shit!
[Christensen] Eventually we leave
and go to the police station,
to get ourselves cleaned up.
When we pulled in,
it was completely quiet.
Then one of my colleagues says,
"It's true, Bjarne,
you do smell a bit like shit."
Then everyone starts laughing.
That gave me my last nickname.
Since then, we called him Shit Bjarne.
[Nikolaj] It became his trademark.
[Christensen] I heard that all the time.
I took the whole thing like,
"Okay, the people respect you a little.
They might like you
since they pulled that stunt."
[moody dramatic music playing]
[Norton] In the latter half of the 2000s,
the police had been at it for a while
with daily raids
and their zero tolerance policy.
The authorities started realizing
that it wasn't having an effect,
and none of the underlying problems
were improving.
So it was time to turn to other tools,
other tactics, in order to fully realize
the government's so-called
"normalization" process.
And that's when the buildings really
became an important area of interest.
[Christensen] Our operations
grew significantly.
We started on Pusher Street,
but Christiania as a whole
needed to be normalized.
That meant demolishing
illegally constructed buildings.
[dramatic music playing]
The most prominent of them
was Infohuset.
That was where most of the dealers
and the other stall owners lived.
Members of the biker gangs
also lived there,
and as residents of Christiania,
they were allowed to sell cannabis.
[Norton] Infohuset is a property
in Christiania,
located in the area called Prærien.
It is a relatively large open area
facing Bådsmandsstræde
and Prinsessegade.
It's an illegally constructed property.
And during this time period,
it is believed by police
to house some of the heaviest players
dealing on Pusher Street.
[contemplative music playing]
Infohuset is life in the lap of luxury.
The few times I've been in there,
they are like luxury apartments.
Gold taps, drop-in tubs,
and that kind of stuff.
It's just a regular brick house.
[Christensen] It is very well know to us,
to everyone really,
that drug dealers and various members
of Hells Angels live there.
We all know that.
They don't contribute anything to society.
They're living a life of luxury.
A lot of them were on welfare.
And there was piles of cash lying around.
That builds resentment.
Bjarne is ridiculous.
No biker has ever lived at Infohuset.
That's a police fabrication.
Its total bullshit.
[Christensen] That house had to go.
An arrangement was made,
with the demolition team
that I would get to be the first person
to swing the wrecking ball.
[Larsen] The police are well aware
that no one in Christiania
is interested in their buildings
being demolished.
The atmosphere is intense and resentful.
Their plan is to start out gently.
[ominous music playing]
[Christensen] On the east edge
of Christiania there was a building
called The Cigar Box.
The Cigar Box was an illegal building
that had caught fire.
It burned down, and there were
just a few charred beams left.
OLE LYKKE
CHRISTIANITE
The Cigar Box was mostly
burned down at that point
and definitely not worth very much.
[Christensen] We decided to start
by clearing out The Cigar Box.
There was nothing to object to.
Clearing out that place
wouldn't be a problem.
[Norton] The Cigar Box
would become a turning point
in the police's fight
against Pusher Street,
the drug dealers, and the Christianites.
The Palaces and Properties Agency
was the institution
that designated a building
for demolition and removal.
The Cigar Box was a property from which
Christianites had evicted residents.
[tense music playing]
That day, the police thought
they were headed out
on just another routine operation.
[Balther] We didn't want
The Cigar Box removed.
You got the impression
that it really wasn't about the building.
No, it was about asserting power
over Christiania.
[Lykke] The early stages of demolition
were seen by the Christianite community
as the starting point
for the abolition of Christiania.
It was like the beginning of the end.
[Christensen] We went in
early in the morning.
There weren't that many of us.
Technical Services cut up the beams
and drove them away.
It was going well at first,
until people started showing up.
[people chanting]
Police control breeds the violence!
More and more came.
Ein, zwei, drei! Nazipolizei!
That created an agitated
and hostile atmosphere,
so we started patrolling.
Police control breeds the violence!
Then the rocks started flying.
The police pressed toward Pusher Street.
[chuckles] And let me tell ya,
that was when the shit really hit the fan.
- [people shouting]
- [man 1] What the fuck are you doing?
[man 2] Stop it!
[man 3] You fucking assholes!
- [people shouting]
- [officer] Calm down!
I mean the pepper spray was flowing
and people were in tears.
[tense music playing]
People got thrown to the ground,
got lacerations and started bleeding.
[people shouting]
It was a truly unnecessary
and ugly situation.
Wakey-wakey, on your feet. Hello?
It was violent, very violent.
It just kept going.
A few people from Christiania,
myself included,
maybe 20 or 30 of us,
we got all the trash containers together.
We got them from alleyways
and the streets.
We dumped them all on Torvegade
and we set it all on fire.
[siren blaring]
It took it from there.
Me and a buddy were riding around
with a megaphone.
More and more people joined in.
Word traveled fast around town.
[Lykke] This was right after
Ungdomshuset was shut down.
A lot of people were furious
with the police
and were more than ready to fight them.
[Nikolaj] I had heard
there were people in Jutland
who saw it on TV
and came to Christiania to help.
That escalated
into full-blown fighting in streets.
[siren blaring]
Fires, burned-out cars,
and all that kind of stuff.
Molotov cocktails
and lots of tear gas.
[Beier] Christiania was completely
blanketed in gas.
They threw so much tear gas.
This created problems for my colleagues,
and we needed to make space
in order to operate.
[explosion]
[Nikolaj] We wore gas masks.
I mean, we just pick up the gas canisters
and throw them right back at the police.
[chuckles] The tear gas didn't work on us.
[Beier] It was a wild, intense experience.
It was dark and all I could see
was Christianites in dark clothing,
running left and right, all over the
place, hiding behind sheds, behind bushes.
We were under attack
and I couldn't see anything
At one point I issued an order
to my tear gas gunner.
I told him, "This is too dangerous.
If you see someone and they
are holding a rock in their hand,
you have permission to just shoot them
with the gas canister.
That's an order."
[man] The cops are in the cars.
The cars are on fire.
At night, the police
start gaining the upper hand,
and they push the rioters away from
Christianshavn and into Christiania.
[Nikolaj] We're starting to lose ground.
The police are closing in.
They're moving, one step at a time,
slowly down Prinsessegade
until they manage to push us back
so far that we have to retreat.
It's, uh, five six AM.
Me and three others, uh,
we run down Pusher Street
down to Nemoland.
All of Nemoland is full of cops.
With shields.
They're all in battle formation.
They start beating
against their shields, going,
"Dom, dom, dom, dom."
They start marching,
and then they call out, "Hit them!"
I was scared shitless.
[ominous music playing]
[Christensen] The crowd
was starting to grow.
The Christianites and anarchists knew
when they cast the first stone
that once they did A, B would follow.
[Nikolaj] There aren't any places
to run. They came from
every entrance from everywhere,
with over 300 men.
The only option I have
is to run to Stjerneskibet,
which they have surrounded too.
I climbed out a window.
We laid on the roof for five hours,
until the danger had passed.
[dog barking]
I can't believe no one saw us,
but no officer would have thought
we'd be dumb enough to hide on the roof.
[contemplative music playing]
[Norton] With the police's
violent conduct in Christiania
and other parts of the city,
public opposition starts brewing
against beating protesters
and activists with batons.
As footage
from those operations circulate,
more and more people
voice discomfort and outrage.
This spurs considerations that it might
be time to turn down the heat a little,
as people start questioning whether
such force is necessary or proportional.
[Beier] Our extreme zero-tolerance
approach only resulted
in increasing confrontation.
There were a lot of fights
that could have been avoided.
It's the job of the police to de-escalate
and we should have prioritized dialogue
to prevent unnecessary clashes.
We were supposed to go high,
when everyone else goes low.
We didn't do that.
We went along with their dirty fights.
That's what caused the escalations.
We engaged in show-of-force tactics,
pushing into crowds
rather than opening communication.
Unit pride and quick tactical wins
was all that mattered.
There were so many fights that could
have been prevented if we,
as police officers,
had tried to talk things down.
But we didn't, not at all.
[dog barking]
When I look back
at my own behavior during that time
and how confrontational I was,
I can reflect and understand very clearly
that it wasn't very professional.
I didn't properly exercise
my duty-bound authority.
I wasn't trained well enough
to know how to deal with all of that.
I just had to rely on my own skills
to somehow resolve it.
We have our armor until it wears out,
and then we fall back on our humanity.
[siren blaring]
To think that tearing down
The Cigar Box, of all places,
had that kind of effect, I mean
That was intense.
[man] What's going on?
Hey, man!
[Norton] If you look back
at that three-year period
where Bjarne Christensen
had daily patrols in Christiania,
he became, to the people of Pusher Street,
the very face
of that confrontational style of policing.
Local sentiment connected those methods
to Bjarne Christensen himself.
[people shouting]
The authorities started to consider
whether the police strategy
was really what was best for the area,
and to weigh the idea
that some important things
might need to change moving forward.
In 2008, a shift happens
to the police effort in Christiania.
The ideas about how to handle
and go about it.
There was a realization that the rigid
and ruthless zero-tolerance policy
couldn't stand alone
in the way that it had.
The police strategy changes,
and with that the daily confrontations
with the citizenry come to an end.
The police start to practice
a more classic form of investigation,
targeting the kingpins directly
as opposed to the population at large.
[contemplative music playing]
[Christensen] After clearing The Cigar Box
people in the various government agencies
and ministries got cold feet
about the operation.
Once they saw the reaction and fallout
from clearing that one dilapidated site,
they left it alone.
They gave in to mob pressure,
that's how I see it.
They capitulated.
They weren't willing to take on the fight
that it would have become.
To do our job properly, we would have
continued to use a lot of resources,
fought hard, and fought a lot.
We were told,
"This is the last time. Make it count."
What happened? It fizzled out.
Then you're disappointed and sad.
You go, "Six years wasted."
We accomplished nothing.
[Beier] I had been okay with the job
I had been doing in Christiania
and doing what needed to be done.
But then I became a part
of the realization
that zero tolerance and ruthlessness
were not the way to go.
We all believed that we'd stick it out
till the bitter end.
It just didn't happen.
So I said to myself,
"If they ask you to do it again,
the answer is no."
- Get outta here!
- That's right, take your crap with you.
[Larsen] Even though Bjarne Christensen
and the zero-tolerance approach were out,
there was still a police presence
in Christiania.
But now they practiced much
less confrontational methods.
JESPER VESTERGAARD LARSEN
JOURNALIS
For example,
they don't arrest cannabis smokers.
Shortly after that, the weed market
grew back very quickly.
[upbeat music playing]
The stalls got a boost,
and people started to name them
and market them and build them
into real brands.
MATILDE
CHRISTIANITE
[Norton] The Christianites' acceptance
of cannabis sales
stemmed from the fact that cannabis
is an ingrained part of the spirit
of Christiania itself.
There was a bond
between the Christianites and the dealers.
A lot of the drug dealers
were Christianites during this period.
[Mathilde] One time I got a flier from
this dealer who had photographed himself,
partially masked,
and there was a QR code.
It really seemed like an advertisement you
might expect from a legitimate business.
I thought, "Wow, this has suddenly
become extremely commercialized."
[Kluck] People can relax
and be themselves.
That's a good reason to
bring better weed across the border.
Make sure customers
get a better selection,
better pot, better joints.
[Mathilde] Some stalls
were more popular than others.
Usually the stalls that had like Christmas
garlands and such were the busiest.
It felt like any other market.
There was an ordinary kind of calm to it.
[Kluck] We even had a few concerts
at that time. Free to attend.
Eat a hotdog,
listen to music, drink a beer
It was great.
A calmer Christiania
attracts an older crowd.
[contemplative music playing]
Back in the day, I traded pot
for hashish in Christiania.
THE WHOLESALER
Now a days, there's much higher quality
stuff. The product is a lot more refined.
So eventually,
I started my own cannabis cultivation
and sought out some old contacts,
from my previous operations.
From the Netherlands, actually.
I built it up to a relatively large site,
with, um
three or four thousand plants.
I delivered 12 to 13 kilograms
to Christiania once every four weeks.
I think I charged
35,000 per kilo.
[Norton] One of the key hypotheses
of law enforcement during this period
was that the Hells Angels play
a dominant role in Pusher Street.
The police said that they believed
the biker club controlled about 80%
of Pusher Street's market.
They wanted an investigation
to document what was going on.
POLICE
[Lykke] As Bjarne
and his police officers withdrew,
the cannabis market came roaring back.
It It returned
in a much different form.
This return was very clearly directed
and run by the Hells Angels.
Very clearly.
[intriguing music playing]
It becomes clear that the biker gangs
have a strong presence in the market.
Bandidos and the Hells Angels
had that market in the 2010s.
We went out there, we found the stalls
had all been packed up.
But there were still people there.
You know, those biker types.
And it became very to clear to us
when we spoke with them
that these guys
were definitely part of those gangs.
[siren blaring]
[ominous music playing]
Meanwhile, there was
a full on war going on
between the immigrant gangs
and the Hells Angels.
It was about immigrant gangs
trying to get into the cannabis market.
Hells Angels,
in particular, really fought back.
We ended up in a situation where
there was gang warfare in Copenhagen.
[siren blaring]
[dog barking]
[Sandberg] There was
a big gang war in the 2000s.
There's this sense that,
yeah, you're at war with each other,
but it's an ongoing evolution.
New kids come in
and want a piece of the action,
and you know, that has to be dealt with.
The question is always: is it better
to fight it or is there room for both?
There are several violent encounters that
pop up between criminals in Christiania.
[ominous music playing]
[Nikolaj] There's a lot of tension,
you can feel it.
My boss told me
not to go around the city.
And to you know avoid going to clubs,
because you might end up
in the wrong place at the wrong time.
A lot of these clashes are likely due
to immigrant biker groups
who are trying to get into the lucrative
cannabis market in Christiania.
[tense music playing]
[Beier] I've been following the situation
in Christiania closely for many years,
and the severity of violence has increased
exponentially as time has gone by.
[Lykke] Both Bandidos and Hell's Angels
established hard-hitting youth factions.
For Hells Angels
it was called AK-81.
If there was trouble,
a certain group would show up
like some kind of guard squad.
[Norton] The bikers realized
they might be facing a new enemy
that they hadn't really seen coming.
In short, they were taken by surprise.
And they thought the situation called
for new recruits.
But they also saw that they might
have trouble attracting young people.
At this point in the 2000s,
they were hanging on to old ideals
with long hair and motorcycles.
Their image felt increasingly out of step
with younger generations,
which made it difficult
to bring in new blood.
One of the ways they tried to get around
this was by establishing a support group
for young people who were curious.
Around this time, some of the key
members of Hells Angels,
namely Jørn "Jønke" Nielsen
and Brian Sandberg,
they ramped up the new group
and renamed it AK-81.
This was a letter and number code
that meant "Always Ready Hells Angels."
Jønke said AK-81
was just "a group of strapping lads."
It was, "a crew of eager young men."
And you have to admit,
he was right about that.
In practice, they functioned
exactly as the description implied.
These people were recruited
as a type of goon squad
in the conflict with the street gangs.
What's remarkable
is the way the use of firearms
comes so prominently into the picture.
[tense music continues]
There's shootings and deaths.
And what became
very clear to us, as police,
was this intense battle
over the illegal cannabis market.
The uptick in violence made it clear how
ruthlessly that market will be defended.
The cannabis market held such value
and was such a big business
that these biker groups were ready
to fight and kill each other over it.
[ominous music playing]
[gun cocks and rapid gunfire]
In 2009, there was an outright
assassination outside Grå Hal.
There was an immigrant guy,
who was sitting in a car.
And someone associated with AK-81
came and shot him.
[rapid gunfire]
[dramatic music playing]
The gang war came very close
to Christiania as well.
[Norton] Although the police
didn't have a strong visible presence
in Christiania at this time,
they still had their eyes
on Pusher Street.
[tense music playing]
[Mathilde] The police were still present
in Christiania
and I would encounter them
in my everyday life.
There certainly weren't those
big conflicts like I had seen before,
but I would still see arrests being made.
[Nikolaj] You don't talk to police.
You don't say anything.
When you're in custody, you go silent.
You don't offer a defense.
You keep quiet.
Whatever you say, they can build a case.
So just keep your mouth shut.
[Norton] As the investigation
against Pusher Street intensified,
the police set their focus
on finding out who the kingpins were.
They cast a wider net and started
looking at the supply chain
going into Christiania.
This raised more questions about
how the street trade actually operated
and who was connected to whom.
The inquiry's scope widened conceptually,
from the handful of street sellers,
to the broader picture
of how product and people moved
throughout the market.
In 2012, police start a new investigation
of Pusher Street
and establish a new unit.
Its formation marks a shift
towards a more concentrated focus.
The new unit
is named Task Force Pusher Street,
and its purpose is exclusively targeted
at Pusher Street.
[Beier] Task Force Pusher Street was
created to conduct basic investigations
with surveillance, document investigation,
interviews, wiretaps.
All the classic investigative tools
are at their disposal.
The unit coordinated those methods
to pursue leads.
[contemplative music playing]
[Lykke] The police came back
with a new operation.
They mostly did surveillance,
but they also had undercover cops
buying cannabis from dealers
to collect material
for their investigation.
[Larsen] After the police stop
the confrontational approach
to challenges on Pusher Street,
some of the dealers start to feel
like they're free again.
But they're dead wrong.
[dramatic music playing]
MARCH 13, 2014
Police went out in force, hitting 150
addresses across the country.
[Norton] In March 2014,
Task Force Pusher Street
launched the single
largest operation in the group's history,
called Operation Nordlys.
More than 80 people were arrested
and the scale of this operation signaled
how concentrated
the investigation had become.
The overall purpose of the operation
was to demonstrate
that police would strike,
specifically against the Hells Angels.
Their aim was prove that the biker group
had been playing a controlling role
in Pusher Street.
Pusher Street in Christiania
was combed through
in the largest-ever police
operation targeting cannabis sales.
In March 2014,
police conducted Operation Nordlys.
They arrested around 80 people
associated with the cannabis market.
[man] The police found
hundreds of kilograms of cannabis,
cash, vehicles and weapons.
[dog barking]
[Beier] I wasn't part of Operation
Nordlys, but I'm familiar with it.
The investigation went specifically
after the bagmen
who had their origins in the biker groups,
and the pushers
working the stalls in Christiania.
The operation targeted both the
supply-side players tied to the bikers
and the street-level dealers.
[man] The many detainees
have been or are being arraigned.
Among them are five members
of the Hells Angels,
many of them top men.
[Mathilde] I really only remember
that Operation Nordlys was huge.
I was just, at home,
and then I got a call from my in-laws
saying that there had
been this massive raid.
They came at five AM. They rammed
the door, and cops flooded in.
[Mathilde] I talked to several of my
girlfriends whose fathers were arrested.
They built a big case
with agents in plain clothes
who went around filming.
[Mathilde] There were cameras in places
that no one knew about:
up on the rooftops and even in apartments.
They had been placed around town
in secret, to document the drug dealing.
[Kluck] Hidden cameras.
They got a whole lot of footage.
They built a case on it.
[interviewer] Was there footage of you?
Yeah, there was.
I don't remember how much, but a lot.
[intriguing music playing]
When they led me out to the car,
I saw them in all the apartments.
So I knew it was a big case.
[Bille] All of the old dealers,
they just disappear.
The guys who make sure the people
behave themselves are gone.
The entire infrastructure is gone.
It's a tragedy. A tragedy.
ON THE NEXT EPISODE
"Allan, two of your colleagues
have been shot in Christiania."
[gun cocks]
[gunfire]
An officer is in critical condition
after being shot in the head
while on patrol in Christiania.
Is he dead or alive?
[Lykke] The place is crawling
with armed police.
They are not to be trifled with.
[officer] Show me your hands!
The tension grew so fast, like overnight.
[Bille] Everything just became so brutal.
It got very rough.
[shouting]
[Lykke] A series of violent events.
- [people shouting]
- [dramatic music playing]
It was an uncomfortable place.
THE HELLS ANGELS MC AND
BANDIDOS MC WERE PRESENTED
WITH AND OFFERED TO COMMEN
ON THE ALLEGATIONS,
BUT HAD NOT DONE SO
AT THE TIME OF PUBLICATION.
[tense dramatic music playing]