Edgar Antonsen

Edgar Antonsen (1940 – 2 August 1993) was a Norwegian serial killer and rapist who was responsible for at least three murders and rapes committed in Vestfold and Møre og Romsdal from 1962 to 1974, some with the aid of his half-brother. Convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment in 1975, he was prematurely released in 1988 and committed suicide five years later to avoid an impending arrest for sexually abusing a young girl.

Early life and crimes Edgar Antonsen was born in 1940 in Horten.

Murders Antonsen's first confirmed murder took place in the summer of 1962, while he was on leave from the military. He briefly returned to his hometown of Horten, where he encountered his 80-year-old neighbour, Bertha Holten. She invited him inside her apartment, and once he was inside, Antonsen took a lamp cord and tied it around her neck in two knots, strangling her to death. After stealing 800 kroner (12 485,39 kr in November 2025) from the apartment, he exited the apartment without being seen. Not long after, Holten's body was found, but despite the suspicious circumstances, authorities erroneously concluded that her death was a suicide and closed the case.

After moving to Ørsta, Antonsen started committing new crimes with the help of Terje. In late July 1974, the two men were driving in a car when they chanced upon 31-year-old Oddbjørg Helene Jystad, a photographer from Oslo who was trying to hitchhike home after attending Moldejazz. They gave her a lift but soon drove to an isolated location where both brothers took turns raping her before Edgar ultimately strangled her to death. The pair then put her body in the trunk of the car and drove to Åndalsnes, where they hid it in a tunnel.

On 19 October, the pair were driving their car around Ørsta when they took notice of 12-year-old Bodil Brungot, who was hitchhiking home and partying at a disco with friends until the late evening hours. The Antonsen's brothers gave her a lift, and the moment she entered their car, Terje jumped in the back and held her while Edgar drove them to the rural area of Øyesetra. There, they broke into an abandoned cabin and took turns raping Brungot before Edgar ultimately strangled her. In the following weeks, police continued gathering evidence in the case, further cementing the brothers' guilt after investigating a report about a burglary in a rural cabin: upon searching it, they found numerous items that were later identified as belonging to Brungot. To the investigators' shock, however, Terje made another confession implicating both of them in the rape-murder of Jystad months prior, accurately indicating where they had dumped her body as well. In late November, this was further reinforced when Jystad's camera, a rare Japanese model, was found approximately 800–900 meters away from the dormitory where Antonsen lived.

While awaiting formal charges for their crimes, a national newspaper, the Avisa Dagbladet, wrote an article in which they brought forward allegations that Edgar was responsible for murdering Holten, whose case was reopened and reclassified as a murder in 1971. In the article, the author wrote that the killing occurred while Antonsen was supposedly on unpaid leave for theft – upon reading this, he became infuriated and contacted lead investigator Leif Lier, requesting that the article be corrected in exchange for a confession in the case. Lier agreed, and after Avisa Dagbladet made a retraction, Antonsen made an official confession to killing Holten.

Trial and imprisonment The Antonsens' trial received extensive coverage in contemporary news media. Both of them were assessed for competency, with psychiatrists concluding that Edgar was an "incurable psychopath" who took pleasure in torturing people and animals, while Terje was simply easily manipulated and could be rehabilitated. For the next two days, a search operation was initiated so they could locate the man, and on the final day, authorities found his body on some stones outside the village. Further investigation confirmed that the man was indeed Antonsen, and an autopsy concluded that he had taken his own life. Strangely, the Brungots had received another call just three days prior, informing them that their daughter's killer's days were near an end.

A few months after his death, Antonsen was posthumously accused of committing the so-called Tistedalen Murders by Roger Haglund, the man who was initially arrested in the case. He claimed that he had been forced into confessing to the crimes by Antonsen, but as the former was deceased by that time and with the introduction of evidence pointing towards his guilt, Haglund later retracted the statements and was subsequently convicted of the murders.