Magne Andreassen

Magne Andreassen was a gay man killed in Lillehammer by Bård Eithun on August 21, 1992. His murder became both a crime that police struggled to solve and, months later, a striking example of how media coverage of Norwegian Black Metal could misattribute violence: a newspaper story named Varg Vikernes as the killer, although Eithun was later jailed for the crime.

Identity and Circumstances

In August 1992, Eithun was visiting family in Lillehammer, where his mother lived. Late one night he went out to a pub, had a beer, and left when he did not like the atmosphere. He walked through a nearby park, built for the Winter Olympics, carrying a knife. By his later account, he was not drunk or under the influence of drugs when he encountered Andreassen. Their meeting ended in Andreassen’s death.

The Killing and Eithun’s Account

Eithun later said that, at the point of the encounter, he believed he would not have another opportunity if he did not act then. He turned and stabbed Andreassen. Eithun described experiencing the incident as if watching it from outside himself, and recalled that his perception of time had become unclear. He said that he intended to kill Andreassen rather than leave him alive to seek medical help and report him. These details come from Eithun’s retrospective account; the book presents them alongside the otherwise unexplained circumstances of the crime.

Investigation and Immediate Aftermath

The murder initially led nowhere for police. The book describes it as a dead end: investigators had no significant evidence and pursued unproductive leads in the gay community. Eithun’s apparent impunity continued into the following day, when he joined Vikernes and Øystein Aarseth in burning Holmenkollen Chapel. The account places the killing and the arson in the same escalating climate of crime and transgression, while distinguishing the separate acts and their participants. Eithun was eventually sentenced to fourteen years for the murder.

A Murder Recast in the Press

On January 20, 1993, Bergens Tidende brought the Black Metal scene to wider attention with a front-page story titled We Lit the Fires, featuring Vikernes. The article ended by claiming that Vikernes had burned eight churches and killed a gay man in Lillehammer. The killing it invoked was Andreassen’s, but the attribution to Vikernes was wrong: Eithun was the man later jailed for the murder.

The mistake appeared amid rapidly intensifying coverage of the scene. Kerrang! published a prominent Norwegian Black Metal feature on March 27, 1993, helping bring the movement to an international audience. The book later notes both the sensational character of such coverage and the disputes over remarks attributed to its subjects. Andreassen’s murder therefore occupies two distinct places in the account: as a killing that initially baffled investigators, and as a real crime inaccurately folded into the public image of Vikernes and the Black Metal scene.