Eritrea man gets life sentence for Ikea stabbing

Police officers attend the Ikea store after three people were injured in a knife attack at the store in Vasteras, Sweden, Monday, Aug. 10, 2015. (Peter Kruger / TT via AP)

HELSINKI - A Swedish court has sentenced an Eritrean asylum-seeker to life in prison for stabbing a 55-year-old woman and her adult son to death.

The Svea Court of Appeal says the 36-year-old man, Abraham Ukbagabir, had confessed to the Aug. 10 stabbings at an Ikea store in central Sweden and that he was responsible for causing the deaths of the two victims. He also stabbed himself.

The appeals court said Tuesday it was upholding the Oct. 30 verdict of a lower district court, which found him guilty of the two killings. Judge Birgitta Bylund Uddenfeldt said there were no mitigating circumstances.

The court agreed with an earlier decision that Ukbagabir be deported but it was unclear if he would serve prison time in Sweden first.