
Marius Borg Høiby, the 29-year-old son of Crown Princess Mette-Marit, has been found guilty of two counts of rape and sentenced to four years in prison by the Oslo District Court.
The court found Høiby guilty of two counts of rape and acquitted him of criminal responsibility on two other similar charges. The decision was handed down on Monday after a trial that has drawn widespread attention in Norway and cast a shadow over the royal family.
The prosecution had requested a sentence of seven years and seven months in prison, while the defense had argued that an 18-month sentence would be sufficient. Høiby's lawyers have the right to appeal the decision.
Although not a member of the royal family, Høiby grew up close to it after his mother married Crown Prince Haakon when he was just four years old.
The court found that he had raped two women, one of them on the royal estate in Skaugum in 2018 and the other in Oslo in 2024. According to the court, the victims were asleep or unable to resist at the time of the events.
In addition to the rape charges, Høiby was also found guilty of violence against his former partner, Norwegian influencer Nora Haukland, as well as causing serious injuries to another partner.
On the other hand, he was found not guilty of two other rape charges related to events that occurred in Oslo and on the Lofoten Islands.
The court also ordered Høiby to pay around 640,000 Norwegian kroner (around 57,000 euros) in compensation to four of the women involved in the case.
The case has taken on a particularly public dimension due to Høiby's connection to the Norwegian royal family. The situation has been made even more sensitive as Crown Princess Mette-Marit suffers from pulmonary fibrosis and was recently placed on the waiting list for a lung transplant.
Communications experts and royal observers have described the matter as a serious institutional crisis for the Norwegian monarchy, although public attention has increasingly focused on the princess's health.