Jacob Guntlack (1744–1771) was a notorious

Swedish Swedish or ' may refer to: Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically: * Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland ** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...

thief Theft is the act of taking another person's property or services without that person's permission or consent with the intent to deprive the rightful owner of it. The word ''theft'' is also used as a synonym or informal shorthand term for some ...

and

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. He began his thievery in Sweden and

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at age fifteen; he was a famous

criminal In ordinary language, a crime is an unlawful act punishable by a state or other authority. The term ''crime'' does not, in modern criminal law, have any simple and universally accepted definition,Farmer, Lindsay: "Crime, definitions of", in Can ...

by the time he was

executed Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty, is the state-sanctioned practice of deliberately killing a person as a punishment for an actual or supposed crime, usually following an authorized, rule-governed process to conclude that t ...

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in front of thousands of spectators. His

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, entitled ''Den uti Smedjegårds-häktet nu fängslade ryktbare bedragaren och tjufwen Jacob Guntlacks lefwernes-beskrifning, af honom sjelf författad'', were published the same year, either written by himself in

prison A prison, also known as a jail, gaol (dated, standard English, Australian, and historically in Canada), penitentiary (American English and Canadian English), detention center (or detention centre outside the US), correction center, correc ...

, or after

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s in prison.

References

* Gunnar W. Lundberg; Stortjuven Jacob Guntlack: En svensk Cartouche . 1744 births 1771 deaths Executed Swedish people People executed by Sweden by hanging 18th-century Swedish criminals 18th-century executions by Sweden Age of Liberty people {{Sweden-bio-stub