Norway killer Breivik tests limits of lenient justice system

byJohn Smith •
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Co-judge Henriette Thoner, left, and decide Dag Bjoervik take heed to convicted mass assassin Anders Behring Breivik, again to digital camera, on the primary day of a listening to the place he's looking for parole, in Skien, Norway, Jan. 18, 2022. A decade after the 2011 bombing and capturing spree that left 77 useless, Breivik is looking for early launch from a 21-year sentence — the utmost time period in Norway.
  • Co-judge Henriette Thoner, left, and judge Dag Bjoervik listen to convicted mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik, back to camera, on the first day of a hearing where he is seeking parole, in Skien, Norway, Jan. 18, 2022. A decade after the 2011 bombing and shooting spree that left 77 dead, Breivik is seeking early release from a 21-year sentence — the maximum term in Norway.
  • Convicted mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik sits in the makeshift courtroom in Skien prison on the second day of his hearing where he is requesting release on parole, in Skien, Norway, Jan. 19, 2022. A decade after the 2011 bombing and shooting spree that left 77 dead, Breivik is seeking early release from a 21-year sentence — the maximum term in Norway.
  • Convicted mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik, hands are seen in handcuffs as he arrives at the court room in a courthouse in Oslo, Aug. 24, 2012 . A decade after the 2011 bombing and shooting spree that left 77 dead, Breivik is seeking early release from a 21-year sentence — the maximum term in Norway.
  • Convicted mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik, left, and defense lawyer Oystein Storrvik participate in the makeshift courtroom in Skien prison on the third day of the trial, where he is requesting release on parole, in Skien, Norway, Jan. 20, 2022. A decade after the 2011 bombing and shooting spree that left 77 dead, Breivik is seeking early release from a 21-year sentence — the maximum term in Norway. Storrvik, said in his closing arguments at the parole hearing that Breivik should be released to prove that he is reformed and no longer a threat to society, and that is not possible to prove while he is in total isolation.
  • Convicted mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik is surrounded by prison guards as they arrive for his fourth and last day in court in Skien, Norway on March 18, 2016. A decade after the 2011 bombing and shooting spree that left 77 dead, Breivik is seeking early release from a 21-year sentence — the maximum term in Norway.
  • Psychiatrist Randi Rosenqvist sits in court on the second day of convicted mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik's hearing where he is requesting release on parole, in Skien, Norway, Jan. 19, 2022. A decade after the 2011 bombing and shooting spree that left 77 dead, Breivik is seeking early release from a 21-year sentence — the maximum term in Norway. "His conditions according to Norwegian standards are excellent," said his prison psychiatrist, Randi Rosenqvist.
  • Convicted mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik arrives in court on the first day of a hearing where he is seeking parole, in Skien, Norway, Jan. 18, 2022. A decade after the 2011 bombing and shooting spree that left 77 dead, Breivik is seeking early release from a 21-year sentence — the maximum term in Norway.
  • Convicted mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik, right, is escorted by police as he arrives inside a makeshift courtroom on the first day of a hearing where he is seeking parole, in Skien, Norway, Jan. 18, 2022. A decade after the 2011 bombing and shooting spree that left 77 dead, Breivik is seeking early release from a 21-year sentence — the maximum term in Norway.
  • A Norwegian flag sits among flowers and tributes laid outside the Oslo Cathedral in Oslo, Norway on July 30, 2011, in memory of the victims of July 22 bomb attack and shooting spree. A decade after the killings in 2011 that left 77 dead, Anders Behring Breivik is seeking early release from a 21-year sentence — the maximum term in Norway.

STAVANGER, Norway (AP) — Convicted mass assassin Anders Behring Breivik spends his days in a spacious three-room cell, enjoying video video games, exercising, watching TV and taking university-level programs in arithmetic and enterprise.

Midway by means of a 21-year sentence and looking for early launch, Breivik, 42, is being handled in a method which may appear surprising to individuals outdoors of Norway, the place he killed eight in an Oslo bombing in 2011, after which stalked and gunned down 69 individuals, largely teenagers, at a summer season camp.

However right here — regardless of how depraved the crime — convicts profit from a legal justice system that's designed to supply prisoners a few of the comforts and alternatives of life on the skin.

Nonetheless, Breivik’s excessive case is testing the boundaries of Norway’s dedication to tolerance and rehabilitation.

“Now we have by no means had anybody in Norway who has been answerable for this degree of violence earlier than. And there was debate right here about whether or not a part of the justice system needs to be modified for somebody like him,” stated Erik Kursetgjerde, who survived the slaughter on Utoya island as an 18 12 months outdated. Nevertheless, he advises a gradual method that doesn't bend to Breivik’s need to subvert the system.

Throughout a three-day parole listening to this week that was broadcast to journalists, Breivik renounced violence, but in addition flashed a Nazi salute and espoused white supremacy, echoing concepts in a manifesto he launched on the time of his killing spree. The outburst was acquainted to Norwegians who had watched him ship rambling diatribes throughout his partially televised legal trial.

“Clearly this has been extraordinarily attempting for survivors, the bereaved and Norwegian society as an entire,” stated Kristin Bergtora Sandvik, professor of regulation on the College of Oslo, including that there's debate in Norway over whether or not parole laws needs to be overhauled in a bid to stop this kind of grandstanding.

In 2016, Breivik efficiently sued the Norwegian authorities for human rights abuses, complaining about his isolation from different prisoners, frequent strip searches and the truth that he was typically handcuffed in the course of the early a part of his incarceration. He additionally complained in regards to the high quality of the jail meals, having to eat with plastic utensils and never with the ability to talk with sympathizers.

Whereas Breivik’s human rights case was in the end overturned by the next courtroom, the episode confirmed simply how far the Norwegian legal justice system might bend in favor of prisoners’ rights and dwelling circumstances.

“His circumstances in keeping with Norwegian requirements are glorious,” stated his jail psychiatrist, Randi Rosenqvist. She testified on the parole listening to that Breivik continues to be a public menace.

Even after Breivik’s outbursts at this week’s parole listening to, Norwegian authorities present no signal of wavering from treating him like some other inmate at Skien jail.

“In a Nordic jail sentence, the principle punishment is deprivation of liberty. All of the Nordic nations have techniques primarily based on a lenient and humane legal coverage that begins from the mutual understanding that punishment shouldn't be any stricter than mandatory,” stated Professor Johan Boucht from the College of Oslo Division of Public and Worldwide regulation, who has additionally labored in Sweden and Finland. “The second side is rehabilitation, and the precept that it's higher in the long term to rehabilitate the inmate than create a manufacturing facility for criminals.”

Up till about 50 years in the past, Norway’s justice system targeted on punishment. However within the late Nineteen Sixties there was a backlash to the tough circumstances of prisons, resulting in legal justice reforms that emphasised kinder remedy and rehabilitation.

Norwegian sentencing and jail circumstances are sharply at odds with different European nations comparable to France, the place the worst criminals can face life imprisonment, with the potential of an attraction solely after 22 years.

Comparatively few French defendants get the longest sentence, however amongst these going through it are Salah Abdeslam, who's the one surviving member of the Islamic State cell that attacked Paris in November 2015. Abdeslam has complained bitterly about his circumstances within the Fleury-Mérogis jail, the place he's below 24-hour surveillance in solitary confinement, the furnishings is fastened to the ground of his tiny cell and he can train for only one hour day by day.

Breivik’s comparatively lenient remedy inside jail doesn't imply he’ll get out anytime quickly, and even in 2032, when his sentence ends.

Whereas the utmost jail sentence in Norway is 21 years, the regulation was amended in 2002 in order that, in uncommon circumstances, sentences might be prolonged indefinitely in five-year increments if somebody continues to be thought of a hazard to the general public.

Breivik’s lawyer, Øystein Storrvik, stated in his closing arguments on the parole listening to that Breivik needs to be launched to show that he's reformed and now not a menace to society, and that's not potential to show whereas he's in whole isolation.

However Breivik’s habits throughout this week’s parole listening to was proof sufficient to some that he ought to by no means once more see freedom.

Kristine Roeyneland, who leads a bunch for households of Breivik’s victims and survivors, stated his comfy jail circumstances and skill to unfold extremist views by means of publicized parole hearings are reprehensible.

Regardless of the consequence of Breivik’s request for early parole, which will probably be determined by a three-judge panel in coming weeks, some take an enlightened view of the Norwegian authorities’s obvious dedication to deal with him like some other prisoner.

“Individuals is perhaps afraid that he’s utilizing the regulation as a stage,“ stated Sandvik, the regulation professor. ”However it's also possible to say that, , he's being utilized by the regulation. He’s a megaphone for the rule of regulation.”

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Related Press reporter Lori Hinnant in Paris, France, contributed to this report.

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