Crime: Justice

After 13 months of demonstrations by the civil society demanding just punishment for Anders Behring Breivik’s killing spree of 77 innocent Norwegians in manic fervour, the court finally awarded him imprisonment for 21 years – the highest ruling allowed under the Norwegian law. In the most bizarre reaction against the ruling, Breivik proved beyond doubt that he is deranged, to say the very least. He said, "Since I do not recognise the authority of the court, I cannot legitimise the Oslo district court by accepting the verdict." However, the court declared him sane enough to be treated as a political prisoner that made him an even bigger culprit as the horror borne out of his detonating a bomb and shooting randomly in a crowded tourist spot are still recounted publicly in a way that is unparalleled in the Norwegian history. Breivik is not repentant at all, as he said after the verdict, "I wish to apologise to all militant nationalists that I was not able to execute more." It shows the threat that Breivik possesses to the Norwegian society and the world at large. That is why, definitely, his sentence of 21 years imprisonment is not enough.

Breivik is only 33 now, and 21 years hence he would be 54 – an age where a person is very much capable to cut a swathe through battalions of ordinary people. There can be counter arguments that in 21 years, repentance may step in that will morph him into a rectified person. While that may have been true of a highly educated individual whose act of killing was due to a momentary lapse of control or in acute anger, this logic surely is not applicable to fanatics like Breivik, thriving in ultra-right wing xenophobic ideologies. The newspaper Verdens Gang reported on July 26, 2012 that Breivik, from his prison cell through letters, is trying to mobilise 50 rightwing activists from across Europe incorporating them in an organisation called the Conservative Revolutionary Movement. He has also written letters to mass murderers like Pater Mangs and Beate Zschape and is in a binge of writing, spending 8 to 10 hours per day in that endeavour. He has also expressed his intent to write books to promote his ideology. Given the ridiculous levels of leeway provided by the Norwegian prison system in supporting the ‘rights’ of prisoners, Breivik could well become a multimillionaire penning his books. One wonders if the Norwegian justice system is completely blind to the fact that awarding a pithy 21 years to Breivik would additionally motivate other ready-to-kill fanatics to commit their ‘revolutionary’ assassination deeds.

The government should immediately re-open the case and extend Breivik’s prison tenure from 21 years to lifetime. In simple words,, he should not ever be released from prison. And that is the way it should be in special cases like this. Breivik becoming a cult figure is the last thing we need in these testing times. And support for him from the Norwegian justice system, not at all!