Breivik, who has admitted detonating a
fertilizer bomb outside government headquarters, killing eight, before gunning
down 69 at the ruling party’s summer youth camp, faces the possibility of
indefinite extensions to his sentence.
Many survivors and victims’ families wanted a
sane verdict, saying the opposite would diminish his responsibility for the
attacks.
Breivik said he targeted the ruling
centre-left Labour Party for its support of Muslim immigration. He dismissed
being called a child murderer, arguing that his victims, some as young as 14,
were brainwashed activists whose support for multiculturalism threatened to
adulterate pure Norwegian blood. His trial began on 16 April 2012, and closing
arguments were held on 22 June, 2012.
Reports
Breivik himself had argued for the sane
verdict as he wanted the attack to be seen as a political statement. Two teams
of court-appointed psychiatrists examined Breivik prior to his trial; in the
first report Breivik was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, and a second
evaluation was commissioned following widespread criticism of the first report.
The second psychiatric evaluation was published one week before the trial,
concluding that Breivik was not psychotic during the attacks nor during the
evaluation, he was diagnosed with narcissistic personality disorder.
First
report
The psychiatrists diagnosed him with paranoid
schizophrenia, concluding that he had developed the disorder over time and was
psychotic both when he carried out the attacks and during the observation. He
was also diagnosed with abuse of non-dependence-producing substances antecedent
of 22 July 2012. The psychiatrists consequently found Breivik to be criminally
insane.
According to the report, Breivik displayed
inappropriate and blunted affect and a severe lack of empathy. He spoke
incoherently in neologisms and had acted compulsively based on a universe of
bizarre, grandiose and delusional thoughts. Breivik alluded to himself as the
future regent of Norway, master of life and death, while calling himself
“inordinately loving” and “Europe’s most perfect knight since WWII”. He was
convinced that he was a warrior in a “low intensity civil war” and had been
chosen to save his people. To the psychiatrists, Breivik described plans to
carry out further “executions of categories A, B and C traitors” by the
thousands, themselves included, and to organise Norwegians in reservations for
the purpose of selective breeding. Breivik believed himself to be the “knight
Justiciar grand master” of a Templar organisation. He was deemed to be suicidal
and homicidal by the psychiatrists.
Second
Report
On 10 April 2012 the second psychiatric
evaluation was published with the conclusion that Breivik was not psychotic
during the attacks and he was not psychotic during their evaluation. Instead,
they diagnosed antisocial personality disorder and narcissistic personality
disorder. Breivik expressed hope at being declared sane in a letter sent to
several Norwegian newspapers shortly before his trial, writing about the
prospect of being sent to a psychiatric ward he stated: “I must admit this is the
worst thing that could have happened to me as it is the ultimate humiliation.
To send a political activist to a mental hospital is more sadistic and evil
than to kill him! It is a fate worse than death.”
On 8 June 2012, Professor of Psychiatry Ulrik
Fredrik Malt testified in court as an expert witness, stating that he finds it
unlikely that Breivik is schizophrenic. According to Malt, Breivik suffers from
Asperger syndrome, Tourette syndrome, narcissistic personality disorder and
possibly paranoid psychosis
Planned
attacks
Anders Behring Breivik, the convicted
Norwegian mass murderer and terrorist, in a sequential bombing and mass
shooting on 22 July 2011 bombed government buildings in Oslo, resulting in
eight deaths, then carried out a mass shooting at a camp of the Workers’ Youth
League (AUF) of the Labour Party on the island of Utøya, where he killed 69
people, mostly teenagers.
Breivik claims that he started a
nine-year-plan to finance the attacks in 2002 (at age 23), founding his own
computer programming business while working at the customer service company. He
claims that his company grew to six employees and “several offshore bank
accounts”, and that he made his first million kroner at the age of 24. The
company was later declared bankrupt and Breivik was reported for several
breaches of the law. He then moved back to his mother’s home, according to
himself to save money. The first set of psychiatrists who evaluated him said in
their report his mental health deteriorated at this stage and he went into a
state of withdrawal and isolation. His declared assets in 2007 were about NOK
630,000. (US$116,410), according to Norwegian tax authority figures.He claims
that by 2008 he had about NOK two million (US$$369,556])and nine credit cards
giving him access to €26,000 in credit.
In May 2009 he founded a farming company under
the name “Breivik Geofarm”, described as a farming sole proprietorship set up
to cultivate vegetables, melons, roots and tubers.
Also in 2009 he visited Prague in an attempt
to buy illegal weapons. He was unable to obtain a weapon there, and Breivik
decided to obtain weapons through legal channels in Norway instead.He obtained
one semi-automatic 9 mm Glock 17 pistol legally by demonstrating his membership
in a pistol club in the police application for a gun licence, and the
semi-automatic Ruger Mini-14 rifle by possessing a hunting licence.
Breivik had no declared income in 2009 and his
assets amounted to 390,000 kroner ($72,063), according to Norwegian tax
authority figures. He states that in January 2010 his funds were “depleting
gradually”. On 23 June 2011, a month before the attacks, he paid the
outstanding amount on his nine credit cards so he could have access to funds
during his preparations.
In late June or early July 2011, he moved to a
rural area south of Åsta in Åmot, Hedmark county, about 140 km (87 mi)
northeast of Oslo,the site of his farm. As he admits in his manifesto he used
the company as a cover to legally obtain large amounts of artificial fertiliser
and other chemicals for the manufacturing of explosives.] A farming supplier
sold Breivik’s company six tonnes of fertiliser in May. In his manifesto
Breivik described his first experiments with explosives, and details a
successful test detonation at a remote location on 13 June 2011. He sets the
cost of the preparations for the attacks at € 317,000 – “130,000 out of pocket
and 187,500 euros in lost revenue over three years.”
Six hours before the attacks, Breivik posted a
YouTube video urging conservatives to “embrace martyrdom” and showing himself
wearing a thermal sports top and pointing a Ruger Mini-14. He also posted a
picture of himself as a Knight Templar officer in a uniform festooned with gold
braid and multiple medals. In the video he put an animation depicting Islam as
a trojan horse in Europe.Analysts describe it as promoting physical violence
towards Muslims and Marxists who reside in Europe.
Far
right ideologist
Breivik described his far-right militant
ideology in a compendium of texts entitled 2083: A European Declaration of
Independence, which he distributed electronically the day of the attacks.In it
he lays out his worldview, which includes Islamophobia, support of Zionism and
opposition to feminism. It also expresses support for far-right groups such as
the English Defence League and paramilitaries such as the Scorpions.It regards
Islam and “cultural Marxism” as “the enemy”, and argues for the violent
annihilation of “Eurabia” and multiculturalism, and the deportation of all
Muslims from Europe based on the model of the Beneš decrees. Breivik
wrote that his main motive for the atrocities was to market his manifesto.
Breivik had been active on several Islamophobic and nationalist blogs, and was
a regular reader of Gates of Vienna, the Brussels Journal and Jihad Watch.
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