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Friday, October 4, 2024

Mass-murderer’s appeals cost millions

As the latest rounds in court instigated by mass-murderer Anders Behring Breiving wound down last month, the bills he’s created for Norwegian taxpayers keep going up. Not only did Breivik’s white-supremacist attacks cost the lives of 77 mostly young people on July 22, 2011, the ultra-right-wing Norwegian terrorist is continuing to unleash other major costs on the Norwegian public.

State broadcaster NRK reported that Breivik, who has sued the state for allegedly violating his human rights in prison, has piled up nearly NOK 1.5 million in his lawyers’ fees alone. In addition come all the costs tied to the state’s defense, court costs and the high-security arrangements to ensure that the son of a retired Norwegian diplomat had another fair trial in a makeshift court room set up in the gymnasium of the prison in Skien where he was being held.

Last month’s trial lasted six days and was an appeal of last year’s court ruling that Breivik’s isolation did indeed violate his human rights. The state thus appealed, as did Breivik on some points, and a new ruling is pending. Breivik’s attorney, working on a no cure-no pay basis, has claimed he’ll take the case all the way to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg if necessary.

Breivik himself, who has no assets and already has enormous compensation claims against him after killing 77 people, has no ability to pay his lawyers. His application for free legal assistance was rejected. If he ultimately loses the case, his lawyer thus risks sitting with no compensation whatsoever.

State attorneys, meanwhile, claimed that Breivik has not been “damaged” by his time in prison and remains “the same manipulative” man who’s capable of extreme violence, “who can shoot youngsters in the back and who, when they’re lying helpless on the ground and plead for their lives, shoots them in the face.”

A verdict in the appeals case is due later this month.

newsinenglish.no staff

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