Norway killings: Breivik might not be declared insane legally

It’s unlikely that the right-wing extremist who admitted killing dozens in Norway last week will be declared legally insane because he appears to have been in control of his actions, the head of the panel that will review his psychiatric evaluation has said.

The decision on Anders Behring Breivik’s mental state will determine whether he can be held criminally liable and punished with a prison sentence or sent to a psychiatric ward for treatment.

The July 22 attacks were so carefully planned and executed that it would be difficult to argue they were the work of a delusional madman, said Dr Tarjei Rygnestad, who heads the Norwegian Board of Forensic Medicine.

In Norway, an insanity defence requires that a defendant be in a state of psychosis while committing the crime with which he or she is charged.

That means the defendant has lost contact with reality to the point that he’s no longer in control of his own actions. “It’s not very likely he was psychotic,” Rygnestad said.

A psychotic person can only perform simple tasks, Rygnestad said . Even driving from downtown Oslo to the lake northwest of the capital, where Breivik opened fire at a political youth camp, would be too complicated.

“How he prepared” for the rampage, meticulously acquiring the materials and skills he needed, while maintaining silence, argues against psychosis.