The Norwegian 22 July 2011 Terror Acts and Mass Murder: Insanity, Evilness or Both?

This review presents unique information rarely seen in a description of a politically extreme right wing terrorist. During the trial following the terror acts in Norway on July 22nd 2011, the author, a forensic psychiatrist was at the time engaged by a national Norwegian newspaper to comment on the court proceedings. The author has later thoroughly gone through all available background material such as the terrorist’s childhood, relationship to his mother, childhood psychological evaluation, the interviews made by the forensic psychiatrists and information from the police documents. This information is shared in the review. The author also discusses how it was possible for two pairs of court appointed experienced forensic psychiatrists to arrive at completely different conclusions. One pair concluded with insanity due to Paranoid Schizophrenia and the second pair found no signs of psychotic disorder at all and concluded with Narcissistic Personality Disorder. The court found the terrorist capable to stand trial and sentenced him to 21 years in preventive detention with 10 years to be served before the possibility to apply for an appeal.