engleski

The Breivik case and the comparative issues of criminal (in)sanity

In the summer of 2011, Anders Behring Breivik commit-ted a terrorist attack in Norway in which 77 people were killed, and at least 319 more were injured. This paper anal-yses several aspects of the deadliest attack on European soil since World War II, primarily the psychological back-ground of this crime and its legal implications. The paper consists of three sections. The first section presents the comparative and legal basics of criminal insanity that is necessary in order to understand the sections that follow. The second section deals with the perpetrator’s psycho- logical profile and the great debate that had ensued due to the contradicting reports of the Norwegian experts. The last section of the paper summarises the essence of the previous two sections while presenting a comparative procedural analysis of hypothetical trials in select juris- dictions. This paper is based on a comparative analysis of legal norms that aims to highlight the high complex-ity of the issue. The Breivik case has been selected as an ideal example because, on the one hand, it has created a number of contradicting opinions within its domestic le-gal system while, on the other hand, its universal nature makes it suitable for a more complex comparative analysis.

criminal insanity, Anders Behring Breivik, comparative law, criminal procedure, criminal psychology, criminal profiling

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