Mass Murderer Smirks at 21-Year Prison Sentence
Judge rules against prosecutors who wanted Anders Breivik declared insane.
Aug. 24, 2012 — -- The man who killed 77 people -- many of them teenagers -- in a bombing and shooting rampage in Norway last July appeared unable to conceal his happiness after he was declared sane and sentenced to 21 years in prison today.
Anders Breivik, a rightwing extremist who admitted to carrying out the massacre in an effort to battle "multiculturalism" in Europe, had previously said that being declared insane -- as prosecutors requested -- would have been the "ultimate humiliation." The 21-year sentence is the maximum under Norwegian law but can be extended later if Breivik is still deemed to be a threat to society.
Courtroom cameras showed that as Breivik stood and heard the ruling against him, his lips curled into a tight smile.
Last July Breivik detonated a bomb in the country's capital, killing eight people, before taking multiple weapons, including an assault rifle, to a nearby youth summer camp where he gunned down 69 more.
"It wasn't like the movies where you see blood... There was no blood. They just fell, lifeless," one survivor told ABC News.
READ: Norway Shooting Survivor Describes Massacre
Breivik was arrested and confessed to the mass murder, but he pleaded not guilty when his trial started in April. He said the massacre was an act of self-defense and the opening salvo in a 60-year crusade against multiculturalism.
Before the shooting, Breivik posted a 1,500-page manifesto online in which he said he was just one operative in the beginning of a violent Christian conservative revolution in Europe led by a group called the new Knights Templar. The manifesto included an extremely detailed account of Breivik's painstaking preparations for the attack. In it, he says that being arrested is all part of the plan.
"Your arrest will mark the initiation of the propaganda phase," Breivik writes. "Your trial offers you a stage to the world."
Breivik also mentions a plan to escape prison and execute a "bonus operation."
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