Life imprisonment in Norway

There is no sentence of life imprisonment in Norwegian law. There is however an indeterminate penalty that could in principle result in life imprisonment, but there are no examples of such after the latest correctional law passed in 2002. There are basically two types of maximum penalty laws:

• The maximum determinate penalty is 21 years imprisonment, but only a small percentage of prisoners serve more than 14 years. Prisoners will typically get unsupervised parole for weekends etc. after serving ⅓ of their sentence (a maximum of 7 years) and can receive early release after serving ⅔ of their sentence (a maximum of 14 years). In 2008, to fulfill its requirements under the Rome Statute, Norway created a new maximal penalty of 30 years for crimes against humanity.^[1]

• The indeterminate penalty, called "containment" (Norwegian: forvaring), is set at 21 years imprisonment, and the prisoner is required to serve at least 10 years before becoming eligible for parole. If the prisoner is still considered dangerous after serving the original sentence, the prisoner can receive up to five years additional containment. If the additional time is served, and the offender is still considered dangerous, a prisoner can continue to receive up to five years additional containment, and this, in theory, could result in actual life imprisonment. "Containment" is used when the prisoner is deemed a danger to society and there is a great chance of committing violent crimes in the future.^[2] However, the offender can be paroled or released at any time if it is determined that the offender is no longer a danger to society.

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