Convicted of ax murder – now Andreas Ribe-Nyhus has written a PhD at Nord University on internal imprisonment – NRK

It must be said that it is a distinctive PhD thesis that was presented at Nord University this week.

Ten years after Andreas Ribe-Nyhus took the life of another human being, he has written and investigated everything from the act of murder to the admission that someone has been killed.

First, it analyzes the impact of the prison on this process.

– The dissertation is about the fact that I have been in prison for more than nine years for murder. In a way, it is an investigation into the experience of being in prison. I go quite deep into the question of what prison does to you, says Ribe-Nyhus.

Under the title “Internal and External Imprisonment”, he analyzes how he believes that Norwegian prisons prevent reconciliation.

Although the PhD raises some ethical questions, it receives praise from various quarters.

– It is an infinitely honest and comprehensive dissertation, giving us an idea of ​​what we really do when we imprison someone, says criminology professor Hedda Giertsen from the University of Oslo.

She is the first opponent on the commission to have evaluated the doctoral thesis.

• Listen to the interview with Andreas Ribe-Nyhus here:

The most serious crimes of the Penal Code

The verdict was handed down in the spring of 2011. Ribe-Nyhus, then 37, was accused of killing the father of his partner’s son with an ax.

“The act of murder was almost in the nature of an execution. With powerful blows of the ax, the 37-year-old has struck … on the head seven times. In addition, the body was taken to Sweden and buried in the snow , where he was found after four days » it says in the sentence, published in Romerikes Blad.

The judge considered Ribe-Nyhus’s performance one of the most serious offenses in the penal code.

He himself explained in court that he acted in self-defense, something that he passes carefully in his doctoral thesis.

But this is not a way to return to the matter or to discuss any question of guilt.

– I am guilty of what I did, and there was never any question of guilt. The reason I wanted to write this is because of how I felt prison was like.

The time in prison was very different from what he thought it would be.

– It is believed that it rehabilitates, and that Norway has done everything well. Those ideas are almost crazy when you go to prison. The gap between my performances and the experiences I acquired there has largely started my doctoral thesis, explains Ribe-Nyhus.

– I had to admit that I killed someone

Ribe-Nyhus served more than nine years in prison. The first five years were spent in a closed cell, that is, the most severe form of prison.

Reading his own diaries from this time, he thinks it is clear that he has gone through various phases of incarceration.

– In the first phase, I was very moralistic. He couldn’t understand that prison could be as painful, painful and unreasonable as it was, he says.

He calls the next phase the war phase. The phase where he felt he ended up in a kind of fighting mode, and he had to be tough on the other prisoners to show no weakness.

Then came the depression phase.

– It was here that I had to assimilate that I have taken someone’s life. Who am I that did it? Have I become an evil person? How should I live with myself now ?, were questions he asked himself at this stage.

Did you feel like you got answers to these questions while sitting inside?

– No. You don’t get an answer to anything in jail. It’s hard to take your own blame. On the contrary, I feel that it is taboo to reflect on such things.

The inflection point

What should eventually result in giving Ribe-Nyhus a kind of inner atonement is what he describes as a final phase.

This happened when a priest came to visit the prison, where the prisoners were given the task of writing their sins on a piece of paper. Then the sheet would be burned and they were forgiven.

– I, and several others, experience this ritual as very strong. I felt that I was forgiven and I was able to reconcile myself to the fact that this has been my life. What happened, happened, and I will never be able to do it again. But it’s possible to live with it anyway, he says.

Inner and outer atonement

His doctoral thesis has been called “Interior and Exterior Atonement.”

– The idea is that internal incarceration is greatly hampered by external incarceration, he says.

He describes inner punishment as a process in which one asks questions about guilt and remorse, who it is that committed the criminal act, and how to become a better person.

External incarceration is about how the prison is run, and this is where he becomes most critical in his dissertation.

He describes a prison culture, or what he calls the “prison community.” In this society, prisoners have to slap the officers for not being punished and getting what they need.

Distinguish this from the “prison community” where there are completely different rules. The most important thing is to appear tough, so as not to let other prisoners rule with you.

All of this helps prevent internal incarceration, Ribe-Nyhus says.

– Unique and infinitely honest

Hedda Giertsen, a criminologist at the University of Oslo, is the first opponent on the committee to have evaluated the thesis.

She believes it is a brave and strong job that she has done.

– It is like this in a society where it happens that people kill each other. Andreas gives us the opportunity to participate in a reflection on what it entails. And how he manages to move on, she says.

She points out how he uses himself to make us understand how a ward in a high security prison affects you.

– He is infinitely honest and that makes the dissertation unique. I think it would have been difficult to obtain such knowledge in other ways.

The Prison and Probation Service will use your expertise

The director of the Norwegian Prison and Probation Service, Lise Sannerud, writes in an email to NRK that it is difficult to generalize based on Ribe-Nyhus’s incarceration experiences, because it will be experienced differently from person to person.

– What we know is that Norwegian prisons in an international context are considered very good. However, here too there are many conditions that can be improved and in which we continuously work, she writes.

Sannerud adds that their dissertation is of great interest to them in their later work.

According to her, the leadership groups have already made use of the experiences gained by Ribe-Nyhus, both in conferences and in other learning contexts.

– It points out several important topics that we will include in our discussions about the content of prison care, says Sannerud.

An ethically challenging dissertation

Anne Inger Helmen Borge is one of those who have criticized the doctoral thesis. She is an expert in ethics for the most prestigious scholarship applications of the European Research Council (ERC).

For Khrono, she says there is no question that the work is in a gray area of ​​research ethics.

To NRK, he explains that it is especially the consideration for those mentioned in the doctoral thesis, in addition to the challenges of finding out if the content is true, that makes it difficult.

He fears that this is something that could have consequences in the future, if, for example, new research is based on this research.

– There are extremely sensitive aspects in this project, and a difficult subject, which indicates that a thorough ethical evaluation should have been reviewed, as this is something that will be within everyone’s reach, he tells NRK.

Research ethics are very strict in Norway and the rest of Europe, because it is based on trust, he adds. She says she would like Ribe-Nyhus to address the ethical challenges in the thesis.

Received a scholarship from Fritt Ord

– I think it has been a more difficult birth for a dissertation than is normal for such dissertations, says Ribe-Nyhus about the recent academic work he has done.

At the same time, a message appears on his mobile.

– Wow, I must have received a scholarship from Fritt Ord, he says.

You will use the money to make a more accessible thesis essay book.