OSLO — The Oslo police on Tuesday evening began a gradual release of the names of the dead in the Norway massacre, as the lawyer representing the man who admitted responsibility said he thought his client was insane and would spend the rest of his life incarcerated.

The lawyer, Geir Lippestad, declined to say whether his client, Anders Behring Breivik, 32, would plead insanity as a defense when his case finally reached the trial stage. But he described Mr. Breivik as “very cold,” distanced from the real world and believing that he was a warrior destined to die for the eventual salvation of European Christian values.

“This whole case has indicated that he is insane,” Mr. Lippestad said. “I can’t describe him because he’s not like anyone.”

Mr. Breivik has admitted to fashioning and detonating a large bomb in Oslo that killed eight people, then shooting and killing 68 more, mainly youths, at a summer camp run by the Labor Party, which leads the coalition government, on the nearby island of Utoya. The attacks on Friday amounted to one of the worst massacres in postwar Europe, and the date, July 22, has already been seared into the Norwegian consciousness.