Grini was originally a prison but became more and more like a concentration camp because of the constant development. The expansions and new barracks were necessary as the arrests grew in numbers. Grini was a mix of a concentration camp and a general prison.

Several SS officers made sure strict discipline was maintained. Should one get sick, there was no point in seeing the SS, Dr. Rietz. He was described as 98 % nazi and 2% doctor. He was also a member of the German security services. (sicherheitsdients)

All in all, a total of 19 788 prisoners were recorded at Grini. Most of these Norwegians. 86 prisoners of war died, most of these after being transferred to Germany.

At Grini, 9 persons were executed. 5 men and 3 woman. Other prisons, apart from Grini, was "Møllergata 19" in Oslo, "Arkivet (the archive) in Christianson. "Ulven" (the wolf) outside Bergen, later to be relieved by the "Espeland" camp.
"Sydspissen" (soutpoint) in Tromsø and "Krøkebærsletta" also in Tromsø. We had also a terrible camp outside Trondheim named "Falstad. Aside from these numerous prisons slave laborers had many camps in Norway, specially in the north, Bardufoss as an example.

At its peak almost 5000 were imprisoned at Grini. A total of 1470 perished in German concentration camps. About 40 000 saw the inside of German prisons and around 50 000 fled the country. None of these did however suffer the same fate as the Norwegian Jews. 610 lost their lives. 240 women and 370 men. Only 27 survived, none of them women or children. The 2.w.war costs Norway 10 262 lives, of these 883 were women.