I searched the archives and found nothing. I was wonderingif any one of you knew.
What exactly is the difference between “life in prison” and getting “x” number of years,(the number “x” obviously greater than any normal expected human life time).
Also, if you received a 200 year sentence, and you died after 50 in prison, do you still serve the rest of the 200 years as a corpse?
I heard someone say that getting 100 years is worse than getting a life sentence because with a life sentence your term is finished when your life is over.
IANAL, but as far as I know the difference is that a life sentence offers no hope of parole (FindLaw defines it as “a sentence of imprisonment for the rest of the convicted defendant’s life”), while with a sentence of x number of years you have the hope – however slim – of parole, time off for good behaviour, etc.
It really depends on the state law you are under. A life sentence with no possibilty of parole is usually specified as such.
As far as the other part of your question about serving the remainder as a corpse, you must either be kidding or you spent a lot of time in Special Ed classes.
Some states specifically have a sentence of life without parole. Others don’t, so you get things like 3 consecutive life sentences or 300 years, which basically means the convict won’t be eligible for parole before he or she dies of old age.
As opposed to . . . what, exactly? A 100 year sentence, where the Ghostbusters come in and trap your spirit after you die, thereby forcing your eternal soul to remain imprisoned until such time as your sentence has been served?
Bah. Some states have laws which limit the “life sentence” to some number of years. Others have formulae for determining the date of parole eligibility that are based on the length of the sentence. In either case, impossibly long sentences guarantee that the convict will not walk out during his lifetime.
This is pretty much it. North Carolina has a very specific “life without parole” sentence, which means precisely what it says. Short of a court overturning a conviction or a pardon from the Governor, both about as common as ACLU board members endorsing Mr. Bush ;), someone who gets that sentence leaves prison as a corpse. But in some states, a straight “life” sentence makes one eligible for parole in seven years – hence the centuries-long sentences.
(Or they may expect to get an Old Testament patriarch, who could serve out a 250-year sentence and still have 600 years or so of life left! ;))
In some states the maximum sentence was/is a life sentence. The problem was that a technicality in the law allowed someone with a life sentence to apply for parole after 20 years. Someone with a life sentence could get out after 20 years. To get around it the judge would give a number of life sentances to be served consecutively so that the parole application date was so far in the future that death in prison was certain.
ok, i’ve read all the replies and understand them all.
Give me a chance to explain. This might take long.
If anyone here is familiar with the asian tradition (as I am, since I am Asian, Korean to be specific), if a son does not bury his father at his father’s death, it is a great dishonor to both him, his father and hos name, namely his family name. This dis honor is important because for generations to come his ancestors will have to constantly deal with this “dishonoring” of the family name. Now I understand that this is not the case in America. But… there are a lot of folks here, including me, who stillhold on to old world values.
What the hell am I talking about?
A person that received a life sentence would be that… literally, a LIFE sentence. When he dies… his sentence is OVER. His family takes the corpse and gives him the proper burial, restores some dignity to the family name by giving this proper burial.
If, on the other hand, the corpse is NOT released even after his death if in a 200 year sentence, then the criminal’s family will not have the chance to bury the body, therefore bringing forth great shame to the family name even more.
So… Ultimately my question was/is… do the prisons release the corpse even if the original sentence is NOT fullfilled?
Yes, corpses are released to the families in all 50 states.
An interesting story of one corpse that was NOT returned is that of Rabbi Meir of Rothenberg, who lived in what in now Germany back in the late 1200s. He was held imprisoned by the local ruler and held for ransom. He ordered the Jewish community not to ransom him, on the grounds that it would encourage more imprisonments. He spent the last several years of his life in prison and when he died, his corpse was not released. A local businessman finally ransomed his corpse fourteen years after his death, asking only that (upon his death) he be buried alongside Rabbi Meir.
Someone please correct me if I am wrong, but I always assumed that the other reason for the 250 year sentences were when someone had been convicted of a series of crimes which were not, individually, severe enough to justify a life sentence but heinous enough when put together that the judge opted to make the sentences consecutive instead of concurrent–like that man in Georgia who was dumping bodies instead of cremating them could theoretically get thousands of years of prison time because it’s several hundred different charges of whatever it is they are charging him with. Am I mistaken in this belief?
I always thought that extremely long sentences were amended to life plus many,many years in order to cover all the bases so to speak, so that nothing short of a pardon would ever get the person (or non-person) out of prison, in other words there’d be no way of getting out on a technicality.
I sure I read once where a person was given two consecutive life terms plus 120 years.
It also depends on whether you are serving your sentences consecutively or concurrently.
If you are sentenced to “life in prison”, you are eligible for parole after a certain number of years. If you are sentenced to serve sixteen terms of “life in prison”, but serve them concurrently, you would still be eligible for parole after the same number of years as if you were only serving one term.
Same for some of the sentences of “life plus 120 years”. Sometimes the 120 years comes from adding together the sentences of other offenses, even if they are to be served concurrently. If you are sentenced to life, plus six other counts each of twenty years, and you are eligible for parole after serving twenty years of a life sentence, the 120 years are essentially meaningless in terms of time served.
Disregarding things like commutation of sentences, furloughs, escape, and so forth, only a sentence of “life without parole” means that (in theory) the convict will die in prison. And it is possible that a convict sentenced to five terms of five years each will serve more time than a convict sentenced to “life”, if he is serving them consecutively.
The main difference is when the person becomes eligible for parole.
In many states there are guidelines that specify when a person sentenced to “life” becomes eligible to be considered for parole. (Here in Minnesota, I think they are a minimum of 20 years, 25 years, or 37 years. Depending on the date of the original sentence – the laws have been made stricter over the years.)
For ‘x years in prison’ sentence, there are also guidelines on eligibility for parole consideration; they are usually based on serving some percentage of the sentence. (Here in Minnesota, I think it’s 66% of the term.)
So a person sentenced to “life in prison” could be considered for parole after serving 37 years. But a person sentenced to “120 years in prison” could be considered for parole after serving 66% = 80 years. Not many are likely to live that long.
Thus giving a sentence of some large number of years in prison is in effect a way of restricting their eligibility to be considered for parole.
I don’t know if it’s the same in the US, but in the UK there’s early release for good behaviour, but those with Life sentences are only released on license - they can be recalled to prison to serve out their sentence if they misbehave.
Your “license” is what most people in the US would call “parole”, only in the case of your lifers it never ends.
And indeed, it depends on your state. For instance, in this jurisdiction there is neither capital punishment (since 1929) nor “life” sentence. You have to be sentenced to a specific number of years, plus or minus a specified fraction for aggravating or mitigating circumstances. A judge that wants you out of circulation for good may, if he can justify it from the case, tack on extra years to each charge against you for “aggravating circumstances” and then make each sentence be consecutive. We recently had someone get 600 years.