# What happens if a treatment for old age is available before James Holmes dies? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 26, 2015, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-if-a-treatment-for-old-age-is-available-before-james-holmes-dies/729001 "2015-08-26T23:56:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2015, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-if-a-treatment-for-old-age-is-available-before-james-holmes-dies/729001/21 "2015-08-27T16:01:19Z")
> [@pool](#): > > You know I always hear that people who commit certain crimes don’t last long on prison, but is there really any truth to it? Most people who end up in maximum-security prisons did something pretty terrible to get there. Any largish facility of that category will have dozens if not hundreds of child molesters, child killers, and so forth–who’s going to be casting the first stone? They may come in for some extra harassment from both other prisoners and guards, but most will survive quite well. Also, in “supermax”-type facilities for the worst of the worst, the inmates will have very limited contact with each other, since they are housed in one-man cells, fed in their cells, and go to exercise and the shower alone. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2015, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-if-a-treatment-for-old-age-is-available-before-james-holmes-dies/729001/22 "2015-08-27T16:20:16Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > I read a short story once about someone who sold his soul to the Devil in return for immortality. (Not clear what the Devil gets out of this, since he presumably only collects the soul when the guy dies.) Anyway, he ends up getting sentenced to life in prison. > > The story ends there, leaving it to the reader to wonder how that ends up. Presumably, he will spend eternity alive in prison. It could be the Twilight Zone episode [Escape Clause](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escape_Clause), but it ends with the prisoner taking the escape clause to get out of the living hell of being in prison with immortality. In this case, the Devil knew what he was doing as he always wins. ---
**Author:** ![SirRay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cc9497/32.png) [@SirRay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SirRay)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2015, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-if-a-treatment-for-old-age-is-available-before-james-holmes-dies/729001/23 "2015-08-27T17:54:34Z")
> [@Telemark](#): > > It could be the Twilight Zone episode [Escape Clause](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escape_Clause), but it ends with the prisoner taking the escape clause to get out of the living hell of being in prison with immortality. In this case, the Devil knew what he was doing as he always wins. And since we’ve brought up fiction, I recall (a bit dimly) a graphic/comic story from the 1980s (could have been in National Lampoon or Heavy Metal or whatever, I don’t recall) of a vigilante-type who self-righteously goes around assassinating specific people - at the end of the story the reveal comes when the vigilante thinks to himself that society should have never given murderers serving out their life-sentences the immortality/anti-aging drugs that everyone else gets. I guess in that universe after you serve the equivalent of your several consecutive “life” sentences, you get out of jail… ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2015, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-if-a-treatment-for-old-age-is-available-before-james-holmes-dies/729001/24 "2015-08-27T18:00:47Z")
> [@Morgenstern](#): > > Do you really think Holmes is going to survive in prison? He’s got a very large target on his back just due to the publicity, let alone all the innocent victims he claimed. 5 years max. I’d be surprised if the prison allowed him to be in a situation where he’d be at risk of suffering mob justice. People like Charles Manson, Ted Kaczynski, Private Manning etc. don’t just get thrown in general. ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2015, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-if-a-treatment-for-old-age-is-available-before-james-holmes-dies/729001/25 "2015-08-27T18:09:36Z")
Read a book recently about past lives and how in order to enact some ‘justice’/revenge, the person who was confined in solitary till death and later was discovered as a infant in their new body (reincarnation), kidnapped and held again, arms, legs, eyes and ears removed and held confined and immobile till death at age 12, found in the next life and process repeated, surviving into late teens in that condition till once again he died. Forth time around was found but he could not use his limbs anymore even though he had them and they appeared normal, they didn’t see the point of the continued efforts against him and gave up. ---
**Author:** ![Honey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/honey/32/5074_2.png) [@Honey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Honey)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2015, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-if-a-treatment-for-old-age-is-available-before-james-holmes-dies/729001/26 "2015-08-27T22:08:40Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > I’d be surprised if the prison allowed him to be in a situation where he’d be at risk of suffering mob justice. People like Charles Manson, Ted Kaczynski, Private Manning etc. don’t just get thrown in general. Right, but after several years in isolation it’s very tempting to ask to be put in genpop. 23 hours a day alone in your cell can seem worse than death. Jeffrey Dahmer was in isolation for a while then asked to go to genpop. He was then bludgeoned to death. Even if someone is being protected, there is always a way to get to them somehow. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2015, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-if-a-treatment-for-old-age-is-available-before-james-holmes-dies/729001/27 "2015-08-27T22:32:38Z")
> [@Grumman](#): > > Your idea is terrible. A man like Holmes should be rendered a non-threat by the cheapest acceptably humane method available. It is fucking stupid to prolong his existence for the purpose of torture when simply waiting for him to die is cheaper, more humane and more effective. Life in prison is [far cheaper than imposing the death penalty.](http://www.forbes.com/sites/kellyphillipserb/2014/05/01/considering-the-death-penalty-your-tax-dollars-at-work/) ---
**Author:** ![Grumman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/43a26b/32.png) [@Grumman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grumman)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2015, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-if-a-treatment-for-old-age-is-available-before-james-holmes-dies/729001/28 "2015-08-28T02:29:51Z")
> [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > Life in prison is [far cheaper than imposing the death penalty.](http://www.forbes.com/sites/kellyphillipserb/2014/05/01/considering-the-death-penalty-your-tax-dollars-at-work/) _Somebody_ didn’t read the thread. We are not comparing America’s incompetent death penalty to ~70 years in prison, we are comparing ~70 years in prison to potentially thousands of years in prison. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2015, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-if-a-treatment-for-old-age-is-available-before-james-holmes-dies/729001/29 "2015-08-28T02:36:36Z")
Nothing changes. He’ll be there for 3,318 years after he’s died twelve times. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-if-a-treatment-for-old-age-is-available-before-james-holmes-dies/729001.md?page=1)