> Not to be too argumentative, but wouldn't that be an reason for the death penalty? That is, if the stakes are higher (life and death), people naturally care f

> Not to be too argumentative, but wouldn't that be an reason for the death penalty? That is, if the stakes are higher (life and death), people naturally care far more than they otherwise would. Not really. Locking an innocent person up for the rest of their life is high stakes enough, and plenty of people care about it. That's why we don't only ever overturn the sentences of people who are on death row. There's no requirement that we take a lax attitude towards innocent people being caged for any length of time. While life behind bars might sound like torture, it doesn't have to be. It's unfortunate but there will always be some people who need to be kept apart from the rest of us for our safety. There's zero reason for those people to be kept in "harsh conditions, surrounded by misery, despair, and hopelessness". We can treat all prisoners humanely and allow them to live a decent (if heavily restricted) life locked away from the rest of us. If we did that, any innocent person we mistakenly locked up would have zero reason to choose to die rather than stay locked up while fighting to get their sentence overturned. We'd still have every incentive to make sure we don't screw up.