> If someone was killed they would get out a certain date. No, there are lots of people (in the United States) doing life without the possibility of parole. T

> If someone was killed they would get out a certain date. No, there are lots of people (in the United States) doing life without the possibility of parole. There are many people who will never be released from solitary confinement. Some of these people were incarcerated for fairly trivial crimes and all subsequent punishment was for acts committed while in prison. What do you think happens to people who repeatedly cause injury to corrections officers, attempt to sexually assault them or infect them with HIV, etc? They are eventually put in solitary for life. Some people will never be released from prison because of single acts which they have never repeated, but also are not willing to ever show (real or simulated) remorse for. The system for people with severe mental health problems who commit repeated acts of violence works differently but is similar in its effects. Some of those people never get out, and they knew with decades of life left that they would never get out. In the UK, there are many quite high bars before a criminal convict can be incarcerated forever without chance of release. But it's much easier to block release forever from someone who is insane and considered dangerous. The system for sex offenders works in a very similar way in some places. Some sex offenders, not the worst offenders, can be in a situation where they will never be allowed out, or being allowed out is so unlikely that it will never be worth it to them to spend years complying in order to attempt to be released. Most jurisdictions have some method by which a person who a) did something to get them within the system, b) committed repeated assaults or threats while within the system and c) did not show that they had radically changed their attitude, will never get out. The details vary but they always exist. My suspicion is that in most places, people in this situation vary from almost harmless: suffered bad luck and a lack of comprehension from decision makers to extremely dangerous: very hard to imagine how they could ever not be an extreme threat to innocent people outside of incarceration.