I'm still under 30, so I am literally forced to imagine what it is like. 30 years is currently outside the scope of my experience. It is beyond my gut conception of forever.

Once I get old enough to have a practical idea of what 30 years is (say, 40), a 30 years sentence might as well be a life sentence as it would easily consume the remainder of my productive life.

Can confirm. Brother committed murder at 16. Was tried and sentenced to 70 years (as an adult, thanks Texas). He’s 34 now. Totally different person. He was a kid then.

When he went in, there were few to any mobile phones and virtually nobody talked about the internet.

So when he got out he had to learn how to use all that tech we take for granted in our daily lives.

Locking someone up for 30 years is more or less equivalent to a death sentence - society will have progressed so much during this timeframe that the convict will never be any productive part of society again. At that timeframe, seriously, it's more humane to give the convict a gun with a single bullet than lock him up for 30 or more years - and many people are locked up for longer for non-violent crimes.

Then again, the US is barbarian enough to lock up juveniles for life, so people saying "30y is not enough" doesn't surprise me in the slightest.

Everything less than life is capped at 15 years (manslaughter etc.)

Life sentences mean exactly that: until death. But for constitutional reasons every convict must have hope that he can be released early. That‘s what those regular reviews (after 15 years or more) are for.

Many convicts get released early, because they sat in prison for a long time and pose no threat anymore. Others are released for medical/humanitarian reasons.

But this opinion that murderers always get free after 15 or 17 years is pervasive and utterly wrong. And it leads to people demanding excessive punishments, because they feel they must demand much more to have evil people do time.

0: https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/stgb/__57a.html (In German)

What in the world, indeed, but from my perspective “What in the world, you routinely want to lock people up indefinitely? That’s abhorrent.“

By default indefinite sentences are gruesome (to say nothing of the death penalty).

The court mostly ruled that we must not have a situation like in America where elected politicians who are driven by populism decide on it. It must be legal proceedings in a regular court.

This is a violent and uneducated adult male who raped a medical student and then murdered her. The opportunity cost to society is already great, now they will waste their society's resources in keeping this man alive. In my opinion, he should be executed as soon as possible.

Every 5 years after the main sentence the person is reviewed to see if releasing him would be a risk to society. And if deemed such a risk, the sentence is extended by another 5 years.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imprisonment_for_public_protec...

People would go in for a minor offence, but be seen as high risk, and then stay in for many years.