He also lost a civil case, where the plaintiff was award 3.4 million in restitution, in which he paid $0 into.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/01/13/pig-heart...

> After Bennett got out of prison, she said, he “went on and lived a good life. Now he gets a second chance with a new heart — but I wish, in my opinion, it had gone to a deserving recipient.”

What makes him any less deserving? I don’t want to downplay the fact that he stabbed a guy, but the criminal justice system sentenced him and he, by all accounts, appears to have regretted his actions and reformed to be a good person. It seems like the system worked far better than it usually ever does. Once you’ve gone through the system and come out the other side rehabilitated, you’re done: continuing to deny random services, including in this case access to experimental surgery, is just cruel and seems really a desire for continued revenge against this person (which I definitely understand from a human perspective, but definitely does not belong in our social services scheduling).

> there's a case that he should have spent his life in prison.

Why? Normally you do this because you want people that cannot reform to stay away without resorting to murder. This person was gravely ill, which is it's own prison.

Why? If he had murdered Edward Shumaker (which seemed to have been what he intended to do), instead of merely stabbing him seven times, causing paralysis, and making him live the rest of his life in a wheelchair while in constant pain before ending his own life via a drug overdose of pain medication, a sentence of murder would be something the judge would have to consider. David Bennett Sr. got off pretty easy for ruining someone's life.