• TheProtagonist
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    1 year ago

    Seems like you are pretty much at the mercy of that parole board then. Are there any rules they base their judgement on, or is it just their personal “gut feeling”? I once saw a documentary about an (in-)famous prison in Louisiana (“The Farm”) where the parole board knew what they would say (from internal discussions before hearing the inmate) before he would even report to them. And when he would get a “no”, it meant another five years of waiting…

    In Europe / Germany you can get a parole (probation) after serving 2/3 of your sentence, if a court decides that you are no threat to society anymore and unlike to commit further crimes, unless the court decided on “severe guilt” for special crimes (like serial killers / rapers), where a parole / probation can be excluded.

    EDIT: so, in Germany with that sentence she would most likely leave prison at the age of 29, being able to start a new life, if it’s unlikely that she would commit the same or a similar crime again (of course not possible if a psychiatrist diagnoses her to be a threat to society). I know that she took two lives, but if she rots in prison, it will not make them alive again either.

    • @dhork@lemmy.world
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      11 year ago

      Rules will vary from state to state in the US, but yes, if she wants to get out she will have to figure out what the Parole Board wants to see from her, and do those things over the 15+ years she will be in prison. But even then, the nature of her crime (and any statements the victims families will choose to give) will factor in. It would not surprise me at all if the parole board just issues blanket denials to the first applications for murder convictions.

      And yes, like all systems, it has been abused in the past, but some states seem to be trying to improve it. There is no uniform set of qualifications to serve on these boards, and I bet some states pad the board with rhe Governor’s friends. According to the Wiki article on parole boards, though, some states mandate that at least one ex-convict needs to be on the board.

      • TheProtagonist
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        11 year ago

        Interesting, those differences in justice systems. Over here, the “parole board” is always a (professional) district judge (or a group of judges, depending on the case), and the victim families or other persons outside of the judicial system normally have no stakes or say here.