I just heard on the TV that someone got life in prison plus 47 years. I never understood this. Life in prison is life in prison so what does this mean when they get additional time on top of life in prison?
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This means they have been convicted for multiple crimes. One gives them a sentence of life in prison, while any additional crimes they were convicted of would add up to a 47 year prison sentence.
Life in prison doesn’t necessarily exclude the possibility of parole. Thus, you could get life in prison but be eligible for parole in like 25 years. However, if they have additional time on top of that life sentence, they have to serve it also even if they’re paroled from the life sentence. At least, that’s my understand of it. Maybe a lawyer will chime in and better explain things.
Life in prison in the US can still potentially get parole, which is optional early release. Getting sentences well beyond a lifespan will make parole irrelevant as you’ll never live to the eligibility period. Also, a lot of crimes can add up to a bunch of difference sentences, all sequential, so you could have a conviction with a sentence of life. plus a sentence on another charge for 20 yrs plus another for 10 yrs and another for 5.
Usually life plus X means the same thing as life, at least in practice, but there are exceptions.
Ok, imagine you were convicted of murder and robbery, and you got a life sentence for the murder and 50 years for the robbery. If you’re in a system where life means no chance of parole, it doesn’t make much difference to you. If you’re in a system where there is a chance of parole, you might have to serve x% of your time before you can be paroled — so maybe with the murder charge you might be eligible for parole in 20 years, but you are in a place where you actually have to serve half your sentence before parole. Because of the 50 year add-on, you have to wait 25 years for parole instead of 20. Is it 25 more years on top of the 20, or 25 total, so just 5 more years? That depends on where you are and the specifics of your sentence.
Now imagine you’re convicted for murder and robbery, life plus 50, but then suddenly the supreme court overturns your murder sentence! Well great, but you still have the 50 years of your robbery sentence to serve.
Someone gets Life for murder and 47 years for kidnapping. The murder charge got overturned on appeal but not the kidnapping. The individual still has to serve 47 years for kidnapping.
When you see a sentence like that, it’s usually for multiple crimes. Maybe murder + robbery + other things.
So if the “life in prison” sentence is overturned for some reason, the convicted person still has to serve the other sentences for the other crimes.
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Not only that, but there are non-technical reasons as well.
Lets say one person is convicted of 1 murder, sentenced for 100 years no parole, and another person is convicted of 10 murders, sentenced for 100 years, no parole.
This implies that those ten people murdered are “worth less than” the one person, since both people are effectively getting the same punishment.
Instead, the person convicted of 10 murders, would be sentenced to 1000 years. Obviously the actual time in prison would be the same as the first, but on paper, it indicates that they are serving ten, hundred year consecutive terms, so that it is shown that each person’s death is considered individually and fairly.
Let’s say someone gets convicted of kidnapping and murder. They get life in prison for the murder and 10 years for kidnapping.
5 years later, DNA evidence proves that the defendant couldn’t have possibly killed the victim, but the fact that the defendant kidnapped the victim is still definitely true.
The life sentence can get overturned, but that prisoner would still have to serve out the last 5 years of the kidnapping sentence.
Edit: Just to be clear, I completely made this example up. The crimes and their punishments were arbitrary, I was just trying to get across why there are different sentences for one criminal.
Where I live a “life” prison sentence is 40 years. A “life” sentence doesn’t mean you stay in prison until your dead usually. It just means you will spend your “best” years in prison. Imagine going to prison at 28 years old for “life”. You’ll get out when you’re 68. You most likely will not find a decent good paying job or a place to live. It would suck.
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