Sometimes, the laws simply require certain sentences for certain crimes.

And sometimes, it's done because a person was convicted of multiple crimes. If, in the future, he wins a court appeal and some (but not all) of the convictions (and associated sentences) are overturned, he would still have to serve the remaining sentences.

I'm some places "life" has a defined term. Where I live it's 25 years.

Not "until you die".

So Life +10 here is 35.

I dunno, but when a person gets sentenced to multiple life sentences, it's to ensure that even if they beat a charge or two on appeal, they'll still have whole life sentences to serve.

First of all life centence does not mean untill one dies. In some countries it is hardcoded value like 25 years.

Second there is such thing as amnesty. It is not rare new president makes an amnesty to reduce prison time for some years. Generally it target small groups like those who were imprisoned for political things, sometimes it target all prisoners. To prevent accidental homicide maniac release some years are added above life sentence.

There are a few reasons. One is that sometimes there are different crimes where the sentence can be or need to be either legally or at least symbolically stacked on top of one another. A proper accounting of the crimes and the sentencings lead to that kind of eventuality.

I remember seeing a guy get 100 years as part of a three strikes law sentence for rape. On top of that he got 2 five year sentences for failing to register as a sex offender. That's 110 years. The last two just seemed kind of like an afterthought, but it's just how the law is administered.

You can also argue that if something is found to be amiss with the first conviction and sentence, instead of simply letting the guy out the government keeps them in prison because of the other convictions and sentences.

And finally, I don't know enough about the criminal justice system to know if people who get life without parole really stay in prison for life without parole.

It’s to make sure that the courts intent to keep him/her behind bars for the rest of their life, so if they manage to appeal one sentence they still have to appeal the other ones

25 years is the minimum "life-term" you serve before you're eligible for things like supervised release, which would continue until you die (assuming you're lucky enough to get paroled in the first place).

To explain this, we have to go over what 'parole' means.

For a life sentence, an inmate must serve at least 25 years before being eligible for parole. For lesser sentences, they're usually eligible after serving a certain minimum number of years.

However, life without parole is just that -- the inmate is never going to be granted parole. That does not, however, forgo the possibility that their sentence may be commuted (changed to a lesser sentence).

If the sentence is commuted, the inmate must remain on good behavior for the remaining portion of their sentence, or the commutation may be rescinded and the original sentence reinstated.

Even if they're eight years into the 'plus ten years' portion and are almost guaranteed to be released on parole in the next six months, they risk going right back to life without parole if they misbehave during that time.

It's basically a way to ensure that they're not abusing the privilege of a commuted sentence just to shorten their time behind bars.

Not quite applicable but in Florida they have “hard time”. In most cases when you get prison time you only have to do 75% of your sentence if you have good behavior, called gain time. Right now it’s about 10 days for every 30 you serve. however they can sentence you in a way where you have to do every day of your sentence. In most cases like this they give a sentence of so many years which includes some hard time, like 5 years with two years minimum. This way you don’t qualify for any gain time until you serve 2 years. That means you loose 240 days of gain time, which is a lot on a 5 year sentence.

The main reason is because the crime was so bad that even their ghost will have to serve time in a containment unit for the specified time after they die.

Laws in each jurisdiction differ, but in some jurisdiction certain crimes carry specific sentences. These sentences usually have a minimum and maximum time they can be set to, and someone convicted with multiple charges has to be sentenced for each and every one of them. Also depending on the jurisdiction the judge may have the ability to add more years on top of that on a case by case basis. This is important because cases can be appealed even after sentencing or even reversed if new evidence comes to light. Thus if someone was charged with multiple crimes, but only charged with the one with the highest penalty, if they could successfully appeal against it they'd walk free, whereas when they have multiple sentences for multiple crimes they have to fight each individually, meaning they're much more likely to serve time, even if they can successfully fight one of the charges (which doesn't necessarily mean they were innocent, just that they could argue there wasn't enough evidence against them)

Then we have life imprisonment, which as a sentence can mean different things in different jurisdictions. In some countries it's more or less what it says, imprisonment for the rest of one's natural life unless pardoned or paroled. In other countries however life imprisonment may actually just mean a fixed sentence (of anything from 15 to 45 years) after which they may still be let free. In some jurisdictions sentences on multiple charges can stack even to an unnatural length (being sentenced to 150 years for example), while in others regardless of the charges against someone there may be a maximum year limit to which someone can be sentenced, even if the sentences for each individual crime committed add up to more than that.

So in the case where someone has committed a heinous crime, but the life sentence seems small compared to the act, more years may be added. Basically the important thing to realise here is that 1) Laws may vary a lot from one jurisdiction to another but 2) Legal terms always have a legal definition in their jurisdiction. These terms may often be very confusing since their meaning in common language may mean or imply something different than what they legally are. This is the reason why it's almost always a bad idea to defend yourself in court. The job of a lawyer is more or less knowing these terms and how the system works and help you, because without studying a legal system it's impossible to understand.

It’s like fr fr… realistically you only need one fr to make the point, adding another is for emphasis so people know you’re serious

Please read this entire message

Your submission has been removed for the following reason(s):

Information about a specific or narrow issue (personal problems, private experiences, legal questions, medical inquiries, how-to, relationship advice, etc.) are not allowed on ELI5.

If you would like this removal reviewed, please read the detailed rules first. If you believe this submission was removed erroneously, please use this form and we will review your submission.