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I'll paraphrase because I don't have time to do the old cut-and-paste, but bucket basically said what's the point of keeping someone locked up for life, stewing in a jail cell?
Several years ago, California was set to execute Robert Alton Harris and his story appeared in the house organ of the California Bar (lawyers' association). Harris and a buddy robbed a convenience store, took the two store clerks out, and killed them in an isolated field. By the time of the article (about 10 or 12 years later), Harris had no trouble admitting that he had perpetrated the deed, and agreed that he should be punished. He objected to being executed, however.
In the intervening time, Harris had time to research his family's history, and found that his mother was a boozer of the first water. In doing some further research on the effects of alcohol consumption by pregnant women, he found some interesting facts. Namely, that alcoholic women who drank heavily during pregnancy did certain damage to their unborn children, a condition that was being called fetal alcohol syndrome. These children had certain identifiable characteristics, one of the chief ones being an inability to control strong emotions. Harris was never diagnosed with fetal alcohol syndrome, but he identified with many of its symptoms.
This next sentence is very important: Harris didn't blame his mother, and was willing to take full responsibility for his actions, including being incarcerated for the rest of his life. While in prison, Harris began holding inmate seminars on fetal alcohol syndrome, telling other convicts that their flashes of violent anger and inability to handle alcohol were related problems. Many, many persons in the system committed their crimes while drinking or abusing some other substance. Harris had added credibility with inmates because of his record, and helped many inmates come to terms with why their lives were they way they were.
As these inmates began to understand how their legal problems were intertwined with their substance abuse problems, many were able to leave prison and turn their lives around. (Isn't that, after all, what we as a society hope for everyone who goes to jail?) Harris' seminars were enlightening, reforming, and even transforming of prisoners' lives. The state of California executed him in 1992.
So yes, many inmates will pass their life sentences glowering in a stew of resentment, hatred and anger. Some inmates, however, will find redemption in that time. Unfortunately, I cannot tell you going in which path any particular inmate will follow.
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