Life sentences preventive detention: length of time served and release
Project date range: since 2002 annually
Description
There are no official statistics on the length of indeterminate custodial sanctions such as life sentences, post-sentence preventive detention or psychiatric hospital orders in Germany. Since 2002 KrimZ has conducted an annual survey on the time served in prison and termination of life sentences. For other indeterminate sanctions, similar data were collected for periods ending in 2011 (preventive detention) or 2006 (hospital orders).
Methods
Data are collected by a short questionnaire focusing on prisoners who were released from a life sentence in the year before or for whom the execution of a life sentence was terminated for other reasons. Variables include reasons of termination, length of time served, offences, year of birth, gender, nationality, and the federal state where imprisonment took place.
Publications
Dessecker, Axel & Rausch, Elena. Die Vollstreckung lebenslanger Freiheitsstrafen. Dauer und Gründe der Beendigung im Jahr 2021. Wiesbaden: KrimZ, 2023. (BM-Online; Bd. 36).
ISBN 978-3-945037-49-2
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Dessecker, Axel & Rausch, Elena. Die Vollstreckung lebenslanger Freiheitsstrafen. Dauer und Gründe der Beendigung im Jahr 2020. Wiesbaden: KrimZ, 2021. (BM-Online; Bd. 29).
ISBN 978-3-945037-41-6
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Gomille, Anika & Dessecker, Axel. Die Vollstreckung lebenslanger Freiheitsstrafen. Dauer und Gründe der Beendigung im Jahr 2018. Wiesbanden: KrimZ, 2020. (BM-Online ; Bd. 20)
[Download PDF]
Rausch, Elena & Dessecker, Axel. Die Vollstreckung lebenslanger Freiheitsstrafen. Dauer und Gründe der Beendigung im Jahr 2019. Wiesbaden: KrimZ, 2021. (BM-Online ; Bd. 24).
ISBN 978-3-945037-36-2
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A list of all annual reports can be found here.