compassionate release

Humanitarian prison discharge

Compassionate release is the early discharge of a prisoner on humanitarian grounds, typically when they are terminally ill or severely incapacitated.

The justification is that continued imprisonment serves no purpose when someone poses no threat and will likely die in custody: He was granted compassionate release after his cancer diagnosis.

The term also applies in medical contexts to allowing access to experimental treatments not yet approved.

Related

hospice · dying · prison · inmate · humanitarian · freedom · petition · prison system · behind bars · sentence · illness · warden · life sentence · appeal · medical · forgiveness · dignity · end-of-life

Categories
Opposites
grounds for release

compassionate releaseparole

Conditional early release

work release · conditional release

direction of custody status

compassionate releaseincarceration

Confinement in jail

imprisonment · remand · reincarceration · custody · commitment

rationale for decision

compassionate releaselife without parole

Incarceration until death

indefinite detention · solitary confinement · lockdown · remand · pretrial detention

Family

compassion, compassionate, compassionately, compass, passion, passionate, passionately, passions, patient

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