Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

, life imprisonment is the maximum criminal penalty. In actual practice, life imprisonment rarely lasts for the remainder of a convict's life; it currently consists of imprisonment in closed prison and possible periods of imprisonment in a

halfway house A halfway house is an institute for people with criminal backgrounds or substance use disorder problems to learn (or relearn) the necessary skills to re-integrate into society and better support and care for themselves. As well as serving as a ...

, supervised parole and full

parole Parole (also known as provisional release or supervised release) is a form of early release of a prison inmate where the prisoner agrees to abide by certain behavioral conditions, including checking-in with their designated parole officers, or ...

. The death penalty was abolished in Finland in 1949 for peacetime offences and for all offences in 1972. Life imprisonment is the only possible penalty for the crime of murder and a possible penalty for

treason Treason is the crime of attacking a state authority to which one owes allegiance. This typically includes acts such as participating in a war against one's native country, attempting to overthrow its government, spying on its military, its diplo ...

espionage Espionage, spying, or intelligence gathering is the act of obtaining secret or confidential information (intelligence) from non-disclosed sources or divulging of the same without the permission of the holder of the information for a tangib ...

, war crimes,

genocide Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people—usually defined as an ethnic, national, racial, or religious group—in whole or in part. Raphael Lemkin coined the term in 1944, combining the Greek word (, "race, people") with the Lat ...

, crimes against humanity, and

terrorism Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of criminal violence to provoke a state of terror or fear, mostly with the intention to achieve political or religious aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violen ...

resulting in death. Under the Finnish criminal code of 1889, life imprisonment consisted of at least 12 years of imprisonment after which the convict was conditionally released and remained on probation for the rest of their life. After 1931, release was by presidential pardon and the probationary period was eight years. Today, those sentenced to life imprisonment may be considered for parole after 12 years and most are released after serving between 12 and 20 years. Since 2006, Helsinki Court of Appeals (Helsingin hovioikeus) has acted as Parole Board and a life prisoner has been considered for parole even after serving 10 years. If the parole is rejected, a new parole hearing is scheduled in 2 years. If the parole is accepted, 3 years of supervised parole follows until full parole, assuming no violations. If the convict was less than 21 years of age when they committed the crime, the first parole hearing is after 10 years served. Juveniles cannot be sentenced to life imprisonment in

, the maximum penalty for an offender who was under 18 years of age is 12 years for a single murder and 15 years for multiple murders or sentences where a murder conviction is combined with conviction for other serious crimes. As of 2017, the longest incarceration for a life sentence convict in Finland has been 22 years. The paroled offender committed another murder the following month and was again sentenced to life imprisonment. The average duration of a life sentence in the 2010s has been 14 years.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Life Imprisonment In Finland

Law of Finland