Prison Incarceration

• If you would prefer jail, then lashes would be a much better deterrent to criminal activity. Hearing or seeing someone being lashed for selling drugs might make one think before doing it themselves. By virtue of the number of repeat offenders in prison it is obvious that the current penal system doesn't work.

• Sitting in a jail cell. I can't imagine how much it would burn in your memory to hear that person screaming! Perhaps, but the point is that the whipping is also a "memorable experience" for the person receiving it. Punishment needs to be prompt and acute in order to be effective. Jail merely gives the offender the opportunity to associate with other criminals and learn more efficient techniques for committing crime. The typical young man will find that getting bull whipped is painful and humiliating, but he might prefer that to getting his teeth knocked out so as to facilitate homosexual rape in the jailhouse.

• Unless you are into S & M a small jail cell works!

• Getting bullwhipped is more than painful and humiliating. It can be lethal. Lashes with a lesser implement of pain like the cat o 'nine tails may be more humane than jail depending on circumstances and length of confinement. With the bullwhip, the trauma and bleeding can result in death before the final lash is delivered, or a more agonizing death by infection after the sentence is carried out. Even with the cat, a sentence of one hundred lashes was equivalent to a death sentence, as few survived. The bullwhip was inhumane and utterly ineffective as a deterrent, whereas the cat is still used to punish offenders in many low-crime countries today. As to the S & M reference, I cannot testify personally, but I imagine those whips are made of yarn; sexual toys for immature morons. A real whip is something else.
• Id prefer lashes one time punishment nice and quick no time wasted in a cell wounds will heal its likely you'll get worse or experience worse in prison off of the inmates
• No offense intended, but the answer just preceding this is just a bit elitist. You are imaging no long term affects but that is not guaranteed. You could be inadvertently maimed of contract a deadly infection from a severe lashing. See the answer just above yours. The only time it may be a preferable alternative is if the term was a long one for the reason you stated. Please don't be getting yourself in trouble. Stay safe.
• Its possible... but id rather take that chance even if to contract a illness medicines may be able to cure it plus your life isn't wasted in a cell. Many say the worst part of prison is the experiences they face.
• I would go along with the comment that a cat-of-nine would be better - as it is designed to give pain without doing permanent damage. This was simply because once you had flogged your sailor / slave / soldier, you wanted him to be able to work again quickly. Most of the film recreations of blood soaked backs are massively unrealistic. A bullwhip however takes true skill to master accurately, can cause severe lacerations - but in some case a cut can actually hurt less than a stroke which ALMOST breaks the skin. As such there is a real risk of causing medical problems - which a longer flogging with a cat would not have caused. As for the comments that BDSM whips are made of yarn, perhaps some of the play ones are - but some folks most certainly do use very real whips. Different strokes for different folks as they say.... And to answer the original question, I would prefer the lash over prison any day.

There is no news on the Internet or in the media that Karen Severson and Laura Doyle have been released from prison (as of November 21, 2010).

In July 2011 it was reported that Karen Severson has been recommended for parole. She will most likely be released around December of 2011.

This question refers to the movie A Killer Among Friends- based on the book Missy's Murder by Karen Kingsbury - which is based on the real-life 1985 murder of Michele "Missy" Avila of Arleta, California, by her best friend Karen Severson.

Karen Severson and Laura Doyle were both convicted and sentenced to 15 years to life, and are in the California Institute for Women. Their last parole hearings were toward the end of 2006, and both were denied parole. Karen Severson was apparently denied a compassionate release due to her multiple sclerosis.