Against the implementation of life imprisonment in Colombia: a question of principle

Abstract

The implementation of life imprisonment in Colombia as a mechanism for punishing the execution of sexual crimes against children and adolescents goes beyond the constitutional anchorage of a social and democratic State based on the rule of law and the purposes of the penalty, on the understanding that it constitutes an offense against human dignity without the possibility of resocialization and without taking into account criteria of reasonableness, typical of criminal systems that base the punitive power of the State on the granting of moral retributive penalties, rather than on sentences of deprivation of liberty with consideration of criteria of proportionality, necessity, and reasonableness. To that extent, this document is developed on the basis of a dogmatic-legal methodology through the analysis of historical, doctrinal, normative, and jurisprudential references to the penalty of life imprisonment and from an analysis of comparative law, with the aim of justifying the inconvenience of its implementation in any legal system that advocates the essential goals of a Social and Democratic State based on the rule of law.