Sentencing and parole are turning algorithmic, making risk assessment the new guardian of liberty. But unacknowledged is that life expectancy also regulates time in confinement. In the calculus of guidelines, mortality rates are untabulated consequences. And no punishment can claim proportionality without them.

“Deep learning” can pinpoint the end-of-life for medical planning. George Dvorsky, “New AI System Predicts How Long Patients Will Live with Startling Accuracy,” Gizmodo, Jan. 18, 2018. But there is no computerized guideline to say when incarceration should end life.