by TChris

While ducking the question of whether Karl Bullock's federal sentence of 100 years for distributing heroin is reasonable, the Seventh Circuit, vacating the sentence and remanding for a new sentencing hearing before a different judge, had this to say (pdf) about the sentence:

One hundred years is a long time--one year longer, in fact, than the standard lyrical shorthand for an unimaginably long sentence.¹

[1]See, e.g., Bruce Springsteen, "Johnny 99" ("Well the evidence is clear, gonna let the sentence, son, fit the crime / Prison for 98 and a year and we'll call it even, Johnny 99."); Bob Dylan, "Percy's Song" ("It may be true he's got a sentence to serve / But ninetynine years, he just don't deserve."); Johnny Cash, "Cocaine Blues" ("The judge he smiled as he picked up his pen / Ninety-nine years in the Folsom pen / Ninety-nine years underneath that ground / I can't forget the day I shot that bad bitch down."); Ed Bruce, "Ninety-Seven More To Go" ("Ninety-nine years go so slow / When you still got ninety-seven more to go."); Bill Anderson, "Ninety-Nine" ("The picture's still in front of my eyes, the echo in my ears / When the jury said he's guilty and the judge said ninety-nine years."); Chloe Bain, "Ninety-Nine Years" ("The sentence was sharp, folks, it cut like a knife / For ninety-nine years, folks, is almost for life."); Guy Mitchell, "Ninety-Nine Years" ("Ninety-nine years in the penitentiary, baby, baby, wait for me, around twentyfifty-five we'll get together dead or alive.").