Reply #10: they aren't being released

[pop goes the weasel]

Some might be, but it is doubtful. When people are put in state hospitals, their chances of release are less than those of prisoners. Why not hold them humanely, under conditions which might allow the few capable of reform to actually succeed in modifying their behavior positively? We already know that holding them inhumanely doesn't help matters, and that quite a few are released directly into society completely unreformed or even worse.