Gang members should be sent to Gitmo.
You are more merciful than I would be as Emperor.
Native American tribes often had a "three-strikes" policy which was that on the third offense, the principle was either executed or banished from the tribe permanently. If banished and they returned to their tribe's territory, they would then be killed on sight.
Of course, that led to thousands of renegade outcasts over time, who formed their own "tribes" which regularly raided the settlements of the tribes themselves. Occasionally the tribal leaders would get together and try to hunt down or eradicate the renegade bands, but they would scatter into the surrounding territory until it was safe to come out, then take up where they left off.
Some of the tribes got tired of the pattern and just executed those who violated serious tribal laws - so they wouldn't come back. The Native Americans discovered what we still have not - people who repeatedly break the law often get worse and don't stop until someone stops them by killing them (or in our culture, imprisoning them for the rest of their lives).
In my own view, people who commit increasingly serious crimes should be executed, not just caught and released indefinitely. Let them have their "reset" button punched so that they can reincarnate as a human being who at least has a chance of being normal. Incorrigibility is one of the most frustrating qualities of lowlifes and makes many of them hopelessly expensive and dangerous to keep around.
Most of them should probably be rounded up and gassed like mad dogs since they will never be of much use to either themselves or anyone else in this life. Most of them would be granted a far easier passing than their eventual victims, so that would be more just.
There is something wrong with a system where the only people who suffer death by torture are innocents.
