Do I empathize with him? No, not in any way shape or form. He did something absolutely awful and should be punished.
Do I think this kind of "justice" is right? Absolutely not. As someone mentioned this is circular logic, and will not benefit society in any way. Should he ever be let out? Probably not. Is prison a guaranteed way to make certain someone will reform and not commit more crimes? No, again probably not.
However I strongly believe that no matter how horrible a crime a person should be given a chance to redeem themselves. I do not believe it is impossible for someone to not change their attitude completely, especially over the time period of a long prison sentence, and prisons should be laid out in a way that gives people the chance. He will never make up for what he did, and he deserves severe punishment and will suffer for the remainder of his life, and with his name and face being published in the age of the internet everyone will know who he is and what he did. But you don't cure crime with more crime - which is what this is.
Even if you disagree with the whole idea of rehabilitation and that people can change and no matter how awful an act someone did, there is a chance they might do something good to society - not ever to balance out what he did, but make a small change and do some good, instead of everything being awful the fact is this. We should never let justice and retribution be dependent on the lowest members of society. Murderers, rapists and thieves should not be the ones to decide what is just or right, and certainly should not be the ones to deal the punishment - thats not how civilized society should work, not any aspects of it, and the point of punishing crimes and putting people in prison is that we are a civilized society. That should include the prison, where people should be punished to the extent of the law and not beyond it. The law dictates how criminals should be treated, and while you may disagree with the law, ignoring it and shoving people into a place where they can, and wil,l be punished beyond the extent of it is not how civilized people should act.