> What if someone maims me, or murders a close relative, and I feel the only way to repair the harm I've suffered is to punish the offender?
Repairing private harms isn't the purpose of the criminal justice system, its the purpose of the civil justice system, where imprisonment and capital punishment aren't even options.
The criminal justice system exist to address (whether in a punitive, restorative, or preventive sense), harms to society as a whole.
> "Hurting criminals" isn't just done to deter future crimes, it's done to satisfy the needs of the victims.
Hurting wrongdoers to "satisfy the needs of the victims" doesn't do much to satisfy actual needs of the victims, but does create a society with a lot more victims and wrongdoers.