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Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has expressed his strong condemnation of a case in which three teenage boys were handed non-custodial sentences after being convicted of raping two girls. He termed the outcome “appalling” and supported the decision for the attorney general to review the sentences imposed by Southampton Crown Court. The victims were two girls aged 15 and 14 at the time, assaulted in separate attacks in Fordingbridge, Hampshire, during November 2024 and January 2025. Two of the boys were 14 years old when the incidents occurred, with a third boy, aged 13, also found guilty of involvement in the second assault.
During sentencing, the presiding judge, Nicholas Rowland, emphasized a desire to avoid “criminalising these children unnecessarily.” As a result, the offenders received Youth Rehabilitation Orders (YROs) rather than custodial sentences. These community-based penalties can involve requirements such as unpaid work, curfews, or participation in treatment programs. However, one of the victims expressed deep hurt over the decision, describing it as “a rock straight in my face.” The teenager, now 16, voiced frustration that the sentences seemed to imply the crime was acceptable “in the eyes of the law because they were still children.” She and her family consider the sentences to be merely a “slap on the wrist” and are campaigning for the boys to be imprisoned.
The victim recounted that she was raped in an underpass by the River Avon when she was 15, after traveling to meet one of the boys she had connected with via the social media app Snapchat. The second victim was assaulted in a field, with the perpetrators filming the attacks on their phones and distributing some of the footage online. In response to the BBC interview featuring the victim’s testimony, Sir Keir described it as “harrowing and brave,” acknowledging the “extraordinary bravery and strength” shown by the girls in “heinous circumstances
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