at the risk of sounding a bit Daily Mail-ish, I really don't think the sentences for this appalling attack on a young women with special needs are long enough...

[edam]

WARNING this is distressing Saw previous coverage of the trial - I'm amazed the rapists have only got six to nine years.

Seems to be this is about as serious a crime as you can get, short of murder. So why are the sentences less than the ones I see reported for armed robbery, for instance? Do we value victims of violence less than cold hard cash?

Just hope the poor girl somehow finds a way to live a happy life despite her injuries and trauma.

Yes: Rape trio sentence to be reviewed

oh that is good news

good.

Good news! I was disappointed that I didnt hear anything about this on the news this morning as it was all about US and Obama, but it looks like it was so clearly out of line that no great public/media campaign needed.

Just got in - thank gooodness the sentences are to be reviewed.

came on to update re sentence review but I see tis already done. Good news.

Just got in and seen the BBC - really good news. i just hope they don't put the sentences up by a poxy couple of years or something - if the max for rape is life they should be getting life.

I also hope that as others have said this triggers a review of the sentencing around rape which is random and often light as far as I can see.

So pleased the AG has acted so quickly on this that in itself sends a message, hopefully the follow-through will be as swift and decisive.

On a different note unavailable i too was disappointed not to see it on the covers of any nationals but it was the main story on the cover of the metro which has a pretty large readership so that made me feel like at least someone had noticed.

Why did so few of them get eitehr charged or found guilty? It's three out of an original line up of seven (I think)

Original line up was 10.

One was killed in central london in a fight a few months back. At the time there was a thread saying why the hell was he out and about anyway - at the tim ehe was awaiting trial for this rape and also for assault or gbh or something like that.

6 got off of which some were found not guilty and some had the case against them dismissed.

it sounds like the police had real trouble gathering evidence as no-one would talk to them.

So possibly the only ones who were found guilty were the ones who filmed themselves.

I don't know nkf it could be.

Hopefully they will keep looking for evidence to try and get the others - like they did with Damilola Taylor.

Am VERY glad the Attorney General has acted so swiftly. That in itself should send out a message.

Learning disability is a factor in this crime - they used her vulnerability against her. It would have been an horrific attack whoever the victim, but they singled this poor girl out because she was less well equipped to avoid them or defend herself than most people would have been.

I think that having a learning disablity is relevent because it is a disablity moviated attack. She was singled out because she had learning difficulties in a similar way that Stephen Lawerence was singled out by his killers for being black.

However it was a horrific attack in its own right. These men clearly need to be kept off the street for all our sakes. I hope that the sentences do get lengthened to something more sensible.

The girl was vulnerable but then all women are vulnerable when a group of men attack. I don't see why her her learning difficulty should affect the sentence. I think the sentences are too low and I think they would still be too low if the victim was a genius.

but the girl was more vulnerable than the majority of women, hence less able to defend herself. They were able to 'groom' her because she didn't have the same intellectual ability and knowledge as someone without her LD. They deliberately and knowingly exploited her vulnerability.

If you thump someone else, that is wrong. If you go out looking for a victim who is frail, physically disabled, much smaller than you, that is even more wrong.

The men decided to pick on her in particular because of her learning difficulty.

Its like a racially moviated crime in that sense. Disablity discrimination is legally similar to racism.

Although I understand what you mean. Even if the victim had no learning difficulties, I think they should lock these men up and throw away the key.

I can see they probably thought that she was an easy target. In the same way that prostitutes are easy targets.

When I heard the sentences I thought perhaps they were low because of her disability. That the discrimination was in the court system rather than the minds of the rapists.

Let's see what happens. They should get life as they have taken her life from her.

Monsters, absolutely sick and deranged

how on earth did the judge justify giving such an appallingly light sentence? Is it because she 'agreed' to have sex with one man she knew? Did that make the act, in the judge's eyes, party consensual [obviously completely untrue] And as for the caustic soda attack - words fail me.

More on this case here.

An MP has raised it in parliament which is a good thing, also talking generally about sentencing and asking why the one who was killed was out on bail after an attack like this.