Content warning - Teenage boys escape prison for rape

[ArabellaScott]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clypg68e2neo

These poor girls. An absolutely sickening article.

'Two 15-year-old boys and a boy, 14, were previously convicted of rape following a trial at Southampton Crown Court.
The 15-year-olds were given three-year Youth Rehabilitation Orders with intensive surveillance and supervision. The younger boy's probation supervision will be for one and half years.
Two of the boys' mothers burst into tears as Judge Nicholas Rowland told the attackers "none of you need to go to prison today".
The judge praised the bravery of the two girls for giving evidence.'

How is surveillance/supervision going to make the slightest bit of difference? These boys should have gone to prison or a YOI.

Judge praises girls for their bravery while failing to dish out any consequences whatsoever.

Re
He said they were very young, had low intelligence, a limited understanding of consent and were susceptible to peer pressure.

I don’t believe they don’t understand consent.

I think they just think they can do what they want to non - Traveller girls.

Does anyone remember the programme ‘My Big Fat gypsy Wedding’? As I recall young girls were untouchable and a religious wedding was everything to them all. Possibly if one if their own traveller girls were to be raped, some among them would pulverise the rapist.

I'm scunnered thinking what they will do going forward.

That was quite complex partly because of Scotlands stupid Moorov law, which has now gone, thankfully. (Requiring two witnesses for a guilty verdict).

www.scottishlegal.com/articles/thomas-ross-kc-the-case-of-sean-hogg-what-went-wrong

I have to say, my jaw rather dropped at the following in the article you've linked, given that Hogg admitted to at least one count of penetration of a child aged 13 -

'Firstly, Sean Hogg has clearly suffered too. Had Sean Hogg been acquitted when he should have been acquitted, it is highly unlikely that, other than those directly involved, anybody in the UK would ever have heard anything at all about him or his case. Sean Hogg hit the headlines nationwide because he was sentenced to community work for rape – when he should never have been sentenced at all. As Sean Hogg emerged from the court to face the press pack in the car park, he was asked the presumably rhetorical question “are you a danger to women?” – an interaction that was broadcast on the evening news. It seems unlikely that Sean Hogg would ever have asked that question – far less it being broadcast on national TV – had the jury simply been given the correct legal directions and acquitted on the basis of them.'

Jess Phillips referring to the girls as “young women “ is an insult. Why are the boys referred to as “boys” yet the girls referred to as “young women”?this is the problem with society in full sight

In Scotland nobody can be convicted upon the basis of the evidence of a single witness.

I know this is a separate case but what the hell?! That has truly shocked me, how do they ever get convictions for rape or domestic abuse with that?

Imagine needing two witnesses in Scotland to prove rape.

@ArabellaScott am I right in thinking he was acquitted but the girl did not make up that she had been raped as far as the jury was concerned?

In my opinion, as alluded to by pp, the boys have also been let down by the sentencing.

It is not good enough to list mitigating factors - which as noted in the Spectator article can just as easily be seen as aggravating - as if that somehow means a lesser sentence will achieve the same as a harsher one would have done had the factors not been present.

This is an opportunity to turn these boys away from lives of violent crime in which they will certainly commit more rapes and probably commit murder.

But instead, after committing these truly horrifying crimes and dragging their victims through court, they are given this pathetic slap on the wrist, receive words of praise and sympathy from this misguided judge, and sent on their merry way.

I think Darren Jones’s reaction spoke volumes and we as a society deserve better. As for the brave victims, my heart aches for them.

Roughly speaking, the judge fucked up.

Two girls accused him of sexual assault/rape. The jury believed one but not the other. The judge said they could still use the disbelieved accuser's testimony as the required 2nd witness. Legally this was incorrect.

Is my understanding. It's quite confusing.

You can appeal to The Attorney General. If enough complaints are made he will have to review the sentences

That has been done and he is reviewing the sentence.

I meant the judge specifically. I don't think he's fit to be a judge.

I do mind that there’s such outrage about this in society, but practically none when adult women are raped. That’s also wrong.

Thank you.

So am I right in thinking he most likely did rape one girl but there was no way of him being convicted as there was.no other witness?

Low intelligence be damned, as others have pointed out, they were able to plan and carry out two ambushes and rapes. It may well be that they scored low, because they have poor literacy, as many travellers have no formal education.

In any case, if, as was said, they have little insight into their crimes, they need locking up, in order to protect girls. Like mules, they may learn their lesson slow, but it needs to be taught.

My understanding is that the jury thought one victim was credible. They used the other victim's testimony (decided not credible) as the second witness required for the Moorov mechanism.

"Boys will be boys", bless them. But women are held accountable, even if they are victims of "boys" of the same age.

Even someone of low intelligence, if indeed that applies here rather than lack of education - can recognise distress in another person. So no excuses whatsoever, whether about understanding consent or not. These boys have been trained in one way or another (community culture? porn?) to see girls and women as objects whose wishes they can ignore. It is particularly hypocritical if they areb travellers, as traveller girls are under very strict "no sex before marriage" rules. As with the many rape gangs in the north of England and elsewhere, it seems women and girls outside the perpetrators' own narrow cultural purview are regarded as worthless and fair game.

It is particularly hypocritical if they areb travellers, as traveller girls are under very strict "no sex before marriage" rules. As with the many rape gangs in the north of England and elsewhere, it seems women and girls outside the perpetrators' own narrow cultural purview are regarded as worthless and fair game.

I agree. They know what consent is. In their world it goes with a proposal and a wedding ring only or they’ll be dead. Outside their world these young girls barely counted as human.

Thank you. There is no such thing as Age either. Being a female infant or a female vulnerable in old age does not mean you are immune to being raped, just that nobody, legally, cares. There were iirc some systems to self report having been raped. There were age groups. But, with an upper cut-off age, so nobody in the country who is over that age was/is allowed to report the crime. (Nor, come to think of it, could a whistle blower or other witness)

An aspect of the case nobody has mentioned is that the girls were apparently forced to spend five weeks defending themselves in a process of 'proxy repeat rape by court ordeal'. (Which was supposed to have been banned)

I didn't hear the full interview on R4 but apparently, from the fragment I heard, the courtroom abuse included the rapists' lawyers and the judge being complicit in permitting this:

Iirc, the boys challenged them that they must have made up the stories of rape, to stop their parents being angry they were late home.

And that if anything did happen, it was enjoyed by the girls who were smiling and winking all the time. The boys, lawyers and judge knew there was film, yet somehow allowed the boys to enjoy challenging the girls as liars, for five weeks, then finally to pretend to cry to show how sorry they are.

PS I agree that Jess Phillips (what a disappointment she is) has done wrong, yet again, by describing girls as "young women" and the rapists as "boys".

This is horrific, and should be the cause of another investigation into this terrible case, as well as the appeal against the sentences. This is no country to be female and wanting justice it seems. Those poor girls, my heart breaks for them. I hope they can somehow recover eventually and go on to be happy, but the "system" has let them down massively. Sending love to them.💗💗

So the rapists got no credit for an early guilty plea. I wasn't sure, it wasn't clear in the articles i read and the punishment was so lenient I thought perhaps they had.

Now I'm wondering what on earth the sentence would have been if they had pled guilty. A new mobile each?

Court will review sentences for boys spared jail after raping teenage girls - BBC News

In 2018 in Dublin, two 13 year old boys lured one of their schoolmates, a 14 year old girl, to a secluded place, then sexually assaulted and murdered her.

They were the same age as the rapists in this case. Some of you may have sons of that age. Children, hardly teenagers, but even at that young age, capable of the rape and murder of a girl they knew well from school.

It was revealed that they had been accessing and watching the most depraved, violent porn on their mobile phones, and may have been acting out something that they saw online in committing this awful crime.

They were from a 'good' family, a 'nice' neighbourhood, they went to a 'good' school, they were socially privileged. Their parents gave them everything they wanted - including unsupervised access to mobile phones when they were only 13.

Their parents were probably totally unaware that their nice young 13 year olds were watching violent rape and murder porn, but they never asked, never checked.
I don't think they were ever challenged about giving their young children unsupervised use of mobile phones, with horrific consequences, at an age where they were clearly too young and too impressionable to be given unfettered access to the internet, 24/7.

I wonder was unsupervised use of mobile phones, and accessing violent porn, and feature of this rape case too?
Where are 13 year old boys - children - from all sorts of social backgrounds, learning these 'scripts' of hunting down, raping and/or killing girls, if not from material they are accessing online, unbeknownst to their parents who think their lovely little 13 year old boy would never watch anything ugly like that online, and would never ever harm another child... that is, if they think about it al all, or just hand over mobile phones to 7 and 8 year olds, and leave them to it.

I hope the appeal is successful and the rapists are punished by being detained; apart from justice being served properly, it also means that the boys, the children, who perpetrated these awful crimes will be taken out of the environment that led them to this state, and helped to change, so that when [not if] they are released, they will not be a danger to women and girls.

'The attorney general, Lord Hermer, said: "There has understandably been a huge amount of public interest and concern at this horrific case.

"I directed my officials to work urgently to allow me to consider this decision swiftly, and to begin to bring closure to the victims and their families.

"It is clear to me from their powerful personal statements that these girls have displayed immense bravery in coming forward.

"There is an epidemic of violence against women and girls in this country, and this government will not hesitate in taking action to ensure all women and girls feel safe and have confidence in the justice system."'

We are watching.