Horrendous Attacks; NO Jail?

Added: 2026-05-30

[00:00:00]The judge praised them for their behavior during the trial and then told them, "None of you need to go to prison.

[00:00:07]When you hear the story behind this and the sentence, it will probably make you sick to your stomach," as it did me.

[00:00:16]Now, I'll make two things clear at the outset of this video, and that is that I am constrained in how I can express my feelings about this. um not so much the substance but how I express them in two different ways. Firstly, the platform because this is Google's platform and so I will do it in a way that is uh not entirely graphic. So uh don't confuse that with a lack of uh feeling of rage on my part. And secondly, I am also constrained by my regulators rules in the manner in which I express certain things more so than the substance. So don't confuse any of that with not having the substance behind this. So I have to say those two things. But as I say, this story will probably make you sick to your stomach. And I suspect many of you won't agree with the outcome. And I have a uh proposition for you that I would urge you all to do. and that is to request that this sentence be reviewed.

[00:01:18]This has been all over social media.

[00:01:20]I've been pinged about it countless times. I have to talk about it. It is absolutely 100% in the public interest.

[00:01:28]We need to have a sensible conversation.

[00:01:31]And with that in mind, if I could ask you one small favor, I get hundreds of people in the comments telling me that you've been unsubscribed from the channel without any action on your part.

[00:01:39]I don't know why that is, but it feels like there's something or someone working against me. Maybe because I'm speaking the truth and I'm talking about what you all really think. So if you haven't already uh or even if you have please check that you are subscribed to this channel. It is free. There's a big subscribe button down below on the right hand side and share it with somebody.

[00:02:00]Help me to grow this channel. That is the one thing I ask of you and I will keep speaking the truth and maybe it is all because I'm speaking the truth but I like to be fair and balanced and I will always speak the truth and I am not going anywhere. So thank you for doing that. Now at the outset I'll say these were boys teenage boys but in my view that changes nothing and the guidelines allow a stricter sentence than they were given. But let me tell you the story. So you can read the story in the Daily Mail and various other places and uh some of which I will not read out in full but and I'll have to censor it of course but there were two separate attacks. Firstly by two boys and on the second attack which was at knife point they were joined by a third boy and there were two separate uh girl victims in this story.

[00:02:56]So the headline is that a teenage gang who lured a school girl 15 years old into an underpass and laughed as they filmed themselves her avoid jail as the judge praised them for their behavior during the trial. So the first attack was two 14year-old boys targeted one of their victims 15 on Snapchat before luring her into an underpass. They laughed and they filmed themselves in what is one of the most grotesque, horrific attacks upon any person. Not to mention that she was 15. And so this will have a lifealtering, devastating effect on the entirety of the rest of her life. That should be borne into account surely, but they've avoided jail, but we'll talk about that. Two months later, so it wasn't an isolated incident. Two months later, they were joined by a third. So this was already an escalation of the offense and this time as a gang they did this to a second school girl this time at knife point again recording it which will be important for reasons I come to later and then goed each other to degrade her further despite all of that the judge praised them for their behavior during the trial. Now, of course, they should behave during a trial. That's a given.

[00:04:22]But then said, "None of you need to go to prison." This has obviously attracted significant backlash by lots of people.

[00:04:31]And as I say, I am somewhat constrained in how I can express my feelings about it. But suffice to say, I disagree with the outcome that they don't go to prison in the very strongest of terms.

[00:04:45]And the shadow home secretary Chris Phelp condemned the sentence telling the Daily Mail that these despicable traveler youths should be should have been jailed. This is a sickening case of soft justice. He said repeated gang against school girls deserve the harshest penalties as punishment as a deterrent.

[00:05:10]This soft judge, he says, is sending a signal that these appalling crimes will go without proper punishment, encouraging other offenders, and I happen to agree. Copycats and the like.

[00:05:25]He says the Labor government claims that it wants to have violence against women and girls, but this offense is up almost 10% under Labor. With soft sentences like this, it's no surprise. He said this Labour government needs to urgently grip this situation and ensure proper sentences get handed down. There is a full write up of this case by the CPS here and they go into great detail about each of these offenses and suffice to say it is one of the most horrific stories and and this is one of the most horrific offenses anybody could commit against another person in my personal view. Let me know in the comments respectfully what you think and whether you agree. Before I come to what I suggest you might do about this, obviously a lot of people have said surely they could have gone to prison even though they were boys, teenage boys. Well, yes is the short answer. Um, but it's not a straightforward answer.

[00:06:28]The more detailed answer, so I'll do this in reverse. The more detailed answer is that because they are children, they they do have um not special consideration. Well, it is special consideration. It is a different consideration because the focus for children is on rehabilitation, on all of those sort of community aspects of it.

[00:06:50]And there are literally specific sentences uh and guidelines for young people.

[00:06:58]But in these particular offenses, you will see uh these guidelines which is offenses of this nature for young people. And so these are the guidelines for sexual offenses sentencing children and young people. And so first of all, we look at the nature of the offense.

[00:07:19]And there are obviously, you know, jumping around the algorithm a little bit here, there are certain types of offenses and seriousness of offenses.

[00:07:27]And as you can see the bit that's highlighted as the more serious of the two a custodial sentence or youth rehabilitation order with intensive supervision and surveillance or fostering. So I've highlighted the relevant section here. People have asked the direct question. Surely they could have gone to a prison of sorts. Short answer is yes. A custodial sentence may be justified where one or more of the following factors apply.

[00:07:59]And firstly, any penetrative activity involving coercion, exploitation or pressure, use or threats of violence against the victim. And obviously in both of those situations, it seems clear and certainly the second one because there was a knife used prolonged detention or a sustained incident.

[00:08:21]Again, there's arguments there. Severe psychological or physical harm. And again, I don't think anyone can argue that there is not going to be severe psychological harm to someone subjected to this kind of offense. There will be legal and technical arguments made as to why it's not. I just don't agree with them. Frankly, I think in that kind of offense, with that kind of age, and that kind of situation with multiple attackers, I it's inevitable in my view.

[00:08:50]I'm not a psychologist, but that's as a person on a humanity level, that's what I think. And then we get, and again, I'm sorry to be technical about such a horrific offense, but then we get the technical aggravating and mitigating factors. Aggravating, making it worse, so should lead to a more severe sentence. Mitigating, making, you know, arguments against a more severe sentence, such as previous good character, they've never been in trouble before. Those kind of things, you know, remorse. whatever. Um there's literally a list of these things and yeah, judge will take all of these into account.

[00:09:26]However, however much you think that the mitigating shouldn't come into it, it does come into it. But when we look at the list here, firstly, there was a lengthy trial. So obviously they didn't plead guilty to this. straight away to me, age aside, you know, pleading not guilty, going through a trial, they haven't admitted what they've done. There's, you know, unlikely to be much remorse and so on.

[00:09:56]But then we look at the aggravating factors here. And this is this is not me saying this is exhaustive and I'm just picking some out. There may be many more of these, but just taking these highlights into into account make this quite horrendous.

[00:10:12]Um I didn't highlight significant degree of planning. Uh there clearly is because they they lured her from WhatsApp in the first instance. So there's clearly planning involved there. Child or young persons act together with others to commit the offense? Yes, on both occasions. Worse so on the second occasion.

[00:10:31]Um use of alcohol or drugs on the victim. I don't know. Abuse of trust.

[00:10:35]Perhaps it depends on what they said to her on WhatsApp. This one certainly deliberate humiliation. They were laughing and filming and goating each other etc. including not limited to filming the offense. Yes, that was the case. Deliberately committing the offense before a group of peers. Well, yes, because they they were a group of them. Two and then three of them with the intention of causing additional distress almost certainly because they were doing it together and filming it for it would seem that reason. victim is particularly vulnerable due to factors including but not limited to age. Well, she was also very young and of course uh use of weapon. Um I don't know because it wasn't mentioned in the article. I don't think there are any mitigating circumstances referenced in the CPS article. Um there may have been mitigating factors such as good character and so on and so forth and there was no reduction for guilty plea.

[00:11:30]The bottom line is a custodial sentence may be justified and I respectfully suggest is absolutely justified given that it was not just one but two attacks. It was filmed. It was deliberate. The second involved the use of a weapon. And moreover, as Chris Philp said, if we are going to take these seriously, we absolutely 100% need to be firm on these, whether they are boys or not. Remember, the criminal age of responsibility is 10 in England and Wales. That is to say that they are old enough to know that what they were doing was criminal. That is why it's set at 10. This sort of offense, there is absolutely no question that they knew that this was a criminal act. between the two of them and then between the three of them and they filmed it, etc., etc., all of these reasons is absolutely 100% we need to be firm on these offenses and to ensure that they are dealt with appropriately. And yet, as a reminder, all three defendants were given youth rehabilitation orders instead of custodial sentences. And the judge said, "None of you need to go to prison today." Now, as I said, I am constrained in the manner in which I can express any views here. Not that I would do so rudely. I wouldn't do that. But I vehemently disagree that they should not be given a custodial sentence. And with that in mind, I will be and I would urge you to consider filing this form here, which is asking for a crown court sentence to be reviewed. I didn't mention that, did I?

[00:13:17]was in a crown court. It was adult court. It was Southampton Crown Court.

[00:13:22]And so you'll need that if you file this form here where you can ask for someone's crown court sentence to be reviewed if you think it's too low or in the technical term that is unduly lenient. This goes to the attorney general's office that who can review very low sensitives given by the crown court in England and Wales if they're asked to and that includes these offenses here. Obviously, many of the serious offenses, but this is the appropriate one here. And then if the attorney general agrees, it will be sent to the court of appeal and the court of appeal can make a decision about the sentence which may either decide that it should stay the same or that it's unreasonably low which is unduly lenient in law and may increase it or may just refuse to hear the case. But I suspect the court of appeal would not refuse to hear it. I suspect the court of appeal would think that this is unreasonably low. I I get the whole notion of youth rehabilitation and I'm not against that, but this is the wrong message. The the optics and the public sentiment about this case should make you sick to your stomach. The uh police found footage of this attack on their phones, which is think of the police officers as well as the victim here. You know, the police officers had to, you know, go through this horrific evidence. It's it's a thing that a lot of people sort of forget about sometimes. The police go through this process and have to find that evidence. But but think of the victim here. This this is just not right. I cannot sit here either as a barristister or as an individual. And I do make those distinctions. As a barristister, I am more constrained in how I can say things. Not necessarily what I can say to some degree what I can say, but as an individual, this is horrendous. This is absolutely horrendous. And this is absolutely at odds, I think. Let me know if you agree or not, but I think this is absolutely at odds with the public sentiment of what should happen here. They should, in my view, 100% be going to prison for a very long time. Not withstanding that they are teenage boys.

[00:15:32]I don't see that there's any other way.

[00:15:34]Otherwise, we will end up with copycat offenses. And it is, as Chris Philip said, it is soft sentences. It is going soft on offenders. Just as we've seen with shoplifting, they've watered down effectively the punishment for shoplifting. That is now going through the roof. We now see videos online of gangs of of youths looting, raiding stores because they know nothing will happen. That is the problem. That is absolutely the problem here. As I say, keep your comments polite and respectful, please, but let me know what you think in the comments and I'll link this form below and I urge you to fill it in. It will take all of 5 minutes if you agree that this is unduly lenient and you can ask for it to be reviewed. So, there we are. I'm sorry it's such a negative video, but you know, we have to take the rough with the smooth here and we have to talk about these things. We have to have these adult conversations. This is absolutely not right. It is absolutely wrong. And I vehemently strenuously disagree with this judge about this sentence. But thank you for watching.