Two British teenagers convicted of rape have been sentenced to four years in youth detention after a UK appeals court overturned earlier non-custodial sentences that sparked widespread public outrage.
According to AFP, the Court of Appeal in London ruled on Thursday that the original sentences handed down in May were too lenient, replacing them with custodial terms.
The two 15-year-old boys had initially received three-year youth rehabilitation orders after lower court judge Nicholas Rowland said he wanted to “avoid criminalising these children unnecessarily.”
The decision triggered widespread criticism, prompting Attorney General Richard Hermer to refer the case to the Court of Appeal for review as a potentially “unduly lenient” sentence.
The teenagers were convicted of raping two girls, aged 14 and 15, in separate incidents in Hampshire, southern England, between November 2024 and January 2025. Videos of the assaults were later shared online.
Quashing the earlier sentences, Judge Sue Carr told the boys, who cannot be identified because of their age, that detention was the only appropriate punishment.
“What you did was so bad that we have no other choice,” she said while sentencing them to four years in youth detention.
A third teenager, convicted of encouraging one of the rapes, will retain his original non-custodial sentence.
The families of the victims welcomed the ruling, saying it brought a greater sense of justice after they were left devastated by the initial sentences.
French rape survivor Gisèle Pelicot, who became a global symbol in the fight against sexual violence after waiving her anonymity during a high-profile rape trial in 2024, also criticised the original ruling, saying she was “deeply shocked” that the convicted teenagers had initially avoided detention.
The two boys will serve their sentences in youth detention facilities, as offenders under the age of 18 are not held in adult prisons.
