The government is urgently reviewing the sentences given to three teenage boys who avoided custody for the rape of two girls in Hampshire, after MP Jess Phillips described them as 'unduly lenient'. Phillips, who resigned as minister for safeguarding and violence against women and girls this month, said the youth rehabilitation orders sent a 'bad message'.
The two girls were raped in separate incidents in Fordingbridge, Hampshire, in November 2024 and January 2025. In the first attack, a 15-year-old girl was raped by two boys, both aged 14 at the time. In the second, the three boys threatened a 14-year-old girl with a knife; two raped her while the others encouraged the offending and filmed the assaults.
At Southampton Crown Court on Thursday, two 15-year-old boys were each sentenced to a three-year youth rehabilitation order with intensive supervision and surveillance. The third boy, aged 14, received an 18-month youth rehabilitation order. Judge Rowland said he wanted to avoid 'criminalising these children unnecessarily' and noted that 'peer pressure played a large part'.
Phillips told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: 'It seems unduly lenient to me and has wider public interest beyond just the case itself in the message that it sends.' She added that the boys were 'essentially raping for content' to share on social media. Hampshire police and crime commissioner Donna Jones also called the sentences 'far too lenient', offering to support the victims' families if they wish to appeal.
A government spokesperson confirmed the attorney general's office had received multiple requests for review under the unduly lenient sentences scheme, saying: 'We share the public's shock at the details of this horrific case, and our thoughts are with the young victims during this distressing time.' The victim of the second attack said in a statement that she continues to suffer from nightmares and feels she is 'grieving the person I used to be'.
