The family of one of the two girls raped by teenage boys in Fordingbridge has said that the increase in the attackers’ sentences ‘does not change the fear’.
Jazmine – not her real name – was attacked by two boys who were then aged 14 in the Hampshire town in November 2024.
The boys – known as X and Y – were spared custody by a judge at Southampton Crown Court in May, but were sentenced to four years’ detention on Thursday after the Court of Appeal ruled their non-custodial sentences were ‘unduly lenient’.
Speaking to the Press Association, Jazmine’s parents said that she was feeling ‘terribly overwhelmed and retraumatised by everything’, and ‘hasn’t processed it yet’.
‘She knows they’ve gone to prison. It doesn’t make her feel any more free around her local area,’ they said.
Sign up for all of the latest stories
Start your day informed with Metro’s News Updates newsletter or get Breaking News alerts the moment it happens.
‘It doesn’t change the fear at the moment. That needs to sink in, and she needs to process that.’
They also said that they had not yet been told how long X and Y would spend in custody before being released, after time spent on a curfew was taken into account.
After raping Jazmine, X and Y went on to rape a second victim in January 2025, encouraged by a third boy, known as Z.
Z, who was 13 at the time and is now 14, was also spared custody in May, with Judge Nicholas Rowland stating that he should ‘avoid criminalising these children unnecessarily’.
The Attorney General referred the case to the Court of Appeal days later, with three senior judges finding on Thursday that Judge Rowland ‘erred in his assessment of the seriousness of the offences’.
The Lady Chief Justice Baroness Carr, sitting with Lord Justice Edis and Ms Justice Norton, said in their ruling that the offences committed by X and Y ‘were so serious that, even for very young offenders such as these, a substantial sentence of detention was inevitable’.
The senior judge added that the two girls’ rapes are ‘very likely to have long-term and profound consequences, not all of which are immediately apparent’.
Z’s sentence – an 18-month youth rehabilitation order – remained unchanged after the Court of Appeal declined to increase it, finding that it was “appropriate and not unduly lenient”.
Speaking following the ruling, Jazmine’s parents said that ‘the sentence will never be enough’, and that the Court of Appeal should not have been needed.
They said: ‘You’ve raped my daughter. Whatever amount of time you spend in detention won’t be enough to stop the pain and suffering that you’ve caused.’
Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.
For more stories like this, check our news page.