Why did a boy who stabbed a girl who rejected him get off so lightly?

In March this year, police were called to Upper Churnside, Cirencester, following reports that a schoolboy had stabbed a female classmate. The victim – who had been grabbed and attacked after purchasing a drink from the local shop – sustained cuts to her neck, hands and face. Mercifully, she survived.

Both the victim and the perpetrator were 14 years old. He became obsessed with her last year. After she rejected his advances, he began harassing her via fake social-media accounts. Months later, he stuffed a kitchen knife down his jeans and stood in wait for her.

Clearly, this was a horrifying attack. The victim, according to police, is lucky to have walked away with her life. But what makes it even more difficult to stomach is the complete absence of justice that followed.

After the boy pleaded guilty to wounding with intent at Bristol Crown Court last week, Judge Ian Lawrie KC handed him a 12-month referral order and a three-year restraining order. In other words, after coming within inches of killing a girl, the knife-wielding adolescent will not spend any time in custody following his sentence.

Indeed, the judge seemed determined to ensure the boy’s release. The perpetrator was initially held in a secure facility after admitting the attack to the police. But at the sentencing, the judge said he was ‘deeply unhappy’ about this spell in detention. ‘My own view is custody is the last place you should be’, Lawrie explained. ‘What I’m trying to do is find a sentence that’s best constructed to help you and give you support.’ He even referred to the perpetrator as ‘a bright lad’. After explaining that the boy should not contact the victim again, the judge stressed that he ought to ‘keep out of mischief’.

This extraordinarily lenient sentence has since caused understandable uproar. After all, this was a premeditated stabbing, not mere ‘mischief’ as the judge characterised it. It is surely not far-fetched to suggest this boy poses a threat to the public.

Of course, a child who so viciously attacks another clearly needs ‘support’ of some kind. But for the justice system to focus wholly on rehabilitation over reprimand feels woefully inadequate given the severity of the crime and the extent of the victim’s suffering. ‘I’m scared and nervous anywhere that I go’, she said in her victim-impact statement: ‘Even if someone puts their hand up next to me, I flinch as I don’t know what they are about to do to me… I’ve been having nightmares since; I relive the incident… I can’t stop thinking about it.’

Unfortunately, since the sentence was passed in a youth court, ministers have no power to refer it to the Court of Appeal as an ‘unduly lenient’ sentence. And so it will stand. The boy will get away with just a slap on the wrist.

Many will recall a similarly awful incident from May, when Judge Nicholas Rowland handed a trio of teen boys a community order after the gang rape of two girls at knifepoint. ‘None of you have been in any big trouble before’, Rowland told the boys. ‘You have all done very well with the restrictions put in place throughout the trial… none of you need to go to prison today.’ As in the Cirencester case, what grates is not just the light sentence, but also the judge’s ‘boys will be boys’-style dismissal of such a grave offence.

There are many arguments to be made against ruining a teenage boy’s life by locking him up, but we also need to think about the girl whose life has already been ruined. For girls who have been stalked, attacked or raped, the anguish of hearing a judge let their attacker off the hook for being polite in court or ‘bright’ must be insurmountable.

I hope as much as the next person that the teenage perpetrator gets the help he needs. For the sake of the girl who now wakes every day fearing for her life, I only wish he were receiving it behind bars.