Teen killers could be released in three years (From This Is Cheshire)

Teen killers could be released in three years

2:27pm Thursday 8th November 2007

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TWO "feral" teenagers who killed a "vulnerable adult" after subjecting him to a prolonged campaign of bullying could be released in three years.

Craig Dodd and Ryan Palin, now aged 17 and 15, subjected 40-year-old David Raymond Atherton, of St Katherine's Way to months of bullying before, savagely beating him and tossing him into a river last May.

Distraught neighbours tried to intervene and save Mr Atherton when they saw the pair leading the bloodstained man away from his flat on May 8, but the teenagers rounded on them armed with pieces of wood.

Mr Atherton's body was discovered a week later on May 15 when police spotted Dodd and Palin in a stolen car showing the dead man to their friends and boasting of what that they had done.

Dodd, of Lisguard Close, Brookvale, Runcorn, Cheshire, and Palin of Grasmere Avenue, Orford, were both handed life sentences at Chester Crown Court on March 14 this year after pleading guilty to manslaughter.

Today however Lord Justice Rix, sitting in London's Criminal Appeal Court, quashed those terms, ruling they were "wrong in principle" and should not have been imposed.

But Lord Justice Rix, sitting with Mr Justice Henriques and Mrs Justice Swift, overturned the life terms and replaced them with sentences of detention for public protection (DPP).

Dodd will have to serve a minimum of three-and-a-half years, and Palin three years, before they can apply for release on parole. Before release, they will have to persuade the Parole Board they pose no serious danger to the public.

Condemning the offence Lord Justice Rix said: "Mr Atherton's life had been made a misery by the loutish behaviour of those who attacked him.

"Once he had been moved by the local authority, but they continued this conduct against him. Mr Atherton never fought back. Dodd and Palin both participated in this continuous ill treatment of the victim.

"The extent of the injuries indicated that he had suffered further facial trauma after being led away form his flat where his two neighbours had tried to protect him and assist him. The judge accepted that they had not sought to kill, but this was a savage, cruel, brutal and vicious attack."

However Lord Justice Rix concluded that the sentencing judge had not been right to impose life sentences for the killing.

"We think it was an error of principle to say that a discretionary sentence of detention for life should be imposed," he said.

"These are two very dangerous young men whose future progress will have to be very carefully considered," the appeal judge concluded.

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