Torture brothers may get longer sentences after 'leniency' check

Attorney General Baroness Scotland has announced she will examine the terms given to the 11 and 12-year-olds to see if they were "unduly lenient".

The brothers, who have not been named, were handed indeterminate sentences for public protection, known as IPP sentences, on Friday. Although they were told the minimum they will serve is five years, they cannot be released until authorities are convinced they no longer pose a threat to society.

If Lady Scotland decides the sentences were too soft, she will refer them to the Court of Appeal and ask judges to consider increasing them.

The mother of one of their victims, who wants the brothers to be named, said this week she believed the pair were "evil".

"I believe they could do this again so people should know exactly who they are," she said. "I understand they won't be released until the authorities believe they have been rehabilitated – but they're evil."

During the sentencing at Sheffield Crown Court last week details emerged of how the victims were lured to secluded woodland and subjected to 90 minutes of violence and sexual humiliation. They were strangled, hit with bricks and other improvised weapons, made to eat nettles, stripped and forced to sexually abuse each other.

The brothers' family had been known to social services in Doncaster for 14 years and a serious case review into the authority's involvement revealed agencies failed to intervene on 31 occasions, concluding the Edlington attack had been preventable.

Doncaster Council has published only a summary of the findings, insisting it is following Government guidance. But last night the Tories claimed official arguments for failing to publish it in full were collapsing after Deputy Children's Commissioner for England Sue Berelowitz attacked its position.

The Government claims to have the backing of charities and child protection experts for deciding that full reports be kept confidential, but in a letter to a national newspaper Ms Berelowitz said: "The quality of the executive summary of the SCR of the two brothers in Doncaster certainly does not provide adequate details to instill confidence in those unable to access the full review that lessons will be learnt."

Ms Berelowitz did not say whether reports should be published in full or not, but said any information released should be anonymised, spell out the basic facts with failures and recommendations clearly identified, and hold agencies to account.

Shadow Children's Secretary, Michael Gove told the Yorkshire Post: "The case for keeping secret the details of what went wrong collapses even further as every day passes. Now we have the Government's own children's tsar saying that the two and a half page summary is flawed.

"We need the full details of these investigations to be published. It is not good enough to carry on protecting the bureaucracies that have failed instead of the vulnerable children that really need our protection."