COMMUNITY leaders and MPs have called for a review into what they said were “unduly lenient” sentences given to two teenagers convicted of killing 80-year-old Bhim Kohli.
The attorney-general has been asked to review the sentences handed down to a 15-year-old boy and a 13-year-old girl – convicted of the manslaughter of Kohli in Franklin Park last September – given the racially aggravated nature of the crime.
Questions have been raised about how youth sentencing guidelines were applied in practice, despite the guidelines themselves being considered appropriate.
The boy was sentenced to seven years in custody for manslaughter at Leicester crown court last Thursday (5), while the girl was given a three-year youth rehabilitation order and made subject to a sixmonth curfew.
Mid Leicestershire MP Peter Bedford and Alberto Costa, MP for South Leicestershire, have written to the Attorney General’s Office (AGO) calling for the sentences to be looked at.
Kohli’s daughter, Susan, criticised the sentence outside the court last week. She said, “The two teenagers made a choice. The boy chose to attack my dad and the girl chose to film him being attacked. They knew what they were doing.
“I feel angry and disappointed that the sentences they both received do not reflect the severity of the crime they committed. I understand the judge has guidelines, but they have taken a life and as a result, our lives have been changed forever.”
Costa said he was “surprised” the judge “did not apply a statutory uplift for the racially aggravated factors in this case”.
“While it is right that youth sentencing guidelines evolve with our moral and social understanding, the troubling case of Kohli is not necessarily with the guidelines themselves, but with how they have been applied in practice,” he told Eastern Eye.
He said sentencing must serve justice for victims’ families and should offer young offenders a genuine path to rehabilitation, adding that the two were not mutually exclusive.
The court heard Kohli endured seven and-a-half minutes of sustained violence in the park. Prosecutor Harpreet Sandhu KC said the boy subjected Kohli to racial abuse before attacking him and striking him across the face with a flip-flop. The female defendant filmed the assault on her mobile phone while laughing and encouraging the violence.
Kohli suffered three broken ribs and multiple other fractures during the attack. However, the prosecution said the cause of death was a spinal cord injury resulting from a fractured spine.
Peter Bedford
Bedford said he will continue to fight for justice for the Kohli family. He added, “Kohli was a well-known and respected man in the local community, and was brutally attacked while walking his dog near his home.
“The announcement of the sentences that have been handed down to the murderers of Kholi is absolutely shocking. They are unduly lenient and I am utterly shocked and appalled by this news.
“The two young people who carried out these attacks will, in a few years, be able to continue with their lives, while the family of Mr Kholi serve a life sentence of pain and grief.”
He pledged to use all available powers to prevent the perpetrators from committing similar crimes.
“I will continue to explore all the options that are available to my office as the local MP, to ensure that these perpetrators who took a life, are never in a position to commit such brutal crimes again.”
Costa warned that if sentences appear lenient, public confidence in the justice system was undermined, which was why transparency in sentencing was crucial.
“To serve as a deterrent, sentences need to be timely, certain, and be perceived as serious by those at risk of offending. Deterrence alone will not reverse the rise of youth violence and antisocial behaviour. The wider system must also respond. For example, filming or encouraging violent acts, which occurred in Kohli’s case, amplify trauma, glorify cruelty, and desensitise those viewing the recording to the violence. Stronger penalties for this behaviour should be considered,” he added.
Justice Mark Turner, who handed down the sentences in a televised hearing from Leicester crown court, described the attack on Kohli as “wicked”.
Alberto Costa
In April, a jury convicted the boy, referred to as D1, for punching and kicking Kohli, and the girl, dubbed D2, for filming and encouraging the attack. The jury heard the boy was the principal offender as his actions resulted in Kohli’s death.
The evidence of the girl’s involvement showed she was part of the attack, in encouraging it and filming it, but there was not enough evidence to show she could have foreseen the terrible outcome of the boy’s violent conduct.
Experts and community leaders said that prevention begins long before sentencing, through support for youth services, early intervention, mentoring, and coordinated work to steer young people away from harm and towards opportunity.
Jaffer Kapasi OBE, community leader and consul general of Uganda, described the attack as shocking to both the victim’s family and society. “The violent attack and murder of an 80-year-old pensioner is shocking not only to the members of his family but also to our society as a whole,” Kapasi told Eastern Eye.
He called for a comprehensive review of the entire process from crime to sentencing, warning that the community living in the surrounding area would remain in a frightened state. Kapasi highlighted the need to examine both reported and unreported antisocial behaviour incidents.
“We certainly need to look at the subject of antisocial behaviour reported and not reported. Many questions and no immediate answer,” he said.
Kapasi argued that the government should intervene with additional focused resources, emphasising that education from a younger age should contribute towards reducing antisocial behaviour.
Dal Babu, former chief superintendent in the Metropolitan police, said, “I was extremely surprised that the horrific death of Kohli was not treated as racially motivated, despite the ‘P word’ being used during the vicious attack. I think the sentence of seven years for the boy and a three-year rehabilitation order for the girl will be challenged.”
It was evidence retrieved from the girl’s phone that showed harrowing footage of the attack on Kohli, which was presented to the jury. The boy admitted to witnesses that he had assaulted the elderly man and also wrote a letter to a social worker, admitting what he had done.
The CPS [Crown Prosecution Service] presented CCTV evidence of their actions before and after the attack, including audio of them joking about it to friends.
Barnie Choudhury, Eastern Eye’s editor-at-large, told BBC Radio Five Live last week, “It’s not just the British Asian community, it’s also the white communities in Leicester who are in shock and horror on several fronts following the sentencing.
“First of all, that an 80-year-old pensioner was kicked to death and was attacked brutally, and it was filmed for seven and-a-half minutes while he was being racially abused.”
He added, “The second thing is the comments of the judge that it wasn’t a racially motivated attack. The police ignored comments and complaints and did not investigate fully enough or take seriously enough the antisocial behaviour that was happening in that very park two weeks previously.”
Choudhury said even the victims’ commissioner, Baroness Newlove, said she was concerned by antisocial behaviour.
“Nothing changes because the police have no resources to actually tackle antisocial behaviour through no fault of their own,” he told the programme.
