The system stinks!

I am, as yet, unable to comment on the sentences handed out to nine schoolboy rapists who have now been found guilty of a vicious attack on a 14 year old girl. The reason for the delay is that the Judge, Wendy Joseph QC, has been obliged to send out for pre sentence reports. Whenever imprisonment is considered - and for disposals of a much lesser nature - these are required.
She also declared that she wanted to know what these youths had in their backgrounds.
For the sake of all pity - WHY?
When you have been part of a street gang which has brutalised a girl over a lengthy period inducing the worst terrors imaginable and undoubtedly making her fear for her life, what does their background have to do with sentencing?
They must be sentenced for the crime purely and simply and any youth receiving a sentence of less than eight years must be considered to have 'got away with it' entirely. I would hand out even greater penalties of 10 years plus. If they had been older, I do not see how 15 years could have sufficed for anything this heinous and I would have thought 20 years to be entirely appropriate.

LINK: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1084469/Nine-schoolboy-rapists-facing-jail-punishment-attack-14-year-old-insulted-gang-leaders-girlfriend.html