Juvenile murder sentence rule doesn’t breach human rights, says Supreme Court

Scrapping a law that could have shortened a man’s prison sentence because he committed murder as a child was not a breach of human rights, the Supreme Court has ruled.

Jesse Quaye, then 17, and Ayomindy Bile, then 15, murdered Connor Barrett in Hemsby, Norfolk in 2014 – leading to both being jailed for life with a minimum term of 15 years.

But a later change in the law meant Quaye could not ask for a review of that minimum term, because he had turned 18 before he was sentenced.

The Supreme Court’s decision to reject his appeal ends the legal battle over juvenile life sentences in the UK courts – but the case could potentially be reopened at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.

Connor Barrett, 21, died after he was attacked by Quaye and Ayomindy Bile when they turned up uninvited at a birthday party to assault another attendee.

Their trial heard that the pair had brought knives with them and that their victim died in front of his family, including his younger brother.

After their conviction, Quaye, by then 18, and Bile were jailed at Her Majesty’s pleasure – the legal term for a life sentence given to child killers.

Under long-standing legal principles, a juvenile who is sentenced to murder can ask for their minimum term to be reconsidered once they have served half of that time.