Monster’s term upheld as Crown refuses ‘undue leniency’ claim

A WOMAN who was raped by a sex beast during childhood last night hit out at judges who refused to increase his four-year jail term.

John Barbour, 52, was found guilty of a sickening catalogue of attacks on two little girls, starting when they were as young as four.

After the paedophile, from Aberdeen, was sentenced, the Crown launched an appeal against it as “unduly lenient”.

But it was thrown out by three judges at the Court of Appeal in Edinburgh yesterday.

One of his victims, now 38, was raped by Barbour the day before she started primary school. She said: “I’m disgusted. Where’s the justice?

“After what Barbour put me through when I was a child, raping me almost daily, I feel like I’ve been kicked in the teeth.

“I’ve carried what happened all my life. It took me all this time to be able to come forward. I had to for my sanity, but this almost makes me ask, ‘For what?’

“He should’ve got 10 years for what he did to me alone. What message does this send to other victims of abuse?”

Barbour was jailed in March by judge Lord Ericht. He targeted his first victim when he was 13 or 14, and preyed on the second in his late teens to early 20s.

Advocate depute Alex Prentice QC told appeal court judges the second victim had given evidence of attacks which happened “almost every night” over a “substantial period of time”.

He said: “The conduct perpetrated by Barbour started when he was a child but it continued up to the age of 21.

“Overall, this is a case which can be described as being unduly lenient.”

Mark Stewart QC, acting for Barbour, said the trial judge had been “uniquely placed to assess all the evidence” before imposing sentence.

He accepted the four-year term was “at the lower end of the scale for such offences”, but added it didn’t meet the test for undue leniency.

The Lord Justice General, Lord Carloway, Lord Menzies and Lord Turnbull rejected the appeal.

Lord Carloway said: “Although the court agrees this sentence is at the lower end of the available range, it was still within that range so the appeal is refused.”