"I think it was grossly irresponsible to let them out at all"
Nobody has yet had the courage to acknowledge the fact that these are two ten year old children we are talking about.
They were caught, sentenced and punished according to the law as it still stands at the present time.
The law says that children cannot be held fully responsible and punishable for their actions - that, to me is simple logic; whatever these children did, they did so as children and must be treated as such.
So far we have had execution, incarceration for life, lifelong persecution, burning in hell, genetically evil (straight out of gothic horror fiction)... 'any more for the Skylark?'
I'm assuming that those offering such 'humane' analyses believe that there should be no demarcation line and would be happy to see all ten-year-olds - including members of their own family, treated as adults in criminal cases?
The parallels between the Bulger and the Bell cases are remarkable.
At the age of 11 Mary Bell, along with a 13 year old girl companion, strangled two children and mutilated their bodies, sexually and physically.
It emerged during her trial that Bell had been repeatedly handed over to her prostitute mother's clients for sex from the age of four onwards, and on two occasions her mother had attempted to kill her; the court-appointed psychiatrist described her as a psychopath.
She was found guilty of manslaughter, sentenced and imprisoned for the full term of her sentence - in the same facility as Venables was later held - her companion was acquitted.
On release, Bell was hounded by the press, as was the daughter she was later to have.
She finally won the legal right to privacy, was given a new identity and, despite her childhood traumas, crimes, incarceration and later long-term treatment by the gutter press, went on to lead a normal life; three years ago she became a grandmother - she has been fully rehabilitated.
Would anybody else like to offer an alternative to rehabilitation other than the hanging, persecution and burning in hell we've had so far?

"……just days after withdrawing from another debate,"
Keith – it is none of your business what I do on this forum; do not distort my opinions and the outcome of other threads, they have nothing whatever to do with what is being discussed here.
May I remind you again that the last thread ended up with your being virtually isolated and unsupported and failing dismally to persuade anybody that all Pakistanis are cultural degenerates.
This is not our thread and I have no intention of making it so by dominating it with our vacuous arguments, as we have managed to do in the past.
In respect to the other contributors here, do not make this yet another long pointless dialogue between us as has happened in the past - state your case to everybody here and stop trying to pick a fight with me.
Any attempt on your part to make this a personal argument between us and nause it up for other contributors will be reported to a forum adjudicator – let's stop this now.
Over and out.
Jim Carroll