TWO men who sexually abused a pair of 14-year-old girls at a Dawlish flat in September 2015 have now been sent to prison after the Solicitor General, Robert Buckland QC MP, appealed their sentences.

Lee Pollard and Marc Allen were each originally sentenced to just 15 months’ imprisonment, suspended for 24 months at Exeter Crown Court for the offence of sexual activity with a child.

The sentences prompted outrage from the victims’ families who criticised the suspended sentences as too lenient.

Pollard and Allen, who were both 24 at the time, knew their victims were under-age when they had sex with them but they later denied this.

The offences took place while the young girls were under the influence of alcohol and drugs at a party in Dawlish.

Today, after the action of the Solicitor General, the Court of Appeal quashed the original sentences and replaced them with immediate prison terms.

Pollard, of Higher Union Street, Torquay, has been sentenced to two years nine months’ imprisonment and Allen, of Teign View Chudleigh Knighton. three years six months’ imprisonment.

After the hearing the Solicitor General said: ‘Despite knowing that the girls were only 14 years old Pollard and Allen engaged them in sexual activity and provided them both with alcohol and drugs. They have no excuse for their behaviour.

‘I hope that the increased sentences will bring some comfort to the girls’ families.

At the original Crown Court hearing back in November 2017, the jury heard how both girls lied to their parents about having a sleepover at each others’ houses.

Instead they went to the flat of the 22-year-old older sister of a third schoolmate.

They had all been drinking and messing around in bikinis before Pollard and Allen turned up around midnight with cans of lager and amphetamines, which they used to make ‘bombs’.

The men were 10 years older than the girls and gave them drugs and drink before sending out for condoms, lager and vodka from an all-night delivery company at 3.20am.

The men initially denied any sexual contact but in court said they believed both girls were well over 16, despite evidence from both that they had told them their age.