SO the justice system has let down the family of James Bulger by allowing his killers anonymity on their release, has it?

Well, I do not agree. While I have every sympathy with the family of the young boy so brutally murdered and cannot truly imagine the pain and suffering they have endured, I can't help but feel his killers, too, have been victims.

These children, and I make no apology for calling them just that, were ten years old when they committed this heinous crime. Look at your own families and find a similar aged child. Can you imagine your own son, daughter, niece, nephew, cousin or grandchild committing such a horrendous act?" I am sure that the great majority of us would all say no.

These children's names should never have been allowed to be published in the first place. The court set a dangerous precedent in naming them following the verdict, not in allowing them new private identities now.

The naming of these two was in response to a very right public outrage at this crime and not based on any genuine legal principle.

I am only pleased that now the courts have seen fit to more or less overturn this decision by allowing these two boys to be freed with new identities.

Our judicial system, thankfully, prevents children who commit crimes from being identified, and only a legal challenge, usually made by the media, can overturn this anonymity. But these two children were never given that anonymity in the first place. If that hadn't happened, then we would not be in this situation now.

I think that newspapers should take a stand. These children have served their time, and were rightly imprisoned and punished for what they have done.

I make no comment on whether they have served sufficient time or not, but I will say that they have been punished.

Their crime will not disappear because they are free. They will constantly be looking over their shoulders, fearing discovery, and probably lead incredibly lonely existences, haunted by the knowledge of what they did when they were young.

Society let these boys down for ten years, let it now make up for its past mistakes and let the media not hound them for the rest of their lives.

Name and address received.