Stephen Muir and another teenager set fires which killed Angela Brown

Two teenage boys who killed a woman in a house fire have had their jail terms cut from 12 years to nine-and-a-half years at the Appeal Court in Edinburgh.

Stephen Muir, 17, and a 15-year-old boy were jailed for starting the blaze at Angela Brown's home in Kilwinning, North Ayrshire, in 2008.

The 31-year-old collapsed while trying to save her sons and later died.

Muir and the 15-year-old successfully appealed that the length of their jail terms were excessive.

During their trial, the High Court in Glasgow was told how Ms Brown was asleep with her daughter and two sons when the pair broke in at about 0600 BST on 28 September 2008.

Three fires were started - one by Stephen Muir, who was 15 at the time, and two by the other teenager who then aged 13.

Fire alarms woke Ms Brown, who managed to rescue her daughter. She collapsed while trying to save her two sons and later died at Crosshouse Hospital, Kilmarnock.

These offences demonstrated a quite lamentable level of depravity Lord Osborne

Muir and the 15-year-old boy were originally charged with murder but the Crown later accepted their pleas to the reduced charge of culpable homicide and to endangering the lives of Ms Brown's children.

The teenagers appealed against the length of their 12-year sentences, claiming that they were excessive.

Judges at the Court of Criminal Appeal in Edinburgh have now ordered that they should each be sentenced to nine-and-a-half years.

Lord Osborne, who heard the appeal with Lord Clarke, said the sentencing judge had referred to the offences as "acts of extraordinary wickedness" in explaining how he decided to deal with the pair.

But the appeal judge said the Crown accepted that the acts of the youths did not have the necessary wickedness required for them to constitute the crime of murder.

'Extreme indignation'

It was accepted that they did not intend to injure or kill the occupants of the house.

Their actions were reckless, but given their age at the time and the explanation that they panicked and ran after hearing a fire alarm it did not have the necessary element of wickedness for murder.

Lord Osborne said: "In his reports to this court the sentencing judge expresses, quite understandably, extreme indignation at the nature of the offences with which he was concerned.

"But the use of the phrase extraordinary wickedness suggested the wicked recklessness which may be an ingredient of murder.

"We are not here to judge the choice of words used by the sentencing judge.

"However, we think that the language which he did use in sentencing here may indicate that he lost sight of the nature of the offences with which he had to deal as they were in effect defined by the basis on which the Crown accepted the pleas of guilty."

The senior appeal judge said they had decided in those circumstances the basis for sentencing in the case was "at large" for them.

Lord Osborne said the pair would have faced 12 year detention terms but for their their guilty pleas.

He said their crimes could only be described as "quite appalling", adding: "These offences demonstrated a quite lamentable level of depravity."