A TEENAGER who murdered student Sophie Lancaster has had his jail term cut.

But Sophie’s mother said she was overjoyed that appeals for his fellow gang members have been thrown out.

Law lords decided the term of Ryan Herbert, 16, who was given 16 years and three months for Sophie’s killing in Bacup’s Stubbylee Park, should be reduced to 15 years and six months, as he had pleaded guilty to murder.

But appeals by fellow murderer Brendan Harris, 16, and brothers Joseph and Daniel Hulme and Daniel Mallett, who attacked her boyfriend Robert Maltby, have been rejected by the Lord Chief Justice, Lord Judge, sitting with Mr Justice Owen and Mr Justice Christopher Clarke at the Court of Appeal.

Harris, of Spring Terrace, Bacup, was told he must serve 18 years, the Hulmes five years and 10 months and Mallett for four years.

Sophie’s mother Sylvia, who has launched an intolerance campaign in her daughter’s memory, said: “They have got the justice they deserve.

"This really does send out a powerful message that if you commit crimes like this you are not going to get away with it.”

Sophie, a former Haslingden High student, was fatally injured by kicks and stamps to the head as she tried to protect her boyfriend, during a gang attack in August 2007.

Detective Inspector Dean Holden, one of the senior investigating officers, said the force was “satisified” with the outcome of the Harris, Hulmes and Mallett appeals and accepted the rationale behind the nine-month reduction for Herbert.

He added: “One of the things which is important for me is the decision regarding Robert, for an attack which almost killed him.

“I am particularly pleased about that because it says that if you carry out an attack like this then you can expect to go to prison for around five years.”

A second annual memorial gig, headlined by The Damned, will take place at Heywood Civic Centre, on what would have been Sophie’s 22nd birthday.

And this weekend the foundation is supporting the launch of a new make-up range, by fledgling firm Illa Masqa, which has seen a black eyeliner named after Sophie.