A co-offender's intervention to prevent a death at the hands of another co-offender has a societal dimension warranting meaningful recognition in sentencing; failure to make such allowance may render a sentence manifestly excessive. The strength of the prosecution case is not wholly irrelevant to the utilitarian value of an early guilty plea. Life imprisonment for rape is within range where the offending involves prolonged captivity, multiple rapes, torture, and extreme depravity against a child victim.
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