In the instant that it took to flick a lighter, the lives of four teenaged boys were changed in ways they never intended.

Three of them will spend years behind bars, and a fourth will always carry the physical scars and emotional pain of having been set on fire and nearly killed in an attack that made international headlines three years ago.

“Ten minutes in the lives of these kids changed their lives forever,’’ said defense attorney Perry Thurston Jr., just minutes after his client, Matthew Bent, was found guilty of aggravated battery in Broward Criminal Court on Tuesday.

Bent, 17, is the accused ringleader in the burning of Michael Brewer.