Twelve Years’ for Conisbro’ Brute

William Vallance (42), miner was indicted for criminally assaulting his stepdaughter, Maude Spencer Grindley, 11 years, at Conisbrough on April 24.

It transpired that the prisoner had served two years imprisonment with hard labour for the defilement of a girl. He had also served a term of three month’s imprisonment for living on the earnings of a prostitute.

The prisoner was found guilty.

The learned Judge said that the case was one of the worst of the Assizes. Such an assault by a father or a stepfather upon a daughter was one of the most terrible crimes that one could conceive.

There was no redeeming features in the case, and the least sentence he could pass was one of 12 years penal servitude.

The prisoner, who since the offence had. Had a paralytic stroke, had to be assisted out of the dock