The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1843-04-11 00:00:00

ATTEMPTED RAPE AND ROBBERY-MISDEMEANOUR,

William Harizblet, aged 24, was charged with having, at
Warrington, feloniously assaulted Mary O'Brien, with i,,t:mt
to violate her person, and also with having stolen from her
one ring, her property.
On the prisoner being brought up, the prosecutrix, who
had left the court some time before, as was stated, to suckle
her child, was sent for, but could nowhere be found. Nearly
an hour elapsed before she made her appearance.
It will be remembered, that for the offence charged two

men, named Jones, were tried and convicted at the last as-
sizes, and another, named Mulvey,
the prisoner was not then in custody. As the principal de-
tails of the case were then given, we need not here repeat
them at length. It appears that, on the 24th of July, the
prosecutrix, the wife of Michael O'Brien, went to a place
called Arkley Meadows, near Warrington. near which a re•
gatta was to take place on the following day. She went into
one of the booths pitched there, and the prisoners accosted
her and sat with her. They had some drink. They left the
tent nearly together, and a series of gross assaults upon her
person took place, one of the Jones's being the principal
aggressor, while the prisoner held one of her hands, and
another also held her. Jones did not succeed in his purpose
in consequence of her struggles ; Mulvey was equally unsuc-
cessful, and she got away from them and ran into a ditch, her
clothes being nearly torn from her back. She lost the ring
in the struggle before stated, but could not say whether the
prisoner or Mulvey took it, though both had hold of her.
She afterwards was so alarmed by them that she ran into the
river Mersey, which was close by, and was picked up by the
crew of a boat that happened to be
passing at the time.
She was then insensible, and was taken to the house of Mr.
Jones, Superintendent of Police, Warrington, where atten-
tion was paid to her and she recovered. The prisoner ab-
sconded immediately after the assault, and was apprehended
in March last, in Cheshire, by the Deputy Constable of
Knutsford. Mr. Burke stated the case to the Jury, and the
principal facts were proved in evidence.
The jury found the prisoner guilty.
The learned JUDGE said the prisoner had been guilty of a
most wilful assault, and endeavour to assist others in the
commission of a felonious connection with
an unprotected
female. His companions in the offence had been convicted
of the common assault, and sentenced to 18 months' impri-
sonment and hard labour; and as lie (the prisoner) was
equally guilty, he must suffer the same punishment-18
months' imprisonment in Kirkdale Gaol, and hard labour.
BURGLARY.
Handicraft pleaded guilty to a burglary, of no very
aggravated character ; and not being before known to the po-
lice, he was sentenced to be imprisoned and kept to hard
labour for nine calendar months.
William Willis, a boy, pleaded guilty to a charge of bur-
glary. He had not before been in custody, and had no com-
panions in the crime which he acknowledged. Having been
two months in gaol, he was sentenced to be imprisoned and
kept to hard labour for ten months.
James Irving, 17, Henry Taylor, 16, and John Randall,
17, were charged with having, on the 21st of March, at two
in the morning, feloniously entered the house of Walter
Miller, hair-dresser, Ranelagh•street, in this borough, and
having stolen therefrom money and other articles, of the value
of £lO. All the prisoners pleaded guilty. Irving had been
employed in the house as a painter. His Lordship said it
was shocking to see persons so young brought up on so
serious a charge. He had endeavoured to reconcile his mind
to a lenient sentence, in the hope that the prisoners would,
from the mercy shown them, amend their future conduct.
He then sentenced each of them to imprisonment, and to be
kept to hard labour, for twelve calendar months.

HIGHWAY ROBBERY.
John Nicholson, a young man, and Elizabe;h Mack, a
young woman respectably dressed, were indicted for having,
on the 31st August last, assaulted one Patrick Kelly, in
Lace's-street, and robbing him of two half-c. owns, two shil-
lings, and a sixpence, his property. The prosecutor, an ill-
looking Irish labourer, said the female came up to him and
held his arms, while the male rifled his pocket of the mo-
ney. He did not, however, follow them after losing his
money, but went home to his lodgings. The prisoners said
there was no truth in the prosecutor's story, that he was
beating the girl himself, and that he (the male prisoner)
merely went up to protect her. The female callad Police-
officer Lynch, who said he saw her crying in the street soon
rfter the alleged robbery. She had her apron to her mouth,
and said she had been struok. The other prisoner took
hold of her arm, and went to her home with her in
Lace's-street, in company with another man, who joined them,
and whose face he did not see, but who looked like the pro-
secutor, from his size. The prosecutor took the officer who
apprehended them direct to the cellar where the female
lived, next morning. She was in bed and undressed. He
said he had watched her go into the cellar only a quarter of
an hour before.

The Learned JUDGE in summing up remarked that it was
strange the prosecutor had not looked further after his money
or the prisoners, until neat day. The prisoners were not
defended.

The jury, after consulting for about twenty minutes, found
both prisoners guilty ! Both bad been before convicted of
felony; the male prisoner several tones, the female once.
Nicholson was sentenced to be transported for ten years, and
Mack to be imprisoned and kept to hard labour for two years.