Red Lodge picket. [volume] (Red Lodge, Mont.) 1889-1907, 1900-03-16
STANLEY IS CONVICTED
The Maximum Penalty Of Ten Years is All
That Can Be Imposed for the Helm
GUS Crime.
SENTENCE ON MONDAY
A Case Without Parallel in the Criminal
Annals Of This County-A Das-
tardly 0aense.

Convicted Of the crime of inces
with his fourteen year-old daughter
Charles A. Stanley is now awaiting
sentence of the court, which will bt
imposed on Monday next. His crime
is one that calls for the most severe
punishment, but the statutes of Mon
tana do not appear to have take1
notice of so vile a criminal offense as
that Of which the condemned mar
has been found guilty, and conse
quently ly only a maximum penalty Of
ten years in the penitentiary is pro
yided by law. While Stanley car
thank his stars that this is all the
punishment that can be imposed
upon him, yet in tho serving out of
his sentence he can reflect upon the
Nervousness of his otfense and dc
partial pennance for his horrible and
unnatural crime by carrying with him
until the day of his death the thought
that he used his own daughter as an
instrument for the commission of the
gravest crime known to the calendar.
1t seems impossible that man can
be found in this enlightened age and
generation who could descend tc
such a depth Of infamy and shame as
has Stanley, an9 when the story was
started that he had committed the act
while laboring under fit ofdespond,
ency and despair, the people general
ly were ready to believe the story
that he was in fact al insane person,
until his appearance in the court
room upon the day Of his trial, and
his GOODNESS and placidity Of temper
ament while the exciting scenes in
cident to his trial were being enacted
proved conclusively that the stories
of insanity were devoid of even the
semblance of truth.
Mrs. Charles A. Stanley, the wife
Of the defendant, was the first witness
called by the state, but as the defense
objected to her testifying in this case
because she was the wife of the de
fendant, her testimony was not intro
duced and she was allowed TO stand
aside while the other witnesses for
the state told the story Of the com
mission of the terrible crime.
Edna Stanley, who is the daughter
of the prisoner and the young lady
who was at the mercy Of her beastly
father, then took the stand and amid
tears and sobs told Of the commission
Of the heinous offense. She testified
to how the awful deed had been per-
petrated by her father on the night
Of the 25th of January, she having
been forced to submit to his beastly
outrages through the threat that he
would kill her and the entire family
il resistance were offered. Sometime
early the next morning her unnatural
father compelled her by the use Of
the same threats to occupy his bed
with her mother, and, amid the tears
and pleadings of her mother and her
own heartbroken sobs, to endure a
second time his villainous embraces.
The young girl stated that the first
act of this kind had been perpetrated
by her father about three years ago. No
complaints had been made against
him because the entire family lived
in mortal fear that he would murder
them all il the knowledge of this
blacklist of crimes was ever revealed.
The heartbreaking sobs of the witness
as she told the horrible tale wrought
the audience in the court room up to
a great tension, and although hush
as still as death was upon the court
room, it was plainly evident that the
prisoner would have been dealt With
in heroic manner had he not been
under the protection Of the law and
the court at the time.
Miss Edna's two brothers, aged re-
spectiyely l3 and Is years, were put
upon the stand and testified to
conduct upon the part of the father
which excited their suspicious that
all was not right between him and
their sister and related circumstances
Of the fathers conduct not at all CON
sonant with their ideas as to his duties
as the father of their sister.
The defendant went on the stand
and entered blanket denial of the