The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser. — 1844-08-27 (Liverpool, Merseyside, England)

ESTERDAY.  His lordship entered the court shortly after nine o'clock. The following prisoners were brought up to receive sentence : Thomas Wilson, who pleaded guilty to an indictment against him for throwing a corrosive fluid with intent to injure Phoebe Cockup, at Manchester, was sentenced to fifteen years' transportation. His Lordship remarked on the serious nature of the offence, it being one which was fraught with the greatest danger to the lives and safety of her Majesty's subjects, whether in this part of the country or elsewhere, and could hardly be expiated merely by imprisonment. Thomas Jennings, Alfred Locke and Ellen Leech, convicted of a burglary at Manchester, were sentenced—Jennings to fifteen years' transportation, Locke ten years, and Leech three years' imprisonment. Thomas Dutton, convicted of a rape on Jane Hyde— transportation for life. His Lordship observed, that crimes of such a nature as that charged upon the prisoner were the most serious and dreadful of any that could be contemplated, and must be visited by the severest punishment of the law. John Johnson, found guilty of stabbing his wife at North Meols, was placed at the bar. The learned JUDGE said it was one of the worst of those crimes leading to death and destruction of health or limb, of which the calendar is full. It was impossible to read the offences with which the prisoners were charged at those assizes without seeing that there was a wanton and wicked disregard of life and personal safety, which was far more necessary to be suppressed in a civilized country than those affecting property, and which were in some cases occasioned by poverty and distress. Whatever suffering the punishment of the prisoner might inflict on his unfortunate wife ought to have been matter of consideration before the commission of the act. The crime was one that called for punishment beyond imprisonment, and he could not pass a less severe sentence than 15 years transportation, but at the same time he intimated his intention, in consequence of some circumstances in the case, of obtaining for the prisoner a mitigation of the term to ten years. William Swanton, found guilty of the manslaughter of his wife at Wigan, was brought up to receive sentence. The Judge observed that there were points in the offence, of which he had been guilty, calling for the strongest and severest reprehension, as he must have meditated personal violence and mischief, for which, though not responsible for the crime of murder, he was so for having committed a most grievous and aggravated manslaughter ; whatever circumstances there were in the case relating to the good character and conduct of the prisoner, it left him from the present state of. the calendar, as regarded such offences, no other course than to award considerable severity of punishment ; he regretted that by his violence he had deprived his children of one parent, and the severity of the law would deprive them of the other ; that ought to have been matter for consideration in regulating his conduct to the unfortunate woman whose life he had been the means of taking away, and under all the circumstances he could not pass a less severe sentence than ten years' transportation. James Wade, John Kenyon, and Thomas Leigh, were sentenced under a conviction for burglary—Leigh 18 months, Wade 12 months, and Kenyon 9 months. Samuel Miller, who pleaded guilty to a charge of uttering a forged order for the delivery of goods, was sentenced to 7 years' transportation. He had been previously convicted of similar offences. James Brittain, found gu:lty of maliciously wounding Henry Cotterall, at Wigan-6 months' imprisonment in the House of Correction. _ .  ...- --Richard Woodhouse, convicted on a charge of throwing aquafortis-3 months' imprisonment.