The Maitland Mercury and Hunter River General Advertiser, Sat 10 Sep 1870 1
MAITLAND QUARTER SESSIONS.
This Court opened at East Maitland on Thursday, before his Honour District Court Judge Simpson. The barristers present were Mr WH Wilkinson, Crown Prosecutor, Messrs Wisdom, Pilcher, Healey, Fullarton, and Dillon.
Mr CJ Smithers acted as deputy for the Sheriff.
Several jurors were fined for non-attendance.
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ASSAULT WITH INTENT.
Meshach [aka Mesach] Williams, charged with having at Newcastle on the 30th June 1870, assaulted one Henry Giles, with intent to commit an unnatural offence, pleaded not guilty, and was undefended.
The particulars are not fit for publication. The evidence as to the intent of prisoner was somewhat inconclusive, and the jury, after briefly deliberating, found him guilty of a common assault. He was sentenced to be imprisoned in Maitland Gaol for eighteen months.
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The Newcastle Chronicle, Sat 10 Sep 1870 2
MAITLAND QUARTER SESSIONS.
The criminal sittings of these sessions commenced on Thursday morning, before G Simpson, Esq, chairman of Quarter Sessions. W Wilkinson, Esq, barrister at law, conducted the prosecution for the crown. Of the legal profession there were present—Messrs Wisdom, Fullerton, Pilcher, Dillon (barristers); Chambers, Mullen, O’Keefe, H O’Meagher, J O’Meagher, Gorrick, and Briggs (attorneys).
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UNNATURAL OFFENCE.—Mesac Williams was indicted for having, at Newcastle, on the 29th June, committed an unnatural offence on a boy named Henry Giles, omnibus driver. The evidence in this case appeared in our columns when the case was investigated at the Newcastle police office. The prisoner was found guilty and sentenced to eighteen months’ imprisonment in Maitland gaol.
1 The Maitland Mercury and Hunter River General Advertiser, Sat 10 Sep 1870, p. 2.
2 The Newcastle Chronicle, Sat 10 Sep 1870, p. 2.