May 2018

Pontefract Man Jailed For Sexually Assaulting A Child

A Pontefract man has been jailed for nine years after admitting a string of sexual assaults on a child.  

George Butterfield (70) from Halfpenny Lane, Pontefract was sentenced at Leeds Crown Court today (May 16) after pleading guilty to a series of non-recent sexual offences in the 1990s’ 

He pleaded guilty to 10 offences of indecent assault against a single victim between 1992 and 1999 and was sentenced to nine years in prison. 

Butterfield was also made the subject of a sexual harm prevention order. 

His victim came forward to report the offences in early 2017 resulting in a police investigation commencing. 

June 2011

Man plied girls with drink to abuse them

A pervert who plied young girls with drink before abusing them has been jailed.

Members of the public gallery at Leeds Crown Court clapped and cheered as George Alan Butterfield was sent to prison for four-and-a-half-years on Friday.

Butterfield, known as Alan, was found guilty of five counts of indecent assault on a girl aged under 16 and two counts of sexually assaulting a child by a jury in March this year.

The jury heard how Butterfield, then living in Windsor Walk, Howden Clough, plied the youngsters, aged around 12 and 13, with drink inside his home and went on to sexually assault them in 2003 and 2004.

The trial heard Butterfield, 63, was often inappropriate around young women, using sexual language and touching their bottoms.

Butterfield said he gave young girls alcohol in his home to prevent them getting into trouble on the streets.

One evening one of the girls, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, became so ill from drinking Butterfield said he would assist her. He then went on to commit five acts of indecent assault on her.

Another girl, who also cannot be named, said Butterfield had given her drink and tried to assault her while she slept.

Sentencing, Recorder Alistair MacDonald QC said: “You deliberately plied these young girls with drink to facilitate your sexual abuse of them. You used drink quite deliberately to slow their resistance.”

Recorder MacDonald said the girls’ experience was ‘truly horrific’, and praised them for reporting the abuse and seeing it through to court.

He said: “I commend the very great courage it must have taken to report the offences, going through with it and giving evidence in the convincing manor they did.”

Butterfield was sentenced for three-and-half years for the indecent assault charges and a further 12 months for the counts of sexual activity with a child.

He has signed the sex offenders’ register for life and was made subject to a sexual offences prevention order.