Elderly couple lock 3 children in basement for 3 decades of grotesque abuse and cruelty
Valerie Stannard, 73, held a boy’s hands over a stove and stuffed lit paper down a boy’s pyjamas while her husband Roy, 74, punched a youngster full force ‘as if he was punching a man.’
The children lived most of their lives in the basement at the Stannards’ home in Stoke Newington, north London.
They were often whipped with a bamboo cane or a belt belt and lived most of their lives locked up in the dingy basement.
The youngest victim was just a toddler when he was tied to his highchair and locked in a cupboard with the couple’s dogs because he cried, Snaresbrook Crown Court heard.
The Stannards were convicted of 18 out of 22 charges in March relating to five youngsters involving sexual abuse and child cruelty between 1969 and 1985.
Valerie was jailed for nine years and Roy for 12.
The victims gave heartbreaking evidence during the month-long trial, describing the catalogue of abuse they had suffered.
Valerie Stannard would draw a line on their milk bottles to mark how much had been drunk and she would beat them if she caught them taking more.
Roy Stannard stripped one of the girls naked for his sexual pleasure on six occasions. He also sent them out to steal things for him to sell on his market stall.
One victim told the court: ‘We were not living, it was just an existence.’
Elderly couple lock 3 children in basement for 3 decades of grotesque abuse and cruelty
The couple held the kids in their Stoke Newington home (Picture: Zohar Manor-Abel/Flickr)
Describing another incident of cruelty, she said: ‘He had a coat hanger and put it in his jumper and hung him up on the door making him choke.’
One of the girls was made to do household chores and treated ‘like a skivvy’.
Social services visited their home, but the Stannards were adept at covering their abuse, buying clothes from a shop for the visit and returning them later.
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