Birmingham father and daughter sentenced for incest

A 47-year-old man and his daughter have been sentenced for the second time for having sex.

Andrew Butler and Nicola Yates, both from Birmingham, pleaded guilty in July to having sex with a relative, between 2008 and 2010.

Butler was jailed for 10 months and Yates, 26, was given a 26-week suspended term, at Birmingham Crown Court.

Previously, he was given a four-month suspended sentence, for incest in 2007.

Sentencing the pair for their latest offence, judge James Burbidge said : "There appears to have been a relationship that involved genuine affection, but it was also an illicit relationship, a relationship that is regarded as abhorrent to society at large."

The court heard how Butler and his ex-wife Katrina had separated in 1990 because Butler had allegedly been violent towards her and their two children.

Yates was seven when her father walked out and the pair had no contact until Yates was in her 20s, when she tracked him down using the internet.

Within a year of the reunion, Yates - who was given a community punishment sentence for the first offence - had moved in with Butler, without her family's knowledge, the prosecutor said.

Butler's seven-year-old stepson first found them in bed together, in 2007, and told his mother, who reported the pair to police.

Prosecutor Madhu Rai said Yates had previously kept her relationship with Butler secret from her family, even after their first convictions.

Sometime in 2008 Yates announced she had a new boyfriend called Andrew Bicknell, who was really her father, the court heard.

Police found love letters and cards they had exchanged as well as explicit images and texts on their mobile phones and laptops.

In March 2010, Yates' stepsister Natalie visited the couple's flat and found explicit photos of the pair on Yates' phone.

She copied some of the images to her phone and showed them to her parents who recognised Butler as Yates' biological father and her mother's ex-husband, Miss Rai said.

They were arrested at their flat in Bordesley Green in September 2010.

The judge said Butler was a "manipulative individual", while Yates was "very vulnerable" and had a history of inappropriate relationships.

In mitigation, Butler's lawyer Rob Cowley said: "This was not a relationship that involved any element of coercion, manipulation or abuse of power or authority."

Defending Yates, Liz D'Oliviera said her client felt guilty she had not been allowed to see her father when she was growing up and craved a relationship with him.