Was Podmore’s story plausible? That was for the jury to decide and, in the event, they decided that Podmore was guilty as charged. He was then sentenced to death by Lord Hewart. An appeal was immediately entered.

That appeal was heard on 7 April 1930 before Justices Avory, Branson and Finlay. There were two grounds to the appeal; that evidence had been admitted which ought not to have been and that the judges summing up had been misdirection. The evidence, which the defence held should not have been admitted was, of course, the testimony of the two prisoners both of whom said that Podmore had confessed his guilt to them. Without this, the evidence was purely circumstantial and it had to be remembered that Podmore had never been found guilty of any other offence involving violence. Despite the doubts, the appeal court judges ruled that there had been sufficient evidence to convict and the summing up had been perfectly fair. The appeal was dismissed.

On Tuesday, 22 April 1930, William Henry Podmore, possibly an innocent man, was hanged at Winchester by Thomas Pierrepoint and Alfred Allen. Only three other men were hanged in a British prison in that year: Sidney Harry Fox for the murder of his mother at Margate; Samuel Cushnan for the murder of a postman in Northern Ireland and Albert Edward Marjeram for the motiveless stabbing of Edith May Parker at Dartford Heath in Kent.