Three children have given evidence via video link at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court in the trial of a Louth man accused of child cruelty and assault.
Wayne White (33), Scarlet Avenue, Drogheda, Co Louth, has pleaded not guilty to five charges of assaulting the children causing them harm and three charges of cruelty towards them while having care of them at a Dublin city centre address on dates between September and December 2003.
In opening the case, Karen O'Connor, prosecuting, told the jury Mr White had lived with the mother of a boy now aged nine and two girls now aged 10 and 13.
The prosecution's case would be that while living with the children Mr White subjected them to cruelty and assault "in different ways, with different implements".
The nine-year-old boy told Ms O'Connor that the accused punched him in the stomach when he was asleep in bed and "kept on hitting me with a hammer on the head". The boy also said he was hit with a wooden spoon on the hand and that on one occasion Mr White used a plastic bag to tie his hands behind his back.
Asked by Ms O'Connor if he remembered what happened when he had a bath, the boy said he was in the bathroom when the accused pushed his sister's head under the water.
The boy agreed that events were "confusing" and "difficult to remember" when Monica Lawlor, defending, suggested that he had said "no" when gardaí had asked him if Mr White had ever hit him.
When Ms Lawlor asked the boy if his mother had ever hit him he replied "yes, on the arm and leg".
Asked if this happened every day, he said "sometimes".
The 13-year-old girl told Ms O'Connor that the accused had hit her with a belt and a slipper. "I think I got cheeky with him and he got really angry and started hitting me on the head," she said.
The girl agreed with Ms Lawlor that she had lived with people other than her mother and had been in hospital before she knew the accused. "My ma wasn't bothered about Wayne hitting us," she said.
The 10-year-old girl said the accused had hit her with a hammer, a spoon and a shoe and said, "I was in the bath and he started drowning me."
The hearing continues before Judge Patricia Ryan and a jury of three women and nine men.