'My brother is no killer, just a victim of abuse'

SONS Wayne and Craig suffered horrific abuse at the hand of their mother Elaine, yesterday's manslaughter trial was told. The Royal Court heard how the boys were constantly bullied, punched, kicked and beaten by her.

The brothers feared telling anybody at the time because they did not believe their lives would be worth living.

'I know Wayne has committed the biggest offence, but I forgive him,' Craig wrote in a letter last week, the court heard.

'None of my family look at him as a murderer, but as a victim of years of child abuse.'

His close family continued to support him, the court was told.

In statements to police, Craig said his mother had used slippers on them and made them pull their trousers down.

She broke a wooden spoon over his head so hard that he needed stitches, it was alleged.

His mother also tried to cut his tongue out with a pair of scissors, the court was told.

He would get beaten up for not folding up his infants' school uniform properly and his hair was wetted with boiling water and then cold to cool him down.

He was pushed down stairs and hit over the head with a wooden brush.

'I was on constant best behaviour, but that was not good enough,' he told police.

The abuse affected him so badly that when he was only five he had suicidal thoughts and wanted to swallow chewing gum, the court heard.

'It couldn't be more extreme,' Advocate Peter Ferbrache, Wayne Le Sauvage's defence counsel, told the court.

The brothers were beaten if they did not peel potatoes properly and when their father went out to play darts, their mother would make them stand at the top of stairs at their home with their trousers down.

The younger brother ran away twice, once with his brother.

Craig later turned to gambling and drugs to try to take away the pain of the abuse, the court heard.

He sent a letter to his mother to cut contact and spoke to his brother a few days before Christmas 2005 because he knew the damage it had caused him.

Craig twice attempted an overdose with painkillers and wanted to forget about his childhood, of which he did not have one good memory.

Last week, he wrote a letter on behalf of his brother.

It outlined that at a young age they were 'defenceless little children'.

The court heard that he returned to the island three days after his mother's death and tried to speak to police about their 'unforgivable upbringing'.

The brothers' abuse claims were backed up by their younger sister, Jeannette, who had tried to block memories from her mind, although she was not subjected to the same level of abuse.

'I could talk for days about what she did to them,' she said in a statement.

She remembered her mother lashing out at Craig when he was younger because he could not tie his shoelaces.

They were also hit at meal times.

On the few occasions in Wayne's life that his mother was nice to him, 'it was like having a week off from a concentration camp', the court heard.