'Sly mum' hid her abuse of sons from their father

ELAINE LE SAUVAGE'S youngest son, Craig, has spoken out about the abuse he and brother Wayne endured at her hands as children. 'I don't believe that child abuse goes on to the extent that we suffered without it getting noticed,' he said.

'But my mum was fairly clever in what she did and very sly - that is why people are not believing it.'

The Royal Court accepted evidence that both brothers were subjected to considerable abuse by their mother.

'I was there every day during our childhood and I went through worse than him, without doubt,' said Craig.

'He dealt with the abuse by leaving home at 15 and having virtually nothing to do with his mother.

'I spoke to her to keep the family together. I could have made life very difficult for her, but I just let her be,' he said.

Craig remembers being abused from about the age of four and still bears a scar on his head.

'I was sitting down at the table eating my dinner and knew my mum was going to hit me. She swung at me and I ducked and smashed my head on the table,' he said.

He claimed his mother was also 'very violent' towards his brother and 'started hitting him and slapping him around the face'.

'I would take the blame to stop him being hit and it got worse as we got bigger. I was really frightened to tell anybody. We wanted to, but would not risk it. We lived in fear,' he said.

'It was all done very slyly - not even my dad knew what happened.'

But later the brothers started to reveal the abuse to their father, Philip. Craig said his father was devastated.

'My dad left my mum because of things I had started to tell him after I left home. I started giving him a little picture and he could not believe it at first.

'He started to believe it, which is when he decided he could not live with her any more and walked out around July 2005.'

Both brothers got into trouble from an early age - they were caught shoplifting. Wayne stole cheese slices because he was hungry.

'We did not go without food, but we were given stuff we did not like,' Craig said.

He said the brothers saw a child psychiatrist because of their behaviour but feels the system let them down.

'My mum would always be in the room so we could never say anything and we would not have done because we were too scared.'