A man used his stepson as a 'human dartboard' by hanging him on the back of a door and throwing darts at his head, a court heard.

Bernard Thomas Cawley is accused of a ten-year campaign of cruelty against his three step children.

The prosecution allege he forced the children - James Murray, now 45, and his sisters Paula, now 43 and Tracey, now 38, - to beat each other with steel-toed boots and stilettos.

A jury was told that he hit them with his belt, beat them if they took food without permission, punch James if he mispelt words and hit him over the head if chores were not done correctly.

He put out cigarettes on one Tracey, and found it "amusing" when he forced the sisters to beat their brother, it is alleged.

In one incident, Tracey told the police that James was hung on the back of the living room door where the dartboard was, before Cawley threw darts at his head.

Prosecutor Richard Haworth told Preston Crown Court described the alleged incidents as "gratuitous beating, punching and hitting".

The prosecutor told the jury that James says the abuse started when he was around four-years-old.

He said: "The defendant would hit them with his belt after they had warmed their bottoms against the fire, so it would hurt more.

"He would make James Murray kneel down on the floor and get his two sisters to hit him with his steel toed boots. He would get them to pull his hair. Bernard Cawley would join in, particularly if Mr Murray tried to move away.

"He described how they were kept short of food. If they did anything wrong Mr Cawley would hide it.

"But he would make sure that Mr Murray saw where it was hidden, so that when he went to retrieve the food, the defendant would physically lay into him. If Mr Murray took food without permission he was beaten."

Mr Murray is said to have been told to beat the youngest complainant Tracey Greaves but was unable to bring himself to do it because she was cowering in a corner.

So as retribution, Cawley, of Blackburn, Lancs., is alleged to have punched him in the head with such force that his head "bounced off the wall".

The jury was told Mr Murray was said to have suffered numerous injuries during the period of the abuse.

After going to hospital for treatment on one occasion, he was forced to run and hide from police when they said they would take him back home.

Mr Murray was warned by Cawley that he would be sent to "the cottage" and treated worse there if he told anybody about the abuse, the prosecution alleges.

The court was told Mr Murray didn't tell anybody about the abuse, which lasted until he was around 14, because he "thought it was the norm".

But he told police that Cawley "robbed him of his childhood" and called him a "bully".

The court heard that Mr Murray's mother, who also went by the surnames Cawley and Greaves and has since died, also used to beat him.

Paula Greaves said the violence started for her when she was around six-years-old and only stopped when she went into voluntary care aged 12.

The court heard she was forced to hit Mr Murray with the boot and sweeping brush, and slap Tracey on the back - things the defendant is alleged to have found "amusing".

Mr Haworth said: "Mr Cawley would assault them by punching. Paula used to scream in the vain hope that he would stop. He didn't and she didn't stop screaming. He resorted to putting her head under the tap."

The court heard Tracey had a different father from her older siblings and the defendant is said to have constantly racially abused her.

The court heard how the defendant would punch Tracey all over the body and put out cigarettes and cigars on her, causing scaring.

The jury was told when she was 13, Tracey is said to have told the defendant he was not her father. She attempted to run away from him but Cawley is said to have pulled her back by the leg, causing her to fall and break her ankle.

The abuse against her is said to have lasted until she was 17 and got worse when her siblings left home.

The court heard Cawley and his co-defendant Loraine Greaves - the aunt of the complainants - had an affair when Sheila Murray, the children's mother, was receiving treatment for a mental breakdown.

During that period Loraine Greaves, 62, of Plymouth, is said to have hit Tracey with a dog chain.

Cawley denies three counts of child cruelty and Lorraine Greaves denies one count of child cruelty between 1976 and 1986.