An accused father has told a cruelty case that jury his adoptive four-year-old son deliberately hurt himself.

Simon McWilliam was close to tears as he claimed he was so concerned about John Smith's bizarre behaviour he asked for advice from social workers, relatives, friends and neighbours.

John died from a brain haemorrhage on Christmas Eve 1999.

The jury at Lewes Crown Court has heard how John had 54 external injuries and four adult bite marks on his body.

The boy's adoptive parents McWilliam, 41, and his wife, Michelle McWilliam, 35, of Gardner Road, Fishersgate, Southwick, deny cruelty.

During the trial, the prosecution has claimed the injuries were unlikely to be caused by John self-harming.

But the couple claim the injuries were self-inflicted.

McWilliam told the court John was a loving boy and the couple were baffled by his conduct. He said: "He loved being kissed and cuddled.

"He was lovely, an absolute chatterbox. He was very loving. He wanted a lot of reassurance that he was loved."

McWilliam said he was excited and nervous when John came to live with them six months before his death.

But a month later, John started to make himself vomit and to knock into furniture, such as a dining table, on purpose, which caused bruising.

McWilliam said: "He was violently sick. It was projectile vomiting. If he did not think you were looking he would stick his fingers down his throat or push a spoon in his mouth. It would happen at breakfast, lunch and dinner.

"He was very clumsy but it was more purposeful than accidentally clumsy. He would literally throw himself on the floor."

He told how John had an "horrendous" carpet burn on his face after rubbing it on the floor. He said in November 1999 John started to punch his mother but never hit McWilliam.

He said: "I was talking to about John banging into things and being sick and nobody had ever encountered anything like it. I spoke to everybody I knew, even the people at the local corner shop.

"Whenever you spoke to him about an injury he was always happy to tell you. You could say he was almost proud. It was peculiar."

But, he claimed, when he spoke to social workers they failed to offer any advice on how to tackle John's behaviour.

McWilliam claimed he was told John was being sick because it was a way of expressing the upset he felt on the inside. He was told John was getting rid of the emotional pain he felt by turning it into physical pain he could heal.

As time went by, he said, he became increasingly worried he was failing John.

He said: "There was a sense we were failing. Everything we did, did not work. His behaviour escalated.

"I felt we were not able to fulfil that parental need for John.

"Our John could be extraordinarily good at times when he really wanted something. Equally, it felt sometimes he was sick when he did not get what he wanted."

In the days leading up to his death, McWilliam said John looked so badly bruised he felt embarrassed to take him to visit relations. He said: "He looked battered. It was shocking."

The trial continues.