A ROOFER has gone on trial accused of mistreating a child - by breaking wind in his face, reports the The Northern Echo. 

Gary McKenzie denies the disgusting prank but says he once broke wind in front of the boy's face accidentally, which he said was funny.

Prosecutor Paul Abrahams told Teesside Crown Court that if the incident had taken place in a rugby club after the victim had drunk ten pints it may have been dismissed as horseplay, but in McKenzie's case it amounted to cruelty.

He faces three other charges - that he punched the boy on the arm and 'sucked' his eye while "play-fighting" and that he held a pillow over the face of another child, which he also put down to "playing."

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