A COUPLE accused of cruelty against two adopted children have been cleared in court of two charges.
The stepmother and stepfather were found not guilty yesterday of stuffing soiled underwear into their adopted son's mouth when he was about eight.
The jury at Teesside Crown Court is still considering verdicts on seven other counts of ill-treating the boy, now aged 14, and their adopted daughter, aged 16, and a charge of assaulting another girl, aged 17.
One of the counts accuses the stepmother, aged 54, of forcing the boy to eat the family's pet rabbit after it was savaged by their alsatian, and made into a pie.
The couple, from Spennymoor, County Durham, claim that the allegations were fantasy by the disturbed children.
The jury will continue its deliberations today.
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