A teenage boy has told his father’s sentence hearing that he wanted to commit suicide for all the times he was raped when he was younger.

His father, who’s 66, was convicted of nine counts of rape at their family home in Waterford and one count of child cruelty.

In his Victim Impact Statement, the boy described his father as Adolf Hitler. He said he was a horrible and cruel man who had taken away his childhood.

The boy, who’s now 13, was taken into care in 2011 and now lives in a specialised facility in the UK.

The alarm was raised just before his 8th birthday when he told his teacher that his father had beaten him. The sexual abuse allegations were revealed a year later to his foster mother.

His father was also convicted of child cruelty for locking his son in a wooden box. The court heard his mother released him a few hours later.

She was also convicted of child cruelty following a seven-week trial during which the boy spent eight days giving evidence.

Through a live-video link from a specialised facility in the UK where he now lives, the boy gave harrowing details of the abuse he suffered in the family home from when he was six right up until he was taken into care.

In his Victim Impact Statement, he said he became very depressed in the lead up to the trial but was happy his father is now in prison.

He said he’d been afraid to return to Ireland in case his father found him, but felt he could now walk here without a care in the world.

At her sentence hearing, the boy said he didn’t blame her for what happened to him but he said he wanted to hurt his father. He said words had yet to be invented to describe what he did to him.

His parents will be sentenced next month, but today counsel for his father said his client still maintains his innocence and intends to appeal the convictions and whatever sentence is handed down.

Our Courts Correspondent Frank Greaney reports: