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A four-year-old Coventry boy was killed after being starved of food and force fed salt by his mother and stepdad, a court has heard.

Daniel Pelka died after suffering a blow to the head in March last year and his emaciated body was compared to children in Second World War concentration camps during the prosecution opening at Birmingham Crown Court today.

His mother Magdalena Luczak and her partner Mariusz Krezolek stand accused of murder by causing or allowing the death of a child. Both deny the charges.

The Crown Prosecution Service claims the couple inflicted “incomprehensible cruelty” on Daniel including keeping him locked in the box room at their Coventry home for days with only a faeces-covered mattress for furniture.

The court heard text messages exchanged between the couple in which, it is alleged, they refer to “a form of water torture” where Daniel would be held under cold water in the bath.

Prosecutors also point to a string of incidents reported at school in which Daniel was reported scavenging food from bins and from other children. They claim he was force fed salt to make him vomit up food he had eaten at school.

Jonas Hankin, prosecuting, said: “This case concerns the murder of four-year-old Daniel Pelka by his mother and her partner.

“It is the prosecution’s case that Daniel was subjected to a violent assault in his own home by one or other, or both of the defendants. Irrespective of who landed the fatal blow, each bears joint responsibility for his murder.

“This was not an isolated incident. In the months leading up to this the defendants had subjected Daniel to incomprehensible cruelty.”

Magdalena, 27, and Mariusz, 33, both came to the UK from Poland independently in 2006 and started a relationship together in 2010.

An ambulance was called to the family home at 2.45am on Saturday, March 3, 2012.

Upon arrival paramedics reported that Daniel looked to be already dead. Despite efforts to revive him during the ambulance journey to University Hospital, he was pronounced dead at 3.50am.

The couple told emergency services that Daniel had complained of chest pain the previous day but had gone to bed as normal at 8pm on Friday.

Lukzak said it was only when she checked on him at 2.45am she noticed he wasn’t breathing.

However, the court heard that a police search of the couple’s computer showed that at around 11.25am on Friday someone had searched the internet for the phrase “when a child stops responding”.

It also recorded searches for “when a child is sleeping and not responding”, “care patient in a coma” and “when a child swallows too much table salt”.

The court heard a doctor who went to assess Daniel’s “emaciated” body at the mortuary in the days after his death said it was the worst example she had seen in 19 years working with such cases.

She reported it “resembled images of children starved in concentration camps during the Second World War”.

A post mortem found Daniel had a blood clot on the brain at the time of his death.

The prosecution highlighted medical reports that his hair was falling out and patchy while he had ten bruises on his head, neck, shoulders and a cluster at the base of his spine.

In the months prior to his death, Daniel’s school attendance declined to 63 per cent

Teachers reported a number of incidents in which Daniel was found taking large amounts of school fruit, hiding it in his trousers and eating it in the toilet.

After Daniel was found taking other pupils' fruit, a meeting was arranged with Magdalena Lukzak and Mariusz Krezolek. They claimed he had an eating disorder which gave him an insatiable appetite.

In January 2012, Daniel ate half a birthday cake brought in by one of the teachers.

It was then the school reported that Daniel’s stomach was distended, he had circles around his eyes and bruising which appeared to be in the shape of finger marks around his neck.

The court also heard text messages exchanged between the defendants in the months before Daniel died.

One sent by car worker Krezolek said: “Take him to the room and lock him in there. We will have some peace. And do wait for me.”

Another sent by Lukzak said: “We will deal with Rudey (Daniel) after school. He won’t see grub at all.”

Another from his mother said: “Well now he is temporarily unconscious because I nearly drowned him. He is already in bed covered in the duvet asleep and I’m having some quiet time.”

A third text message from his mother said: “If I hear when he wakes up he will be going back to the bath tub. I didn’t let the water out.”

The case continues.