A MAN has appeared in court charged with “despicable” acts of sexual abuse against two children.

Neil Bennett 51, of Forest Edge, Buckhurst Hill is said to have repeatedly raped and sexually abused a young girl during the 1990s.

He is also alleged to have indecently assaulted a young boy on a regular basis over a similar time period, Snaresbrook Crown Court heard.

Both complainants, who cannot be named for legal reasons, are now in their 20s, with the current trial stemming from November 2006 when the male complainant entered a police station and told officers he had been sexually abused by Mr Bennett as a boy.

Prosecutor Simon Wild told the court: “It started when he was too little to quite know what was going on. He didn't realise or understand some of the strange things that were happening.

“One of the first things he remembers was when he was about ten or 11 he was playing a game of cards, I think it was snap, and, at the defendant's suggestion he switched from playing snap to strip poker, which, of course, is an outrageously inappropriate game.

“From that inappropriate, but not utterly indecent game of cards [the male complainant] will paint a picture to us of that indecency gradually increasing.”

Mr Wild said Mr Bennett would regularly perform sex acts on the male complainant and encourage him to perform sex acts on him.

He said the female complainant had previously made allegations about Mr Bennett in 2000, but after an investigation no charges were pressed.

The court heard that the alleged victim, now a young woman, was reiterating a number of the allegations a second time, and in her early youth had suffered a mental breakdown.

Mr Wild said: “She remembers he would have showers with her in an inappropriate way she didn't realise at the time. He began to touch her and kiss and cuddle her.”

The jury was told the abuse escalated through attempted rape into full rape over the years.

Mr Wild said: “This utterly deplorable abuse would continue right until her breakdown when she took her overdose.”

Mr Bennett faces five charges of indecent assault, two of indecency with a child, two of rape and one of attempted rape, all against the female complainant.

He faces two charges of indecent assault against the male complainant and denies all the charges.

The trial continues.