Woman tells court her partner taught toddler to call her names, tracked where she went on Snapchat and held scissors at her throat

Choking back tears, the 24-year-old woman said Paul Measor trained their toddler to call her names and and to swear at her.

Measor denies a charge controlling and coercive behaviour in an intimate relationship, and he denies two charges of common assault.

The mother, who works as an administrator in a secondary school, told Teesside Magistrates' Court Measor tracked her movements whenever she went out.

"I had to have an app on my phone so that he could see where I was," she said.

"When I went to work I had to send Snapchats to him to prove I was at work.

"He didn't believe that I hadn't left work until 6pm, so I had to ask the school for the CCTV footage of the entrance.

"They wouldn't let me see it, but I still had to ask."

The court heard a series of recorded arguments between the pair during which Measor could be heard urging the child to call his mother names and swear at her. The woman said she recorded arguments because she knew she needed evidence.

The court heard the couple were in an on/off relationship for several years after meeting via Facebook.

Measor became more controlling after they moved in together and the relationship progressed.

"He didn't like me seeing my friends," said the woman.

"After a while I stopped contacting them because I knew it would lead to arguments.

"He knew the password on my phone, and would look at my social media.

"I had some male friends, but I had to wipe all the male names off my accounts."

The woman said during one argument she went for a shower to get away from Measor.

"He was downstairs running the taps so the shower would be freezing," she said.

"I'd locked the bathroom door, but it was a child lock and he opened it from the outside.

"He ran the sink taps to keep the shower running cold, he was throwing cold water at me, and I was throwing it back.

"When he left the bathroom he took the towels, so all I had was my dressing gown."

Measor is alleged to have spat at the woman during an argument, and he is alleged to have held scissors to her throat during another argument.

"They were small nail scissors," said the woman.

"I thought he couldn't do much damage with them, but he was smirking, he knew he was frightening me."

The woman said that after an early morning argument she was unable to leave the house.

"All the doors were locked," she told the court. "I knew that because I had locked them the previous night,

"When I went to get the keys they were not in the drawer where he kept them, he had taken them."

Measor, 35, of Elizabeth Way, Hartlepool, denies engaging in controlling and coercive behaviour, and two charges of assault, all between October, last year, and August, this year.

District Judge Helen Cousins adjourned the case to be concluded on October 22.

The case continues.