September 2010 Woman sentenced over child abuse A woman who admitted locking three children in a tiny cupboard in Edinburgh has been ordered to carry out 150 hours of community service. Elaine Robertson prevented two boys and a girl from getting out after they had allegedly been tortured and filmed on a mobile phone by her partner Gary Marinello. The catalogue of torture which Marinello, formerly of Drumbryden Gardens, West Hailes, Edinburgh, is said to have carried out included trussing the children up, tying them to a radiator, a gate, and each other with belts, bandages and electric cable. And he was said to have burned the girl’s nose and threatened to burn her eyes out with a cigarette and drop a computer console on her head. The youngsters were also punched, kicked and spat on and beaten with a shoe and put in a small cupboard overnight. Elaine Robertson, 37 years old admitted assaulting the two 11-year-old boys and a 12-year-old girl in an Edinburgh house. Judge Lord Tyre placed her on two years probation at the High Court in Glasgow after he told her it was “not necessary” to impose a jail term. He told her: “This is an opportunity you have been given to be provided with the help that you need.” The charity shop worker now lives in Cupar, Fife. Robertson’s former partner Marinello, 32, died in June of a drugs overdose while awaiting trial. He had filmed the “interrogations” at the flat in Carrick Knowe Drive, Edinburgh, on his mobile phone. It is claimed the abuse only came to light when social workers visited and spotted the injuries. A leading paediatrician said one of the boys suffered the worst case of non-accidental injury she had ever seen. Robertson’s lawyer Edith Forrest told the court on Wednesday that the former auxiliary nurse realised her actions were “criminal”.