Norwegian athletics coach Gjert Ingebrigtsen instructed a court docket on Monday he “loves” his youngsters and was simply an “overly protecting” father as he denied abuse allegations.
Ingebrigtsen, 59, is on trial in Norway accused of bodily and mentally abusing his 24-year-old son Jakob and one other of his youngsters.
Double Olympic champion Jakob stated when giving proof final week that his father “manipulated” and “managed” him all through his upbringing and detailed a collection of alleged incidents.
Gjert addressed the court docket on the prison case in Sandnes in his personal defence. He stated he had tried to defend all seven of his youngsters, two extra of whom additionally grew to become profitable athletes.
“I grew to become a father very early, with an unlimited want to guard. I grew to become what one would possibly name overly protecting,” Gjert was quoted as saying in court docket by Norwegian state broadcaster NRK.
“Highlighting related incidents in relation to the fees might make it seem to be I’m being portrayed negatively in direction of my youngsters. However I like my youngsters immensely.”
Gjert Ingebrigtsen instructed the court docket the ambition of a few of his youngsters had been “completely excessive” once they began to take part in sports activities.
“I by no means heard ‘might you please’, however slightly solely totally different calls for and expectations,” Gjert stated.
“The calls for from the youngsters have been about district stage, nationwide stage, European stage, and world stage. Later, ‘Dad’ grew to become ‘Gjert’, and ‘Gjert’ grew to become ‘the accused’.”
It was alleged in court docket final week that Gjert struck Jakob a number of occasions after he acquired a destructive report about his behaviour from college when he was aged eight.
Jakob additionally stated that in 2008, when he was about the identical age, his father hit him within the face as a result of he was late for a race.
He described one other incident a 12 months later when he alleged Gjert kicked him within the abdomen after he fell off a scooter.
Jakob additionally alleged his father threatened him in 2016, and one other episode across the identical time when Gjert was stated to have thrown his video games console out of the window.
