A man accused of murdering a Tayside toddler told police he did not know how the boy had come about his injuries, describing him as "perfect" the morning before he died, a court heard to day.
Robert Cunningham, 23, looked after Brandon Muir at the flat he stayed in with the child's mother Heather Boyd in Dundee.
He told detectives investigating the death on March 16 last year that he shouted at Brandon the day before, after the toddler attempted to climb on to a window ledge twice by standing on his buggy.
Cunningham said during the March 28 interview, shown to jurors at Glasgow High Court, that he took him down and told him to stand against a wall and stay there.
He said he did not know how Brandon, aged 23 months, came to have a ruptured intestine which led to his death.
The accused told officers: "I came in and he was up again so I tapped him on the hand, like I normally do if they are bad, and then I put him against the wall and told him to stand there once.
"Once, I told him to stand there, and then Heather walked in."
Brandon started crying when he was put against the wall, the court heard, but was otherwise okay.
"He was perfect, honest to God, he was perfect," Cunningham told Detective Constable David Budd and a fellow officer.
Asked by police how he came to have a "burst stomach" he told them: "I don't know how it could have happened."
The court heard that Brandon was repeatedly sick at Cunningham's sister's home later that day.
Boyd put the illness down to a 24-hour bug, he told police.
That night he put Brandon on the couch and fell asleep while Boyd stayed awake all night, he said.
He told police: "I put Brandon on the couch.
"She was going on about something for ages and then I just fell asleep.
"I woke up to her screaming at us."
The trial has heard previously how doctors found at least 40 injuries on Brandon, including bruising and four fractured ribs.
Cunningham denies murdering the boy by assaulting him at the flat on Balunie Crescent.
Boyd, 23, is accused of the culpable homicide of her son by failing to get medical help for him.
She also denies the charge.
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