A MAN in his 50s has told a jury how he was abused by a gay funeral director when he was a schoolboy and how it has affected his life.

The alleged victim of Gerald Martin said he kept his ordeal a secret for almost 40 years until he ended up in hospital feeling suicidal.

He shook and sobbed before he started giving evidence on the second day of 66-year-old Mr Martin’s trial at Teesside Crown Court today.

Gerald Martin arriving at Teesside Crown Court for his trial this morning

The court was cleared for a break after the breathless man needed to use an inhaler and told the staff he thought he was having a breakdown.

Earlier, under cross-examination, he twice pointed to bald Mr Martin in the dock, and said: “That man you are taking about is sat right there.”

Jamie Hill, QC, defending, asked the witness a series of questions about his childhood and the allegations he made against the undertaker.

He said: “I’ve had it for over 40 years and I still live with it now.

“It’s been awful. It’s been a nightmare for me . . . Forty years down the line, I’m still suffering . . . I put my trust in him.”

The witness said that he met Mr Martin at a Boys Brigade or Scout group when he was 14 or 15 and that he attended just a handful of times.

He told the court Mr Martin picked him up from near his home one night, groped him in his car, and abused him in a school or church hall.

Earlier, the court heard that the alleged abuse first came to light in April 2013 when the man dialled 999 saying he was feeling suicidal.

He confided in a nurse at the University Hospital of North Tees in Stockton he had been molested as a teenager by a man in Hartlepool.

Police were alerted and they later interviewed him, and he picked out married Mr Martin in an identification procedure, the jury was told.

Mr Martin, of Valley Drive, Hartlepool, denies a total of 13 serious sex charges against five boys, whose ages ranged from 11 to 15.

He denies false imprisonment when he is said to have dragged a child from a public loo and drove him to his funeral parlour to abuse him.

The prosecution claims the attacks were carried out between 1974 and 1996 - starting five years before Mr Martin married wife, Pauline.

The trial continues.