A DAD suspected of an attack plot was looking at toys for his own children when a three-year-old boy was squirted with acid, a court heard.

Jan Dudi said he was unaware the boy had been attacked in Home Bargains in Worcester as he gave evidence at Worcester Crown Court on Friday. The 25-year-old Slovak father is one of seven defendants who deny the conspiracy to attack the boy with acid in the Worcester shop on July 21 last year following a custody battle involving the child’s Afghan father.

CCTV footage was again played to the jury which shows Dudi, Adam Cech and Norbert Pulko entering the shop after following the mother of the boy from her home in Worcester.

Adam Morgan, Dudi’s barrister, asked him what was in his left hand as the footage was played. Dudi said it was his mobile phone and he was communicating with his wife via Facebook Messenger and she was telling him he needed to go shopping with her.

“I was telling my wife I was at the shop. I was asking her if I should buy a toy for the children, asking her if the children want something” he said.

The former bouncer said he was also ‘watching the woman’, the mother of the child who suffered burns to his face and arm at 2.16pm.

“Were you aware of Mr Cech holding anything in his left hand at this stage?” said Mr Morgan. Dudi said he was not.

“Did you know he was going to hurt one of the children?”

“No” said Dudi.

Dudi also told the jury that a recording made on his phone at this time was ‘an accident’ and that he ‘didn’t know’ the boy had been squirted with acid.

Dudi said it was Cech who told him ‘we are all over Facebook, the news and TV’ after police launched a media appeal in the wake of the alleged attack.

He was asked how he felt and he said: “Bad. I was scared. I was frightened.”

Dudi left for London with Cech and Pulko the day after the attack. The thee suspects were arrested at Pulko’s home in Sutherland Road, London 3am on July 23 last year and taken to Bethnal Green Police Station.

Dudi admitted to the jury he lied in that interview, telling officers he had been to Pulko’s house to collect rent and that he only ended up in Worcester on the day of the alleged attack because the Sat Nav was broken.

The trial continues.