A SHAMED nine-year-old girl was left to trudge the streets of York clutching her belongings in a suitcase after the man looking after her gave her a strapping for being naughty.

Ian Bundy, 28, lost his temper with the disobedient child, York Crown Court heard, and after hitting her three times across the bottom with a belt, said she would be sent to a place for bad girls, known and feared by local youngsters as the Marmalade Home.

But, said prosecutor David Bradshaw, after being told to pack her things the upset girl slipped out of Bundy's house in Spalding Avenue, York and police alerted by concerned shoppers found her wandering the busy streets alone at mid-morning.

Mr Bradshaw added: "She was clutching a suitcase in which she had put all her belongings and seemed to be completely lost. The police took care of her and later that day a medical examination revealed she had bruises to her leg, face and buttocks."

The prosecutor said Bundy, who was not the girl's father but who was looking after her with his own two children, completely over-reacted during a row over the making of toast and took a belt to the girl.

He strapped her three times across her bottom and said she would go to the bad girls' home.

"He got a suitcase and ordered her to pack her things and after doing this she left the house. When Bundy realised she had gone he sought to find her but was unable to do so."

Bundy admitted assaulting the girl causing her actual bodily harm last April and was jailed for 15 months.

Judge Arthur Myerson, QC, told him: "It cannot be in any way excusable to take a belt to a child in that way. For that you must go to prison."

The judge added: "After the strapping you simply sought to terrify her further by telling her to pack her suitcase. Under stress and humiliation of being sent to a home for bad girls she wandered around the streets with her packed suitcase."

Elizabeth McLoughlin, for Bundy, said: "The greatest punishment for him was to find the girl he had been looking after had left and gone. He was panic-stricken and searched the streets frantically looking for her. This picture will remain with him forever."

She said the accused did not know what to do when the child's behaviour became challenging, but took full responsibility for his actions. He had strapped her, told her to pack a case and threatened that she would go to the Marmalade House for bad girls. That was a place known to and feared by his own children."

Miss McLoughlin said Bundy's intention was for the young girl to sit and wait at the bottom of the stairs with her suitcase until her mother arrived. But she had slipped off into the city.