New York, NY —

Prosecutors say Cesar Rodriguez subjected Brown to systematic torture and abuse. His defense attorney says the child's mother is to blame.

WNYC's Cindy Rodriguez reports.

The trial is expected to layout in graphic detail how 7-year-old Nixzmary Brown was often bound to a chair and confined to a dirty room.

But defense attorney Jeffrey Schwarz told jurors there's more to the story. He described Rodriguez's wife Nixzaliz Santiago as a depressed and disturbed mother who subjected the child to brutal beatings.

The attorney said Santiago would coax her husband into punishing the 7-year-old.

On the night she died, Schwartz conceded his client dunked the girl under a faucet of cold water after striking her several times, but only meant to discipline her in the same way his father had disciplined him.

Schwarz told jurors the trial should not be about Rodriguez's parenting skills, but about whether he committed murder.

For WNYC, I'm Cindy Rodriguez.