A woman who saw her former partner fatally shooting her father told a court today how there had been several previous violent incidents, including a case where a baby girl was hit with a fork.

Simone Caruana was testifying in the murder proceedings against former partner Godwin Scicluna, who stands charged with shooting her father Joseph Caruana in Kalkara earlier this month.

The victim Joseph Caruana.

She said she met Godwin Scicluna nine years ago and they had four children. The past two years had been hell for her and he had repeatedly threatened to kill her and her parents.

She made several police reports.

One time he told her that if he ever went to jail for not paying child maintenance, he would escape from prison and immediately kill her.

In another incident, he had dragged her by her hair when she was eight months pregnant. He had also knocked out one of her teeth.

Once she was holding a six-month child when he assaulted her. In the process he ended up hitting the baby on the head with a fork.

Godwin Scicluna, an avid hunter, had four guns and the one which killed her father was always loaded. She used to warn him to keep it away from her children.

Breaking down crying, Ms Caruana described what happened on the day of the shooting. Everything was normal at first, but he told her he did not want to pay child maintenance.

When her father arrived to pick her up, she asked Godwin for her digital camera. He claimed that he had not found it, then left the room, returned with the camera and smashed it. She started crying, he left and returned with a shotgun. She took cover under the table with one of the children.

He pointed the gun at them and, because of the child, she got out and started struggling with him, trying to turn the gun to point at the ceiling.

It was during this struggle that she tripped and fell. The children were crying and one of them shouted 'le papa'.

She told one of them to get out to warn her father not to enter the house, but he entered the room as she tried to get out with one of the children.

She expected her father to follow with the other children, but as she turned, a shot rang out and her father fell.

She told the children to run out. She ran out too and was hit in the arm.

She sought refuge at the neighbouring house of a police constable.

The trial continues.