A 29-year-old man slapped his two-year-old stepson for crying at night and left marks on to toddler's face and neck in June 2017. The court sentenced him six months and two weeks of imprisonment on Friday.
During the court hearing, the man pleaded guilty to one count each of ill-treating the boy, being a member of an unlawful assembly and using threatening words on a polyclinic doctor. He accepted that he physically abused his stepson twice in the same month.
The unnamed man and his wife, who is the boy's biological mother, was sleeping inside their Yishun flat in early June 2017 and they woke up after hearing the child's cry.
The 28-year-old mother and the husband scolded the child to stop crying. When she wanted to turn on the lights of her son's room, her husband asked her not to do that. Later she used the flashlight of the mobile phone and noticed red marks on the boy.
When the mother of the child asked her husband, he admitted that he slapped the toddler out of anger.
The court came to know that after this incident the step-father again hit the child when he saw a wet diaper. He pulled that child's hair and push his head onto the floor and child started crying.
However, the mother noticed some marks on her child's forehead. She also found that some of his hairs also had been pulled out and thrown onto the floor.
Even after this incident, the man continued to abuse his step-son. One day the woman noticed that a redness around the toddler's nose. Later it came into focus that it happened after a fall, as the step-father pushed him when the boy refused to sit still when the man was cutting his hair.
This time the Then the social worker took both mother and son to KK Women's and Children's Hospital and after a check-up, the hospital authority alerted local police.
According to reports on April 28. 2016 the man was found guilty of abusing a doctor from Bukit Merah Polyclinic, who was treating his headache and gave the man only a day's medical leave.
The accused was also found a part of an unlawful assembly at the void deck of Block 233, Ang Mo Kio Avenue 3 at around 2.30am on May 3, 2017.
As per the law, for ill-treating a child can face a jail up to four years, including a fine up to $4,000. If he convicted for unlawful assembly, then the court could send him to jail for up to two years and a fine and for use of threatening words on the doctor the man could have been jailed for a year and fine up to $5,000.
