SINGAPORE – Over a period of eight months, a woman allowed her 11-year-old daughter to be assaulted by the girl’s stepfather and helped to cover up the abuse.

The abuse ultimately turned fatal when the man repeatedly beat the girl with an exercise bar for eating slowly, causing her to die four days later from head injuries.

On Wednesday, prosecutors told the High Court that the tragedy was a consequence of the woman’s inaction and could have been easily averted.

Deputy Public Prosecutor Ng Jun Chong sought a deterrent sentence of eight to 12 years’ jail. 

The 29-year-old woman is the first person to be convicted for allowing the death of a child in the same household, an offence introduced in 2020 to target those who fail to protect victims from abuse.

She was also convicted of two assault charges, for pouring a cup of hot water on the girl’s neck and head, and for biting the child on her forearm.

As for the main perpetrator, prosecutors are seeking 14 to 17 years’ jail and at least 12 strokes of the cane. The 28-year-old man was convicted on a charge of culpable homicide and five assault charges.

His attack on the victim was “unprovoked, persistent and callous”, and entirely disproportionate to what was a trivial matter, said Deputy Public Prosecutor Jonathan Lee.

The defence highlighted that the two had also been victims of abuse.

The woman’s lawyer, Mr Mohamed Muzammil, said she stopped school in Secondary 3 as she could not endure being bullied. He added that her mother used to lock her in the storeroom.

The man’s lawyer, Mr Ahmad Nizam Abbas, said his client made the rounds of welfare homes after he and his siblings were removed from their parents. He cited a psychiatric report saying that his client’s history as a victim of child abuse made him more vulnerable to being an abuser himself.

The couple, who married in April 2020, cannot be named owing to a gag order. They have a son together and two other sons from the woman’s first marriage.

The victim was born out of wedlock when the woman was 16.

In early 2020, the man became upset with the victim because he believed that she had been stealing items in their flat. He was also angry at her for eating too slowly.

He asked her to hold a 1.5-litre water bottle at shoulder level before caning her and hitting her with a belt. The man’s family members, who saw her bruises, scolded him for abusing the girl and the woman for not stopping him, but the abuse continued. He hit the girl with a wooden backscratcher, made her eat chilli padi until she vomited and beat her with the exercise bar.

Between Aug 26 and Oct 28, 2020, the girl did not attend school as the couple were worried the injuries would be discovered. In September 2020, two representatives from the girl’s school visited the flat, but the couple did not allow them entry.

On Nov 6, 2020, the man repeatedly swung the exercise bar at the girl’s head. She was bleeding from the ear and her head was swollen, but the couple decided against taking her to hospital because they did not know how to account for her injuries.

On Nov 10, the woman called her husband at work and told him the girl had blacked out. The man spoke to his supervisor, who told him to call an ambulance. At the hospital, the couple lied that she had fallen from the stairs while she was skateboarding. They later admitted that they had assaulted the girl.