On Tuesday (30 April), a 44-year-old man in Singapore was sentenced to more than 34 years’ jail and 12 strokes of the cane for the murder of his five-year-old daughter, Ayeesha.
The girl died from a head injury in 2017 after her father smacked her face up to 20 times in the toilet.
Source: Court documents via Channel NewsAsia
In court, the man confessed to charges related to abusing and mistreating Ayeesha and her brother, as well as disposing of evidence.
As a consequence of the abuse, Ayeesha’s brother was diagnosed with global developmental delay, requiring physiotherapy, occupational therapy, and speech therapy due to social deprivation.
According to Channel NewsAsia (CNA), Ayeesha and her brother were the man’s biological children from his first marriage.
After their parents’ divorce in June 2014, the children were placed in foster care, but they returned to their father’s custody in early 2015, The Straits Times (ST) reported.
However, facing financial difficulties, the man and his second wife reduced the children’s meals from three to two a day.
Ayeesha and her brother were so hungry that they resorted to eating their own faeces and mattress stuffing.
Starting at the end of 2015, the man, who was trained in martial arts, and his wife began physically abusing Ayeesha and her brother.
Source: doidam10 on Canva, for illustration purposes only
CCTV footage presented in court on Tuesday (30 April) depicted the children enduring forceful and repeated kicks, punches, smacks, and slaps from their father.
One video shows the man delivering at least 86 forceful blows to Ayeesha during a 16-minute assault on 27 March 2016.
He did this after discovering that she had smeared her faeces all over the wall.
In February 2016, the man and his wife confined Ayeesha and her brother to a tight “naughty corner” between a bookshelf and a wardrobe in their bedroom.
They did this as they were unhappy about the children waking up earlier than them and making a mess at home.
They also installed a CCTV camera there to monitor the kids.
Source: Irina Shatilova on Canva, for illustration purposes only
From February to October 2016, the couple kept the siblings in the “naughty corner” all day, only allowing them out to eat and shower.
In October 2016, the children were relocated to the toilet in the kitchen, which became the new “naughty corner”.
Once again, they were released from confinement for meals or when the couple needed to use the toilet.
Ayeesha and her brother were left naked throughout their 10-month confinement period in there.
After the children returned to their father’s care, Thye Hua Kwan – Tanjong Pagar Family Service Centre (FSC), which worked with the Ministry of Social and Family Development (MSF), continued monitoring their welfare.
On 25 May 2015, the man took the siblings to a counselling session.
He told the case officer that Ayeesha and her brother would be living with their grandmother.
Since then, the children were not seen by any case officers until Ayeesha’s death. They also did not go to school.
In October 2016, the man called the case officer and said he wanted to put the kids in foster care as he was worried he might hurt them out of frustration.
The officer then gave the man the contact details of Apkim Centre of Social Services, an adoption service.
However, the adoption process stalled due to the need for consent from the children’s biological mother unless MSF could waive this requirement.
Less than two months before Ayeesha’s death, the man’s wife informed an FSC case officer that he was actively pursuing the adoption process.
On the night of 10 Aug 2017, the man’s wife asked Ayeesha and her brother to do some exercise by moving their legs as they had been sedentary all day.
While Ayeesha’s brother complied, she did not.
Her stepmother reported this to her father, who retaliated by hitting Ayeesha in the face 15 to 20 times.
At around 3am the next day, the wife told the man that the children were sleeping in a weird position.
In response, he went into the toilet to punch the both of them in the back. He also kicked, slapped, and stamped on Ayeesha.
Later that evening, the wife found Ayeesha lying cold and unresponsive.
The man was called over and performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) on his daughter, but she had already died.
In an effort to shield his wife from implication, the man devised a strategy, suggesting she file a police report alleging he had physically and sexually assaulted her.
He also attempted to eliminate any potential evidence during the early hours of 12 Aug 2017 by discarding items such as a CCTV camera, a mobile phone, scissors, a cane, a rubber hose, bath towels, and a child safety gate into separate bins.
The man then put Ayeesha’s body and her brother into a pram and brought them to Singapore General Hospital (SGH).
Source: Hospital Management Asia
There, he falsely informed hospital staff that his daughter had become unresponsive that morning.
Ayeesha was pronounced dead at 10.49am following unsuccessful attempts to resuscitate her.
Upon discovering concerning injuries and a foul odour on the girl’s body, the hospital alerted the police.
During questioning, the man initially fabricated a story about taking Ayeesha to the hospital after noticing she was weak that morning.
Later that day, police apprehended him for further questioning.
Persisting in his deception, he lied that Ayeesha had sustained a head injury from a playground slide the previous night.
He also claimed that he and his children had not spent the night at their residence.
The man eventually came clean after he was shown police camera footage that contradicted his stories.
Inflicted with abuse and neglect by the father, Ayeesha’s brother suffered from severe malnutrition and global developmental delay.
The boy received medical attention at KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital, where he remained hospitalised for four months until November 2017, after which he was placed in foster care.
During the court proceedings, Deputy Public Prosecutor Norine Tan advocated for a sentence of 30 to 34 years’ imprisonment and a minimum of 12 strokes of the cane for the father.
On the other hand, the defence team argued that a sentence that long would be unprecedented.
In rebuttal, Ms Tan highlighted that the facts of the case themselves were unprecedented.
The man, who reportedly wept when hearing the details and watching videos of the abuse in court, pleaded guilty to six charges and was sentenced to 34-and-a-half years in prison.
Meanwhile, the prosecution will review the case of his wife, who was implicated as a co-accused in the charges related to confining Ayeesha and her brother to the toilet.
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Featured image adapted from court documents via Channel NewsAsia (CNA) and by MS News.
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