A 24-year-old Indonesian domestic worker was jailed for four months on Wednesday after admitting to having tortured a two-year-old boy of her employer out of frustration with his mother.
On Sept 21, the employer of Ayunda Lestari Dayuki checked the CCTV footage of the flat and found out the maid sleeping in the living room when she was supposed to be taking care of the boy. So, she called Ayunda and scolded her.
The next day, out of frustration, the maid punched the child's head three times and hit his head once with a wooden toilet brush at a flat in Bukit Batok. Ayunda had been working there for one year and she used to help in the household chores and took care of the victim along with two other children
The boy's father later discovered a reddish mark and swelling on the back of the child's head. An investigation showed that Ayunda hit the boy when he refused to bathe and started to cry. A doctor's examination found a swelling on the back of his head.
Kumaresan Gohulabalan, the Deputy Public Prosecutor, said the maid punched the child on a vulnerable part of his body. According to him, the offence was not easy to detect as the maid committed it outside the view of the CCTV. He requested the court to impose a sentence of at least three months of jail on the accused.
"You are not even remorseful for what you have done?" the District Judge Salina Ishak asked Ayunda when she urged the judge to impose a light sentence.
In response to this, Ayunda, whose sentence was backdated to Sept 26, replied through an Indonesian interpreter that she was remorseful for her "silly acts''.
