Father inflicts "gravest form of sexual abuse" on 10-year-old daughter by sodomising her while she was in school uniform

Selina Lum
The Straits Times
25 July 2016

She was only 10 years old when her biological father inflicted the "gravest form of sexual abuse" on her - he sodomised her while she was still in her school uniform.

When he molested her on another day that same month, in October 2005, the then-Primary Four pupil asked him whether all fathers did such acts on their daughters.

The question shocked the man, but it did not stop him, as he continued to sexually abuse her that month.

Nine years later, when she was 19, he started molesting her again. After suffering in silence over the years, she worked up the courage to report him to the police.

On Monday (July 25), the 51-year-old man was jailed 12½ years by the High Court after he pleaded to one charge of sodomy and two charges of molestation.

Four other charges - of molestation and sexual exploitation of a child - were taken into consideration.

The technician cannot be caned as he is more than 50 years old. He cannot be named to protect the identity of his daughter, who is now 21 years old.

According to the man's lawyer, his wife had run away from home in October 2005.

One afternoon that month, the man told his daughter to follow him to the master bedroom after fetching her home from school. The girl's two brothers were still in school at the time.

As her father abused her, the victim tried to withhold her tears out of fear that he would scold her. When she burst into tears, he stopped.

On another day, he again told her to go to the bedroom where he did a sexual act on her. Despite feeling that his actions were "regrettable" after she asked if all fathers did this, he went on to molest her one more time and made her do an indecent act twice.

In 2014, when she was 19, he molested her once in July and once in October. After the second incident, she decided to leave the flat and made a police report.

In a statement to the court about the impact the abuse left on her, the victim said that she lived in constant fear of being molested. "I could not love him and would never love him because of what he did to me when I was younger," she said.

"I was innocent but my father breached my innocence by exposing me to adult sexual behaviors and he used his authority on me. I was never willing."

The victim said she once tried to kill herself when she was in secondary school.

"The scar that my father has left me is irreversible."