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Singapore

Court dismisses appeal for shorter jail term by man who sexually abused 4 daughters over 14 years

The 45-year-old man raped or sexually assaulted four of his daughters between 2004 and 2018.

Court dismisses appeal for shorter jail term by man who sexually abused 4 daughters over 14 years

People walk across a bridge near the Supreme Court in Singapore on Nov 9, 2021. (Photo: AFP/Roslan Rahman)

SINGAPORE: The Court of Appeal on Friday (Sep 9) dismissed an appeal against sentence by a man who sexually abused four of his daughters over 14 years.

The 45-year-old man, who cannot be named due to gag orders protecting his daughters' identities, was sentenced to 33 years and two months' jail in March. He was also given the maximum of 24 strokes of the cane.

He had pleaded guilty to seven charges of aggravated rape, aggravated sexual assault involving penetration, aggravated outrage of modesty and ill-treatment of a child. Another 26 charges were considered in sentencing.

He raped or sexually assaulted four of his daughters between 2004 and 2018, and starved them over five days in 2018 when he was angry with them.

At his sentencing, the judge called his abuse "horrific" and said it was "one of the worst cases of rape and sexual assault" he had seen.

On Friday, the man mounted his own appeal against the sentence, asking for the jail term to be reduced from 33 years and two months to 28 to 30 years' jail instead.

Speaking via an interpreter to Chief Justice Sundaresh Menon and Justices Judith Prakash and Tay Yong Kwang, the man said: "I am pleading with your honours if possible to reduce my current sentence."

"I wish to reiterate that I am a first-time offender and I'm not a repeat offender, as such I'm asking to reduce my sentence," said the man. He added that he was not "asking to be released".

Chief Justice Menon said: "Well, he may say he is a first-time offender, but the offences took over a period starting 2004 and continuing until 2015 and so for a long period, in fact it went all the way up to 2018, and there were 33 charges in all."

He said two dozen of the charges were sexual offences "committed against his own children", so this case cannot be seen as a first-time one-off mistake.

Instead, it is "sustained conduct continued over a long period", said the Chief Justice.

The appellant then began talking about how some evidence in his case is "unclear". He questioned why one of the victims refused some medical examination, and said it "would not be fair" for the court to give him such a punishment if the evidence was unclear.

"For example, if there is no clear example with regard to the case ... the DNA from one clothes may be transferred to another person's clothes, but that does not mean (it) comes from me your honour, it could be another person," said the man.

The Chief Justice said the man was appealing against sentence and not conviction and there was "no question about his guilt in this matter".

"I'm not going to hear arguments about whether the evidence is clear or not clear because the conviction stands," said Chief Justice Menon.

The man then gave another reason for his hope that his jail term would be reduced.

"I hope that I will be able to do my mini pilgrimage. If I'm released later at the age of 65 or above, I'm afraid I'm not strong enough to do my pilgrimage," he said.

Chief Justice Menon said this "doesn't make any difference" because the reduction he was asking for was about two years and he did not think there was any relevance.

"We dismiss the appeal," he said. "There is no error in the judge's assessment."

The man had begun sexually exploiting his children when his oldest daughter was only six to seven years old, and only his youngest daughter was spared, the sentencing judge noted at the time.

He had taken deliberate steps to separate one of his daughters by taking her to the family's new flat that was still under construction and raping her there. He also sexually groomed her and tried to normalise the abuse by showing her pornography when she was in Primary 5.

The sentencing judge had noted that "nothing can restore the victims' innocence or compensate for their suffering".

Source: CNA/ll(zl)

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