SINGAPORE: A father broke the trust of his daughter and the sanctity of their home by sexually assaulting her in a shared bedroom over a period of three years.
His daughter was later sent to a foster home in 2022, after he separated from his wife a year earlier.
The sexual assaults only came to light in 2023, when his daughter told her foster parents that she had been touched inappropriately.
The court that heard the first incident had taken place when the girl was just 11 years of age. The prosecution said the man had been unaware that his daughter is intellectually disabled.
Court documents showed the man, 55, married his wife in 2006. The couple have two daughters, including the victim.
The man, his wife and two daughters would sleep on four single mattresses placed side by side in a shared bedroom at home.
The court heard that the arrangement was the man would lie beside his wife, followed by his two daughters.
Sometime between 2018 and April 2019, the man waited until everyone was asleep before going to his daughter, who was 11 years old at the time. She was lying on the mattress furthest from him.
He then molested her over her clothes, kissed her on the lips, and made her touch him inappropriately.
The child agreed as she was afraid of him. The court heard that she did not verbally or physically resist her father as she had seen him beating her mother on a previous occasion.
In December 2020, he sexually assaulted his daughter again while she was asleep.
Around the same period, he assaulted her for the third time.
The court heard that his daughter had tried to turn her body away this time, but he carried on sexually assaulting her.
The daughter later shared her experiences with her foster parents, who alerted her child protection officer on March 9, 2023.
The man will return to court on April 3 to be sentenced. The prosecution is seeking a jail term of six years and five months for the man.
He cannot be caned as he is above the age of 50. - The Straits Times/ANN
