JOHOR BARU: A former e-hailing driver has been sentenced to eight and a half years in jail for abusing a three-year-old boy, who subsequently died, four years ago.
Judicial Commissioner Datuk Abdul Fareed Abdul Gafoor ordered Chan Wen Jie, 32, to serve the sentence from Oct 3, 2022, the date of his arrest, after he pleaded guilty to an alternative charge under Section 31(1) of the Child Act 2001.
The High Court also ordered Chan to serve a three-year good behaviour bond with one surety without security, and perform 36 hours of community service within six months.
In its grounds of judgment, it described Chan forcing the victim to eat his own faeces from a disposable diaper as an uncivilised and degrading act that could not be justified as a form of discipline.
The court also considered closed-circuit television (CCTV) footage showing Chan subjecting the boy to various forms of abuse, including hitting his head, making him perform squats, forcing him to stand for prolonged periods and caning him.
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It said the footage showed that Chan’s actions went beyond ordinary physical punishment and amounted to excessive and merciless abuse of a helpless three-year-old who could not protect himself.
The court said Chan had betrayed the trust placed in him by the boy’s father, who had entrusted him with the child’s care.
It also rejected the defence argument that Chan had been disciplining the victim in the same way he disciplined his own child.
"If the accused was unable to care for the victim, he should have returned the child to his father," the court ruling said.
The court said it did not consider the original murder charge under Section 302 of the Penal Code, which had been withdrawn, or the cause of the victim’s death when determining the sentence for the alternative charge.
After weighing the aggravating and mitigating factors, it ruled that the jail term was appropriate for the offence, stressing the importance of protecting children from abuse.
On Oct 13, 2022, Chan was initially charged with murdering Lee See Jie at a house in Jalan Ria 2, Taman Skudai Ria, Skudai, between 8pm and 8.30pm on Oct 2 the same year.
The original charge was brought under Section 302 of the Penal Code before Chan pleaded guilty to the alternative charge under Section 31(1) of the Child Act.
