Singapore: 34-year-old man sentenced to 16 years' jail, canning for raping mother

Mentally ill man sent to jail
Singapore man arrested (Representational Picture) Reuters

Singapore High Court found a 34-year-old man guilty of raping and molesting his own mother and sentenced him to 16 years of imprisonment, including 18 strokes of the cane on Wednesday.

The accused denied all the charges and claimed that his mother, who was 53-year-old at the time of the offence and the step-father created the false allegations against the boy to get him out of their one-room flat.

Foo Chee Hock, the Judicial Commissioner said that this case has raised two questions, one is whether a mother conspired to create a false rape case against her own son and the other one is, whether the son actually assaulted his mother.

During the hearing, the judge found that the prosecution has already proved the three charges of rape, aggravated molestation and molestation.

However, the unnamed man has a history of convictions for drug consumption, robbery and burglary.

Reports said that he is the second child of the woman's three sons from her first marriage and was asked to live with the victim five months before the crime.

The victim was sleeping on Oct 4, 2013, and suddenly the accused returned and sexually assaulted her.

In 2016, during the trial former safety coordinator claimed that the intention of the man was to lift his mother's nightdress and to see private parts.

But, the prosecution argued and mentioned about a phone call what the mother made after the incident took place.

After hearing the phone recording, the court came to know that when the mother asked her boy why he did that, in a reply the accused said he liked it and wanted to do it again.

Sharmila Sripathy-Shanaz, the Deputy Public Prosecutor said the six-minute phone recording was the clear proof that the accused intentionally did the crime and forced himself on his mother.

Deputy Public Prosecutor also said during the hearing that the victim will carry the humiliation, betrayal and hurt, as she was harmed by her own son.

The defence lawyer, who was assigned under the Criminal Legal Aid Scheme argued with the DPP saying that the woman could easily resist the rape by crossing her legs.

Led by Senior Counsel Harry Elias, the defence also said that in the phone conversation there was no mention of the word 'rape'.

During arguing in the court, the defence mentioned about the lack of DNA evidence and told that there were no injuries found on the woman's body.

Even though a vaginal swab was taken from the victim at the Singapore General Hospital, it was not sent for a semen test, as the medical authority placed it in a wet tube.

Authority tested the samples of semen, what they found from the woman's nightdress but those were too weak to testify anything.

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