Mum of boy allegedly molested by teacher ‘pained’ by son’s ‘traumatic experience’

SINGAPORE — A mother had to choke back tears in court on Monday (Feb 12), when she recounted the moment when her son told her his male teacher behaved inappropriately towards him while they were in school.

On Feb 17 in 2016, the art teacher, then 36, and the boy, who was in 13 and in Secondary 2, were the only ones left in the school’s art room. The teacher then allegedly jabbed the boy’s underarm, squeezed the boy’s chest, and put his hands into the boy’s shorts to touch his buttocks and groin.

“My heart ached,” the mother of two said on the witness stand, her voice shaking. “It pained me to know that my son had to go through such an unpleasant experience.”

The teacher, who cannot be named to protect the minor’s identity and who has been ordered to stop his teaching duties, faces three charges of outraging the boy’s modesty.

When confronted by the school principal and vice-principal, the teacher — who joined the co-ed school in 2010 — admitted that he had asked the boy if he had a girlfriend and if he masturbated, and said to the boy that he reminded him of a manga character in an adult comic.

He also admitted to touching the boy’s thigh, but denied all other allegations and claimed that he merely tugged at the side of the boy’s shorts at the seam.

After she was told of the incident, the mother wanted to make a police report immediately, but held back after the school said that it was doing an internal investigation into the matter first, in line with the Education Ministry’s protocol, which includes taking statements from both parties.

In the boy’s statement, which was written over an hour in solitude the next day and admitted in court on Monday, he stated that he could “feel (the teacher’s) fingers spreading out” in his pants.

Leaving school after giving his statement that day, the boy felt unwell, so his mother took him to a doctor, who referred him to the emergency department of the National University Hospital for a psychiatric check-up. The incident was then reported to the police when the boy was there.

Taking the stand on Monday, the school’s vice-principal, who handled the matter from the beginning, said: “The parents were very angry and very upset, and demanded to know what the school was going to do. We provided assurance that we would look into the matter (and) told the mother to give us some time so that we would have a clearer picture (of the incident).”

The mother said that her son was “very passionate” about art, but after the alleged incident, he has “lost interest” in the subject and has become sensitive to and easily startled by others’ touch.

She added: “We should not remain silent. Schools should be a relatively safe environment for students to learn, and should not be a (source of such a) traumatic experience.”

The trial continues on Tuesday.

If convicted, the accused faces up to five years’ jail, and caning or a fine for each charge.