Ex-SAF regular jailed 24 years for raping daughter since she was 12 after he 'sexually groomed' her

SINGAPORE — When his daughter was in Primary 3, he would pat her to sleep in her bedroom. But what began as an act of calming his daughter, who was afraid of the dark, gradually took a sexual turn.

Over time, he started patting her buttocks, then her inner thighs. In 2016, when she was about 12, he molested and raped her.

For about one-and-a-half years after that, he continued to rape her at least once a month until his offences finally came to light when his then-wife walked in on them.

The father, now 41, was sentenced to 24 years’ jail and 24 strokes of the cane on Monday (April 4) in the High Court after he pleaded guilty to two charges of statutory rape and one of aggravated statutory rape.

Five other related charges that he committed against his daughter were taken into consideration during sentencing for other sexual offences.

Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP) Christopher Ong described the man’s acts as a “persistent and sustained sexual grooming” that robbed his daughter of her innocence. 

“Her protector turned out to be her predator,” DPP Ong told the court.

The father cannot be named due to a court order to protect the identity of his daughter, now aged 18.

Court documents stated that the man was a regular in the Singapore Armed Forces when he committed the offences.

OFFENCES BEGAN AT HIS IN-LAW’S

DPP Ong said that the man first started to molest his daughter between 2014 and 2015, when she was around 10, while the family was living with his in-laws.

In December 2016 while his daughter — the elder of two girls — was lying on a mattress at his in-law’s home, the man reached over and started to touch her. He then raped her for the first time.

His daughter felt pain but did not struggle or resist as she was scared of him, DPP Ong said.

She did not consent to the act and the man apologised to her before they both went to sleep.

Over the months or so afterwards, his daughter started to enjoy the sensation of having sex with her father. 

Sometime in early 2017 while they were having sex at his parent’s home, the man felt as though the condom he was wearing had broken.

Fearing she would get pregnant, he picked her up after school the next day and made her swallow a “morning-after” emergency birth control pill.

They continued to have sex until one day in June 2018, when his wife walked in on the girl performing a sex act on her father in the family flat. 

After chasing her husband out, she tried to ask the girl what was going on. But her daughter, who was 14 at the time, covered herself with her blanket and cried, unable to speak.

The mother later learned that the man and the girl had had sex on previous occasions, but she did not report the case to the police out of concern for her two daughters. 

DPP Ong said: “In particular, she was worried that (her older daughter) might commit suicide as she was very close to (her father), and had threatened to kill herself if her mother lodged a police report.”

The next year, in July 2019, the older daughter herself decided to report the offences when she felt unhappy with her father for interfering with her personal life.

'OTHER BOYS' MIGHT 'TRASH HER'

During the course of investigations, the father said that he committed the acts against his daughter because he had grown very affectionate towards her and did not want her to have sex with “other boys” who might “trash her”.

A psychiatrist at the Institute of Mental Health found that he had no mental disorder and did not suffer from any abnormal sexual behaviour or impulses.

A doctor at the institute’s child guidance clinic found that his daughter suffered from insomnia, panic attacks, nightmares and recurrent thoughts of her father’s sexual abuse. 

She would frequently be reminded of him and had difficulty concentrating in class. She had suicidal thoughts and had been cutting herself to relieve her distress. 

After she disclosed this to the doctor, she received social service intervention from the Ministry of Social and Family Development. She was temporarily removed from the family flat and taken to a Christian residential refuge for teenage girls. 

During her stay there, a clinical psychologist from the ministry found that she had symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder and that her exposure to sexual grooming and abuse at a young age caused her confusion about normal, healthy sexual boundaries that led to her sexualised behaviour.

In an impact statement dated January 2022, the girl described herself as an “emotional wreck” and said that she is still afraid to hear keys jingling, or the opening and shutting of the main door, because they reminded her of her father returning home.

She said that she felt like she was the cause of the breakup of her family and fears she will never find someone to love because of her “misguided understanding” of sex.

'ABHORRENT, PERVERSE BREACH OF TRUST'

The man’s lawyers Cory Wong and Josephus Tan from Invictus Law Firm asked for 18 to 20 years’ jail and the same number of strokes of the cane as that imposed. 

Mr Wong on Monday told the courtroom — which was packed with the man’s family members, colleagues and friends — that the man is truly remorseful and admits that he has failed as a father, a husband and as a son.

The man accepts all fault solely as his own, Mr Wong said of his client. “He wishes to disavow anything previously said that remotely suggests pushing the blame to everyone, including the victim.”

Mr Wong added that his client had made clear his intention to plead guilty at a very early stage, even before the charges against him had been formulated.

Justice Ang Cheng Hock accepted the prosecution’s proposed sentence and said: “The acts of the (father) are an utter abhorrent, perverse breach of the trust between a father and daughter.”

He noted that the man's act of systematically and gradually escalating his sexual abuse against her over time had amounted to "sexual grooming", which had caused her severe psychological and emotional harm.

The judge said that while he has taken into account the man’s remorse and early plea of guilt, the courts have to send a strong message that such actions cannot be condoned and must be punished accordingly.

For each count statutory rape, the man could have been jailed up to 20 years and be liable to a fine or caning.

For aggravated statutory rape, he could have been punished with between eight and 20 years’ jail and with at least 12 strokes of the cane.