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Man with history of domestic abuse jailed 4 months for hitting wife, violating protection order

SINGAPORE — He had previously spent time behind bars for physically abusing his ex-wife and threatening his ex-girlfriend. But Mohamed Isa Mohamed Yatim, 63, went back to his old ways in 2016, when he slapped his wife a few times and threatened to hit her with a chair.

SINGAPORE — He had previously spent time behind bars for physically abusing his ex-wife and threatening his ex-girlfriend.

But Mohamed Isa Mohamed Yatim, 63, went back to his old ways in 2016, when he slapped his wife a few times and threatened to hit her with a chair.

On Friday (Sept 7), he was sentenced to four months’ jail after he was found guilty of two charges of voluntarily causing hurt to Mdm Nor Biah Ismail, 61, and contravening an expedited order.

Three other charges of allegedly hitting his daughter-in law on her head with a baseball bat, verbally threatening her, and punching his son several times in the face were stood down.

Isa is appealing against his conviction and sentence, and currently out on S$15,000 bail.

In 1998, he was sentenced to six weeks’ jail for wrongfully restraining his ex-wife by placing his arm around her neck to prevent her from leaving.

He was then jailed a further three months in 2000 for pulling his ex-wife by her hair and grabbing her arm. In 2005, he also threatened to splash acid on his ex-girlfriend’s face.

During the trial, Mdm Biah testified that the couple was married for 32 years before the incident on Sept 24, 2016.

However, their marriage deteriorated over the years as Isa “kept changing women… had other women”. After a wedding ceremony the previous month, when Isa wanted to send Mdm Biah and his second wife home together, things got worse.

They argued frequently, and Isa would commit acts of mischief such as sprinkling salt at the entrance of their flat. He also broke a photo frame which contained their wedding picture.

While Isa admitted during the trial that he broke the frame to give Mdm Biah “a taste of her own medicine”, he claimed that he sprinkled the salt to defend himself against black magic.

Mdm Biah then applied for an expedited order. Even though he had not physically harmed her yet, she said she had seen him sent to jail for hitting his previous wives and was afraid she would “get it badly from him”.

An expedited order is a temporary form of a personal protection order, which is granted if a judge finds that there is imminent danger of family violence being committed against the applicant.

The court order was pasted on the door of their flat on the evening of the incident.

When Isa returned home and saw it, he confronted Mdm Biah. He admitted during the trial that he was angry and embarrassed when he saw it, and spoke to her in a rough tone.

Mdm Biah told him she wanted a divorce, after which he pulled her into their room, took out a Quran and made her swear her fidelity to him.

He then slapped her two or three times on the left side of her face and called her “bodoh” (Malay for stupid). He also held onto a chair and threatened to hit her head with it.

Mdm Biah started to have a headache and told her daughter over the phone what happened. When the police arrived, she was taken to the hospital.

The physical abuse caused her to experience spasms in her left eye. She has since moved out of the family home after the incident. The couple’s divorce was finalised in February.

During the trial, Isa claimed that Mdm Biah had slapped herself and falsely alleged that he assaulted her in order to obtain a divorce from him at the Syariah Court, and to “make (his) life difficult”.

Deputy Public Prosecutor Goh Yi Ling said: “Bearing in mind the victim’s elderly age and frailty of health, it is incredulous that she would risk her own physical well-being so that she could make this false allegation against the accused.”

For contravening the expedited order, Isa could have been jailed up to six months and/or fined up to S$2,000.

For voluntarily causing hurt to Mdm Biah, he could have been jailed up to two years and/or fined up to S$5,000.

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