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March 19, 2019

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Singapore couple jailed for maid abuse

Source: AFP | 00:05 UTC+8 March 19, 2019 | Print Edition

A SINGAPOREAN couple was yesterday jailed for abusing a Myanmar maid after the pair force-fed her with a funnel, made her eat her own vomit and threatened to kill her family if she reported the maltreatment.

In a case described by Singapore prosecutors as “arguably one of the worst of its kind” in the city-state, the married couple — both of whom were sentenced two years ago over the abuse of another maid — beat and kicked their helper and made her clean the house in her underwear.

Moe Moe Than, 32, was also given little food, limited use of the toilet and faced threats that her parents in Myanmar would be killed if she reported the abuse, court papers showed.

District Judge Olivia Low yesterday sentenced the woman, Chia Yun Ling, to 47 months in prison and ordered her to pay a fine. Her husband, Tay Wee Kiat, a former information technology manager, was jailed for 24 months.

They were also ordered to pay compensation to the maid.

The sentence, however, drew angry reactions online, with readers demanding a harsher punishment.

“Pathetic sentences. Should each be doing 10 years and have their kids taken off them,” reader Rich Mackereth wrote on the Facebook page of state broadcaster Channel NewsAsia.

“Such deplorable human beings!! They need also to be whipped and caned,” wrote reader Andrew Siah with the symbol of an angry emoji.

The couple’s mistreatment of Than during her employment of nearly a year in 2012 was detailed in more than 20 charges.

The same couple was in March 2017 sentenced to jail terms for abusing their Indonesian maid — the husband for two years and four months and the wife for two months. The two have yet to serve those sentences.

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