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The father of a man jailed for assaulting his mother over a three-year period has said he was not aware of the abuse that occurred.
Responding to Lianhe Wanbao’s inquiries last Tuesday (March 23) evening, the 69-year-old said that he had not noticed anything strange over the years.
His son, Andy Koh Ju Hua, 30, was sentenced last week to 56 weeks in jail. He had pleaded guilty to four counts of willfully harming his 68-year-old mother.
His acts of cruelty included hitting the housewife in the face, hitting her head with a remote control, and kneeling her in the groin. On another occasion in 2018, he balanced a metal lock on his mother’s genital area multiple times.
An only child, Koh stayed with his family in a 4-bedroom HDB apartment in Punggol. His father told reporters that he worked as a dishwasher and would leave the house at 10 in the morning and return in the afternoon at 6 in the afternoon.
He claimed that the interactions between him and his son were normal and said Koh had never raised his voice to them. In hindsight, he added that the abuse could have occurred when he was not at home.
The old man stated that his wife had moved out of the house last June after a personal protection order was filed, but claimed that he did not know the details.
“I just knew that the reason she moved had to do with the personal protection order, and we lost contact after she moved,” the old man said.
He added that he was surprised to learn that his son had been charged and sentenced to prison.
“Family members asked me to read the newspapers, saying ‘your son is in the news.’
“I only found out what happened after reading the report.”
Sharing that the details were “disturbing,” the old man added: “If I had known, I would have stopped him.”
Last week, the court heard that Koh’s abuse of his mother began in 2017. The abuse was not only physical, but also emotional and mental.
[[nid:522085]]Koh controlled her mother’s movements and restricted her food intake. He also forbade her to drink other liquids besides running water. He was not allowed to shower and could only wear old and torn clothes.
On one occasion, Koh ordered her to stand by a sink and put an ice pack on her face for 12 hours after hitting her.
And in December 2018, after being hit with a metal padlock at the hands of Koh, the woman called her brother for help. They took her to the hospital, where doctors found her with a nasal bone fracture and bruising in the pubic region.
Although the police were called, the woman claimed that she had fallen into the toilet.
When the woman returned to seek help at a relative’s home in June last year, they found her in a fragile and dirty condition. After a police report was made, she finally told doctors that her son had beaten her.
