A 40-year-old Filipina domestic worker was given a suspended sentence in the Kwun Tong Magistrates’ Court on Monday for abusing a two-year-old boy at her employer’s home in Kowloon.
Erlinda Benavidez Organista was sentenced to jail for two weeks on one count of “assault by a person in charge of child,” but magistrate Leung Ka-kie suspended this for one year as the defendant was remorseful and had confessed to the crime, Sing Pao reported.
The court heard that Organista, who had been working for the family since February last year, said she had been in a bad mood after having a quarrel with her husband in the Philippines over their marriage and she did not get enough sleep due to her workload.
The boy had reportedly refused to eat when the defendant tried to feed him in an apartment of the residential complex One Kai Tai in Kowloon on December 21. She lost her temper and slapped the boy’s face eight times, pulled his legs 20 times and pinched his neck and ears.
The abuse came to light as the boy’s father, who was resting in the bedroom, heard his son crying. The father turned on the surveillance camera and discovered the abuse. He immediately called the police and the maid was arrested. The boy was sent to a hospital for treatment and was later discharged.
The magistrate noted that the child was defenseless against the defendant and her marital problem was no excuse.
Since she immediately admitted to the crime and had been remanded for two weeks and was “deeply remorseful,” the judge sentenced her to two weeks in jail but suspended it for one year.
Read: Filipino pleads guilty to child abuse in Hong Kong court