Singapore – A woman injected her son with insulin as the first step in her plan to kill her whole family. She wanted to kill them because no one had protected her when she was molested and raped by her brother as a young girl.
The 29-year-old woman, who is also the mother of two daughters, planned to set the whole family on fire and then commit suicide.
But she wanted to give her son, whom she loved the most, a peaceful death.
Insulin injections would be the most painless way to end his life, she decided after online research from which she learnt high insulin doses could cause blood sugar to crash, resulting in brain damage, coma or death.
She bought insulin pens from Malaysia and learnt how to inject insulin from a YouTube video.
Between January and July 2019, she administered 20 to 30 units of insulin to her six-year-old son on 13 occasions.
She was sentenced to five years’ jail on Wednesday (May 5) for causing hurt to the victim by administering poison, reported Today Online
Her son suffered severe headaches, nausea, double vision, tinnitus, photosensitivity and numbness in the fingers as a result of the insulin injections.
The boy was hospitalised with low blood sugar levels three times and once with hypoglycemic seizure.
The medical staff was able to save him with intravenous drips and expressed great concern over his symptoms.
On July 16, 2019, the boy revealed what his mother had done after a therapist spoke to him.
The hospital reported the case to the police after approaching the mother and getting her to admit her misdeed.
The police arrested the woman and held her in remand in July 2019.
A psychiatric report said that the woman had a depressive disorder of moderate severity and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
It also said she did not feel she had received adequate support from her mother when she was sexually abused as a young girl.
The brother who molested and raped her was 13 years old when his offences came to light. He was sentenced to two years in a boy’s home.
She was deeply scarred by the abuse. Such was her trauma that she was reminded of her brother’s face when she saw her son.
The woman told the court that she felt unhappy when she saw her brother get married and later when she learnt he was about to become a father. That led to her decision to kill the whole family in September 2019.
She claimed her father had also raped her in her childhood. But the prosecutor said this was not proved in investigations. Her father died in 2017.
Deputy Public Prosecutor Bhajanvir Singh wanted her jailed for six years as he believed she needed three to four years’ treatment for rehabilitation.
However, defence lawyer Ng Pei Qi said four years’ jail would be more appropriate. She said her client had been molested and raped as a young girl.
“Her trauma is so deep-rooted that she sees the face of her attacker in her son,” she said, reported Channel News Asia.
However, the prosecutor pointed out that this woman was not a reliable mother for her children
While in remand, the accused continued lying to her cellmates, friends and prison counsellor that her son was the result of her brother’s rape as she felt she would “enjoy more sympathy” this way, he said.
After deliberations, the judge concluded that the woman’s conduct was “clearly reprehensible”, but she also had mental disorders that substantially impaired her mental responsibility for the acts.
Phuong Le Ha is an intern at The Independent SG/TISG