Mother starves 5-year-old son to death until he weighs just 9.7kg, judge calls abuse ‘cold-blooded annihilation’
A Hong Kong mother who abused and starved her five-year-old son to death has been sentenced to 22 years’ jail, with a judge describing her actions as “cold-blooded annihilation carried out with the patience of a torturer”.
According to South China Morning Post (SCMP), the 37-year-old woman pleaded guilty to one count of manslaughter and one count of cruelty to a child.
An autopsy found that the boy weighed just 9.7kg at the time of his death in September 2022 — less than half the average weight for a child his age.
He was about 1m tall and weighed more than 4kg less than when he was two years old, reported RTHK.
Autopsy revealed prolonged starvation and 129 injuries
According to RTHK, the autopsy found that all of the boy’s organs and muscles had atrophied, indicating he had suffered prolonged starvation.
No food residue was found in his stomach, suggesting he had been starved for at least several days before he died, SCMP reported.
The court also heard that the boy had 129 injuries across his body, including bruises and marks consistent with prolonged abuse.
The injuries suggested he had been repeatedly caned, while the autopsy also indicated he had been subjected to force-feeding, gagging, gripping and violent rubbing, according to SCMP.
The High Court heard that the boy had been isolated in his room and allowed out only a few times each week. His mother also lied to teachers to conceal his frequent absences from nursery school.
SCMP reported that the mother called a friend in the early hours of Sept 3, 2022, claiming she had beaten her son to death.
She later called police, saying she had found the boy dead in bed. Officers arrived to find him unconscious, with a darkened face and his eyes and mouth slightly open.
Judge: ‘I cannot envisage anything worse’
In sentencing, High Court judge Susana D’Almada Remedios described the case as “horrid, devastating, heart-breaking and tragic”.
She said the mother had not acted in a moment of anger but had deliberately starved her son over a prolonged period.
“The commission of these cruel and calculated acts of cruelty and neglect exposes a savage nature utterly devoid of the empathy inherent to motherhood,” she said in SCMP’s report.
She also described the abuse as a “protracted, cold-blooded annihilation carried out with the patience of a torturer”, according to Hong Kong Free Press.
The judge added that she “could not envisage anything worse than the present case”.
Questions raised over social worker visits
The judge also questioned why social workers who had visited the family failed to notice the child’s condition.
Social workers had reportedly made repeated home visits, with the last taking place about three months before the boy’s death.
“It is incomprehensible that when the social workers saw [the boy] they were unable to observe a skinny and stunted child,” the judge said, according to SCMP.
She added that his life might have been saved had someone recognised the obvious signs of malnutrition.
The Hong Kong Free Press reported that the family had been known to social services for years, with the boy and his siblings previously placed in foster care because the mother was deemed unable to care for them.
Mother had history of drug abuse
According to SCMP, the boy was placed in foster care shortly after birth because of his mother’s drug abuse.
He also suffered withdrawal symptoms after birth because she had taken drugs during pregnancy.
The court heard that the child was returned to her care in 2020.
During sentencing, the judge rejected the defence’s argument that the mother’s limited education contributed to the offences.
According to HKFP, the judge noted that she had been capable of caring for her other children and that a friend had told police the woman “did not like” the five-year-old.
Ahead of sentencing, the woman wrote a mitigation letter expressing remorse, saying she could not forgive herself for what had happened.
She said she had neglected her son and failed to seek medical treatment for him because she was frequently arguing with her boyfriend, who is the boy’s father.
22-year jail sentence
The mother was sentenced to 20 years’ imprisonment for manslaughter and six years and four months for cruelty to a child.
According to RTHK, two years of the child cruelty sentence will run consecutively, bringing her total jail term to 22 years.
Her three surviving children have since been placed in foster care.
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