<\/p>\nlifted a two-year-old girl by her shoulders and placed her on the floor<\/p>\n
<\/a>. <\/p>\n
After that, Wu Jiaying, now 32, lifted the child by her shoulders again and placed her on a chair. <\/p>\n
A CCTV camera also captured Wu grabbing the victim\u2019s right shoulder and dragging the child to face her. <\/p>\n
Deputy Public Prosecutor Jheong Siew Yin said: \u201cThe accused continued with her work for a brief period before turning her attention to the victim again. <\/p>\n
\u201cShe used her left finger to repeatedly point at the victim\u2019s forehead. The accused then grabbed the victim\u2019s left shoulder.\u201d<\/p>\n
The offence came to light when the victim\u2019s mother spotted a scratch on her daughter\u2019s face. Wu\u2019s employment was terminated on May 12, 2022.<\/p>\n
On Dec 18, the former pre-school teacher was sentenced to 10 months\u2019 jail.<\/p>\n
Deputy Principal District Judge Ong Chin Rhu had earlier convicted her of ill-treating the child after a trial.<\/p>\n
There is a\u00a0gag order\u00a0on the victim\u2019s identity\u00a0and the\u00a0location of the incident.<\/p>\n
DPP Matthew Choo told the court that Wu, who was employed as a Chinese language teacher at the time of the offence, was scheduled to teach the victim\u2019s class on May 11, 2022.<\/p>\n
She later ill-treated the child from 10.17am to 11.22am.<\/p>\n
The victim left the school that afternoon, and her mother later told the centre\u2019s principal about the scratch on her daughter\u2019s face.<\/p>\n
The principal said that she would look into the matter and viewed the CCTV footage the next day.<\/p>\n
Wu\u2019s employment was terminated later that day.<\/p>\n
In submissions, DPP Jheong told the court that based on the CCTV footage and Wu\u2019s own evidence, it was apparent that she had wilfully carried out the acts.<\/p>\n
The prosecutor added: \u201cShe had also provided detailed explanations of her thought process behind each of the… acts, which points to the fact that she had performed the said acts consciously and deliberately.\u201d<\/p>\n
In her defence, Wu, who was not represented by a lawyer, said that she was suffering from major depressive disorder (MDD) at the time of the offence.<\/p>\n
DPP Jheong said Wu had not provided any objective evidence to support her assertion apart from a \u201cpsychological report\u201d by a doctor dated Dec 19, 2024.<\/p>\n
The prosecutor told the court that the report was \u201cfatally deficient and did not meet the standards expected of an expert witness\u201d.<\/p>\n
Among other things, the DPP told Judge Ong that the doctor\u2019s report was vague. <\/p>\n
\u201c(The doctor\u2019s) report appears to be based solely off of self-reported information provided by the accused and the accused\u2019s friends and families,\u201d DPP Jheong added.<\/p>\n
\u201c(The doctor) would not have been able to accurately or reliably assess whether the accused suffered from MDD at the material time of the offences.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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