Trust is one of the cornerstones of a good and healthy relationship.
How can you spend most of your life with someone if you have no faith in them?
But this trust can also be used to betray you. Sadly, the ones we love are sometimes the people who end up hurting us the most.
Man Jailed 6 Years for Killing His Daughter After Trying to Kill Himself
A 36-year-old father with severe mental illness smothered his two-year-old daughter with a pillow after trying to kill himself.
The Singaporean man did so because he feared his daughter would be taken away from a man he suspected to be his wife’s new boyfriend.
The man was sentenced to six years’ jail after pleading guilty to a reduced charge of culpable homicide not amounting to murder, reported TODAY.
How It Started
It all started with the erosion of the man’s marriage.
In 2018, three years after getting married, the man’s wife initiated divorce proceedings which were finalised in October that year.
His wife and their two-year-old daughter moved out of the house in January last year, but the daughter would stay with him in his flat every alternate weekend.
Then, on the Father’s day weekend last year, a seemingly innocuous event eventually drove the man to take his own life and that of his daughter.
Both parents had taken their child to a preschool parents’ conference, and when the mother was about to leave, the young girl started crying because she wanted to be with her.
Her mother consoled her and the daughter felt better before they left school.
Outside, the father saw a man with a Mercedes car who he believed to be his wife’s new boyfriend, as he had seen the car on her Instagram.
Girl Was in “Good Spirits” on Day of Death
The day after, the father and daughter attended a Father’s Day event at Kallang Wave Mall and had lunch at his flat.
They later attended Mass at a nearby church before returning home at about 7.40pm. CCTV footage captured the girl “in good spirits”, according to Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP) Gabriel Choong.
Then, tragedy struck.
As the man watched his daughter at home, he began wondering why his wife had found a new boyfriend before their divorce had been finalised.
He worried about losing his daughter to the new man and questioned why he couldn’t have more privileges and access to his child.
So, he did the unthinkable.
While the girl was sleeping, the man took two knives from the kitchen, sat next to his daughter, and slashed his neck.
His suicide attempt was unsuccessful, however, so he decided to kill his daughter.
Why?
Because he wanted to take her with him in death and did not want to lose her, DPP Choong said.
According to TODAY, the 36-year-old pressed his hands on the young girl’s face, and when she woke up struggling, he took a pillow and smothered her face “with full force”.
When the girl stopped moving, he stabbed his own neck two more times and fell unconscious.
A Horrific Discovery
As part of their arrangement, the man was supposed to return their daughter to his wife at 9pm, but he never showed.
Concerned, the woman went over to the man’s flat and found that the locks to their flat had been changed.
She suspected that the man had gone out and left the girl alone in the flat, so she called the police.
When police officers managed to get through with the help of a locksmith, they made a horrific discovery.
The girl was lying motionless on the bed and the man was lying on the floor in a pool of blood with cuts on his neck.
They were both taken to Sengkang General Hospital, where the girl was pronounced dead. The man was later taken to Tan Tock Seng Hospital.
Suffered From Major Depressive Disorder
You’re probably wondering why the man received a prison sentence of only six years after killing his daughter.
The 36-year-old was initially charged with murder, but this charge was reduced to culpable homicide not amounting to murder.
He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to six years in prison.
A psychiatrist from the Institute of Mental Health who had examined the man concluded that he was suffering from a major depressive disorder at the time of the incident.
The psychiatrist said that this contributed to his use of violence and aggression and significantly impaired his mental responsibility for his actions.
The man also suffered from a delusional disorder, which explained why he suspected his wife of cheating with very little evidence of it.
Had “Tender and Loving Relationship” with his Daughter
The man’s defence lawyer said he had a “tender and loving relationship” with the girl, who was the “light and purpose of his life”.
The lawyer also maintained that the killing was not premeditated.
“The killing was not premeditated in any way whatsoever. It was only when he stabbed himself in the neck that he decided to kill (the girl) in hopes of reuniting with her in the afterlife”.
The judge who passed his sentence through video-conferencing site Zoom called it a “tragic case”, where a “very young and totally defenceless daughter” had been killed by her father.
The judge took his psychiatric condition into account when passing his sentence.
“The mind of the accused will be imprisoned for the rest of his life with the knowledge that he was responsible for the death of his daughter,” the judge said.
Stories like this remind us that we should always treasure the ones we love because they can be taken away from us at any moment.
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