GEORGE TOWN: Suspecting that his 10-year-old son had taken RM5 from his wallet, an enraged father assaulted the boy with a steel shoe rack.
The boy’s mother has since lodged a police report over the incident and claimed that she could no longer accept her husband’s abusive behaviour.
Police said the man, a 36-year-old factory bus driver, had apparently hit the boy on his left arm after realising the money was missing from his wallet.
“Officers who went to visit the woman and the victim in the flat found the boy with bruises on his left forearm.
“The boy also told officers that he had asked his father’s permission before taking the RM5.
“However, his father did not listen to his pleas and proceeded to hit him with the metal rack twice,” an investigator told FMT.
The boy’s mother, a 44-year-old Indonesian woman, told police officers that she and her two children had been abused by the man before and had given him many chances to repent.
The couple had been married for 16 years.
Police said the man had not returned home after the incident and they were looking for him.
The man had spent a year in jail for a drug-related offence.
When contacted, Penang police chief Commissioner A Thaiveegan said the case was still being investigated.
“We will track and arrest him soon. We don’t want to see more serious harm inflicted on the mother and her children,” he said.