Mum jailed for failing to get aid for dropped baby

A nightclub waitress who had married twice on the mainland and had seven children to four boyfriends was sentenced to 20 months in jail yesterday for not seeking medical treatment for her baby girl after dropping her on an escalator.

In sentencing Cheung Ka-lai, Deputy Judge Sham Siu-man condemned her act as 'extremely selfish and, by letting her daughter suffer further pain, was very cruel'.

The three-month-old baby suffered a fractured skull, broken arm and injured foot when Cheung dropped her in Chong Hing Square, Mong Kok, in February this year, prosecutor Andrew Cheng told the District Court earlier. Cheung cleaned the child's wounds, but did not take the infant to a doctor. Finally, a month later, it was Cheung's mother who took her to Queen Elizabeth Hospital on March 13, after noticing marks on her forehead. She reported the case to a social worker.

Further, the judge rejected Cheung's claim, in mitigation, that the incident was accidental. Cheung's lawyer, Priscilia Lam Tsz-ying, had argued that she accidentally dropped the baby while carrying her with one hand while holding things with her other hand.

Cheung said she did not take the baby to see a doctor immediately as she thought the injuries were superficial. In a police video interview, she said she feared she would be accused of abusing her daughter if she took her for immediate treatment.

But the judge rejected that argument, noting that Cheung, after accompanying her mother and daughter to the hospital in March, left soon after they arrived. She left the hospital because she must have known her daughter's injuries were not minor, and she feared the doctors would inquire about what caused them, he said.