Maid who lied that employer's husband raped her jailed 2 weeks
SINGAPORE — A maid who wanted to return to Indonesia but was not allowed to do so by her employer lied to the police that she had been raped by the employer’s husband, a court heard.
She was actually having an extra-marital affair with the man and they had consensual sex twice.
At the State Courts on Wednesday (15 May), the maid Sumaini, who goes by one name, was jailed for 14 days.
The 29-year-old pleaded guilty to one charge of giving false information to a public servant.
Incriminating text messages
On 7 February, Sumaini’s employer called the police to say that the maid had been sexually abused.
Sumaini was interviewed at the Police Cantonment Complex by an officer from the Criminal Investigation Department’s Serious Sexual Crime Branch at about 6pm the same day.
She told the officer that she had been raped by her employer’s husband on 15 January.
The information was recorded in an investigation statement. During the recording of the statement, Sumaini was reminded via a Bahasa Indonesia interpreter that it was a crime to lie to a public servant.
After the statement was recorded, it was read back to Sumaini with the help of the interpreter and she affirmed that the information was true and accurate.
Meanwhile, at the same time that the maid was giving her statement to the police, her employer’s husband was arrested by a team of five policemen and brought to the lock-up at 6.45pm.
After the police investigator had recorded Sumaini’s statement, he checked her mobile phone and found incriminating messages on the Facebook Messenger app between her and the employer’s husband.
Among other things, Sumaini said she missed him. The messages suggested that they were in a relationship.
Sumaini was confronted with the messages and she admitted at about 10pm that she had lied about being raped.
Her employer’s husband was released from the lock-up at around 11pm.
The maximum punishment for giving false information to a public servant is up to one year in jail, along with a fine of up to $5,000.
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