Mother jailed for attack on crying baby

/ Yonhap

By Kang Aa-young, Park Si-soo

A mother in her 20s has been jailed for assaulting her crying baby, which left the one-month-old girl with permanent disabilities.

Daegu District Court said Sunday the woman had been jailed for three years and ordered to attend a 40-hour child abuse treatment program for violating the Child Welfare Law.

According to court documents, the woman slapped her daughter on the calf once and shook her baby up and down several times with her arms back and face down after the victim started crying at 3 a.m. of Aug. 8, 2016. During the attack, the baby fell to the floor, fracturing her skull and leaving her with permanent disabilities in language, cognition and mobility.

“It’s a very bad crime,” Judge Chung Jae-soo wrote in the ruling statement. “The accused ignored her responsibility to look after and protect the baby.”

The judge said he had taken into account that the mother was remorseful and that she had a history of chronic depression.