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Ex-Cop Sent to Jail for Forcing His Autistic Son to Masturbate With Him

The man, who was sentenced to four years in prison, also installed a camera in his room and forced his son to watch him having sex with his wife.
hong kong child abuse
A CORRECTIONAL SERVICES DEPARTMENT VEHICLE ARRIVEs AT THE HIGH COURT OF HONG KONG. A court heard that the man started showing porn to his son on a weekly basis from the age of about 10. PHOTO: ISAAC LAWRENCE/AFP

A Hong Kong court sentenced a former policeman to four years in jail on Thursday for repeatedly exposing himself to his underage son, forcing him to watch porn and masturbate together. A jury had found the man guilty of gross indecency towards a child under the age of 16 last month.

“The defendant has parental responsibility for his son, but he failed to set an example and establish positive values, and instead, indulged himself in sex and porn,” High Court judge Alex Lee Wan-tang said in the ruling. By abetting his son to masturbate, the defendant corrupted the child’s mind and distorted his attitude towards sex, he added.

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The boy, now 15, was between 10 and 12 years old when the abuse occurred. The judge said the man’s occupation as a police officer at the time was an aggravating factor, as his “shocking and shameless” acts damaged the public's confidence in the police force. 

The 48-year-old defendant, identified as F.S.L. in court, was a police officer from 1998 until his dismissal in 2019. He was said to have verbally taught his son how to masturbate since he was in first grade, the court heard during the trial. When his son was about ten years old in fifth grade, he started showing porn to his son on a weekly basis. 

He also began exposing himself and masturbating in front of his son, and inviting him to join. According to the son’s testimony, it became a “daily activity.” On one occasion, his father threatened to beat him with a rattan rod when he refused to comply. On another occasion, when he declined as his mother was sleeping in her room in the same flat, his father threatened him with a knife from the kitchen and forced him to masturbate. 

Another time, F.S.L. allegedly told his son he would show him a “real demonstration.” He installed a camera in his own room and livestreamed himself having sex with his wife, the child’s mother. He also set an alarm on his son’s phone and ordered him to watch the livestream from his phone. In the testimony, the son said he found it disgusting, adding that the next morning his father asked if his performance was “manly.”

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The son was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder and adjustment disorder in February of 2019. His social worker filed a report to the police, which led to F.S.L.’s arrest the next year.

F.S.L. had pleaded not guilty to all charges and denied all allegations in his witness statement to the police. “I love my son more than I love myself,” he said in a video-recorded statement that was played in court. 

In September, after nine hours of deliberation, the jury voted 7-2 to convict him on two counts of indecent conduct towards a child under 16 and two counts of inciting a child under 16 to commit an act of gross indecency. He is also charged with 35 counts of dishonesty in a separate trial that will continue in November, and he is expected to plead guilty to most of them.

He was cleared of two other counts of indecent conduct, one count of inciting a child to commit grossly indecent act and one count of child cruelty.

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