A woman was handed a two-year suspended jail sentence and five years probation by a district court on Wednesday for forcing her physically challenged mother to remain in a bathtub full of hot water for five hours, leading to her death.

Taipei District Court handed down a two-year suspended sentence to the woman surnamed Pan (?) and five years probation, after the judges determined that Pan’s actions caused injuries to her mother that resulted in her death, according to court document.

Pan’s mother, who was in her 70s, had trouble getting about after suffering a stroke. She was found dead on the bathroom floor by emergency services at her home in Taipei on June 9 last year, according to a police statement.

The autopsy found that the mother remained in the bathtub in water that was originally about 40 degree Celsius, for at least five hours, resulting in 2nd-degree burns over a large area of her body, which contributed to her death of cardiogenic shock.

The incident was reported to the police by Pan, who at the time claimed she had checked in with her mother when the latter was taking a bath at around noon and seeing her change positions believed she was fine, according to the police.

Pan said she was shocked to find her mother’s lifeless body at 6 p.m and pulled her out of the bathtub, according to the police.

However, prosecutors later found a large number of notes Pan had written to her mother complaining about her behavior. Confronted with this evidence, Pan admitted to forcing her mother to stay in the bathtub for five hours following an altercation but denied she meant to hurt her.

Pan’s mother was unable to get out of the bathtub partly because she was scared of her daughter and partly because she had difficulty walking and had lost the ability to determine the temperature of hot water after her stroke, according to the prosecutor’s indictment.

Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel