Photos: 14-year-old girl brutally beaten up by her drunkard father

A 14-year-old girl was brutally beaten by her father on suspicion she was involved in a school fight, the Bac Giang Province Police, Vietnam says. The victim, identified only as T, is being treated at the Tan Yen District General Hospital with multiple injuries as a result of the beating she got from her father Nguyen Van Duong, 36, a construction worker, on Friday, December 11.

"I and my friends witnessed a fight. A friend used her cellphone to record the scene and later asked me to continue recording with her phone," she told Thanh Nien reporter from her hospital bed while keeping a fearful eye on the door for her father. "He thought I was involved in the fight. He asked me to take my pants off and lie face down on the bed and used three broom handles and two bamboo sticks to hit me."

She said her father had closed the door and ordered her not to cry. "I tried to ward off the beating with my hands and my fingers were broken. He left me alone and went to work after that."

T was rushed to the hospital by a concerned neighbour. Doctors said the victim had severe injuries in her back, buttocks and thighs and broken fingers. T’s grandmother Nguyen Thi Vuong, who lives in a nearby district, is taking care of her in the hospital.
"Looking at the injuries, I could not believe they were caused by her father… I have repeatedly asked Duong to allow her to stay with me but he refuses," Vuong said.

A neighbor, who asked to be unnamed, said T gets beaten very often by her father. "He even tried to suffocate her once. Normally he is gentle, but always becomes aggressive whenever he is drunk," she said.

Duong Van Hanh, a local official, said Duong’s wife Nguyen Thi Hoan divorced him eight years ago after he repeatedly beat her. She is now working in Malaysia. Duong later married a 21-year-old woman and they had a child. But she too walked out on him with their four-year-old child whom Duong also beat, according to the neighbor. Hanh said commune authorities would fine Duong and order him to not to beat his daughter again. "We will also consider Duong’s rights to raise the girl and may let her stay with her grandmother"