Kota Kinabalu: A child who witnesses an adult’s indecent act and begins imitating it falls under sexual offence law rather than mental abuse, according to senior police officer, DSP Roziah Abdul Rashid.
“This is considered sexual assault and falls under the Sexual Offences Against Children Act,” said Roziah, who is attached to the Sabah State Police Contingent Headquarters’ (IPK Sabah) Sexual, Women and Child Investigation Division (D11).
“In such circumstances, the police report remains the same. A report can still be lodged. From there we will investigate to determine the appropriate section based on the act committed by the child and where the child learned the behaviour from, so we can identify the suspect in the case,” she said.
Roziah was responding to a query from a representative of the Human Rights Commission of Malaysia (Suhakam) during a panel discussion at the recent inaugural Child Safeguarding Conference held at the Sabah International Convention Centre.
The case raised involved a child allegedly exposed to an indecent act by her own mother and who subsequently began mimicking the behaviour.
Roziah said such children could be referred to the Welfare Department for psychological recovery once a hospital evaluation determined the harm involved emotional or behavioural effects rather than physical injury.
“When we refer to the hospital, the hospital will assess. If the injury is not physical but involves the child’s emotions or something outside normal behaviour, the hospital will refer the case to the welfare unit to take over. At the same time, the police also have our own unit to assess through our interview process with the child,” she said.
On the availability of specialised support, Roziah said full D11 units with dedicated psychology officers exist only at the IPK Sabah, in addition to the three Child
Interview Centres to serve the entire State.
“For Sabah, we have three Child Interview Centres, one at IPK Sabah, the second based in Tawau and the third based in Sandakan,” she said.
“Cases from west coast districts are referred to IPK Sabah, while east coast cases go to Sandakan or Tawau depending on location, with psychology officers from headquarters travelling to those areas when needed,” she added.
