Blind dad put on bond for killing son

Ashley Lee Kim, the blind  62-year-old father who killed his 20-year-old son in a frenzy of rage, will have to live with that thought and be tormented by it for the rest of his life as it tears at his conscience. This was the comment of Justice Melville Baird yesterday, as he placed Lee Kim on a bond in the sum of $50,000 to be of good behaviour and keep the peace for two years or in default serve 12 months hard labour. To imprison Lee Kim would be a death sentence in disguise, observed the judge. Justice Baird warned that his sentence was not a licence for persons with disability or ailment to commit crime and think that they will get away unscathed.

He also warned parents who still try to exercise control over their grown children by hitting them with any object at hand, to desist. Lee Kim pleaded guilty to manslaughter after he hit his son Wayne with a bench on March 6, 2001, at Mocoya Gardens. Wayne Lee Kim was hospitalised and died six months later on September 9, 2001, at the Port-of-Spain General Hospital. Lee Kim said in his statement that he had approached his stepdaughter Lorna Henderson, then 29, to strike her because “she can’t be living there and for her to be carrying on and ‘cussing’ and thing.” Sometime later his son came home and an argument ensued over the incident. Lee Kim took up the bench and threw it at his son, hitting him in the head. The State was represented by senior prosecutor Trevor Ward. Justice Baird noted that Lee Kim had admitted his guilty and through his attorney, Keith Scotland, he has expressed contrition and remorse for his conduct. 

Since the incident Lee Kim has suffered four heart attacks, and is also chronically diabetic and hypertensive, and totally blind. Justice Baird noted that  there is no dispute that Lee kim’s  actions “were not premeditated but came about in a frenzy or rage.” The judge observed that a sentence of imprisonment, if imposed on Lee Kim in the teeth of these circumstances, might very well amount to a sentence of death in disguise. Justice Baird was of the view that society would not demand its pound of flesh like Shylock in Shakespear’s play Merchant of Venice, but rather take the approach of the character — Portia, saying: “The court is convinced that a non custodial sentence imposed on him (Lee Kim) would in no way disturb the public confidence in the administration of justice, or cause the value of a human life to be depreciated.”

Recalling the incident which caused the death of Lee Kim’s son, Justice Baird said: “There are some parents who, notwithstanding the fact that their children are grown young men and women, think that they are still entitled to exercise parental control by striking them, but it is fraught with danger. Firstly, as those parents are prepared to use any available object with which to strike their adult children, there is always the possibility that a parent might administer an “unlucky blow,” causing the young person serious injury, or as in the present case, death. Secondly, although out of respect for their parents most young persons having been struck, would calmly accept the blow, as did the deceased in this case, there might be an instance where a young person could be so provoked by the blow inflicted by the parent that there could be a flash point at which that young person might react, with consequences that might be disastrous.

“It could very well be that there might not be many parents who still indulge in this practice. But to those who still do, the court suggests that the practice be stopped. This case must not be ignored. “The thought that he, in a transport of rage, was the cause of his son’s death would torment the repose of Ashley Lee Kim for the rest of his life; the intensity of his regret would always be profound. Not unlike the manner in which the vulture endlessly tore at the liver of Prometheus as he lay chained by Zeus in the Caucasian mountains, so would the death of his son endlessly tear at the conscience of Ashley Lee Kim. It is burden no parent should carry.”