A man was jailed this week for flogging his 15-year-old son with a television cable after discovering the teen, who had been ordered to strip to his socks and underwear for the whipping, had signed up on the gay social app Grindr. The brutal beating took place last September in Plymouth, UK.
The teen reportedly escaped the abuse when his father allowed him to get a glass of water, and ran to school, where staff spotted that something was wrong.
The Plymouth Herald reports that the prosecutor questioned the father about his actions, determining that he had whipped his son because he was angry over his sexual orientation: “You asked him about photographs of lots of boys on his phone and shouted: ‘You are gay’ and ‘you are a woman.’ You shouted: ‘What’s that between your legs?’ You hit him again and again, some 20 times, with the television cable. You caused him ‘loads of pain’, to use his words. I have no doubt that part of the reason you became angry is that you saw material which you thought indicated he was bisexual.”
“In my judgement, this cruel and brutal punishment was motivated by his sexuality, or your perception of his sexuality,” the judge added. “On the basis of the photographs, he is likely to be left with some scarring on his arm and he will inevitably suffer some psychological consequences.”
The man, whose identity has not been revealed to protect his son, was given an 18-month jail sentence.
