Man to be charged with raping, impregnating disabled woman

Huynh Ngoc Hien, 42, broke into the house of the 33-year-old woman on numerous occasions since 2008 and raped her, making her pregnant two times.

His crime was discovered in February last year when the victim’s father caught him red-handed while he was breaking in when she was home alone. He complained to the police, who began an investigation.

Hien seemed to initially show symptoms of mental illness, and the police made him undergo a psychiatric assessment, which found him to have sufficient mental capacity for criminal prosecution.

On Wednesday the police began criminal proceedings against him, local media reports said.

He has confessed to raping the woman many times. She cannot speak and has difficulty in muscle movement.

In 2008 her family noticed some abnormal signs in her and took her to a hospital where doctors found she was four months pregnant. Her family chose for her to have an abortion.

She again became pregnant a year later and again underwent an abortion, with the family still unable to find out who was responsible.

Rape can be punished by death in Vietnam.

The crime is not uncommon in the country, with around 2,000 reported every year and the victims mostly being children and the perpetrators being family members, neighbors or school employees and other adults the children are familiar with.

Sexual assault on disabled people always sparks a public outcry in Vietnam.