BY T K WHYTE

Observer correspondent

GREGORY PARK, St Catherine – The Caymanas police were yesterday searching for a woman who allegedly threw a pot of boiling water on her nine-year-old son, burning him in the face.

According to the police, the boy’s father reported that about noon on Sunday the child was sent to the shop by his mother to purchase a phone card. However, the shop was closed and when the boy returned home at Portmore Villas and did not see his mother, he placed the money on a table.

The boy’s mother, the police reported, on her return home, accused the child of stealing when he told her he did not get the phone card and she could not find the money.

The woman, the police said, boiled a pot of water and allegedly told her son to place his hand in it. When he refused the mother, who was said to be in a rage, allegedly threw the pot of boiling water in the child’s face.

Police said the child suffered severe burns and that they ordered that he be taken to hospital for treatment.

Police said they visited the Portmore Villa home, but they did not find the woman, whose name was being withheld.

“We are looking for her to charge her for child abuse and assault,” an officer at the Caymanas Police Station

said yesterday.