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S'porean teen punches & threatens dad with knife over allowance & air-con use, gets reformative training
He also threatened his uncle with a karambit knife when the uncle refused to give him S$30.
January 07, 2026, 12:25 PM
During an argument about his allowance, a 15-year-old boy grabbed a karambit knife and charged at his father with it.
When the father wrestled the knife away, the son punched him in the face.
On top of this incident on Jul. 14, 2024, the teen also threatened his father and uncle separately with a knife in 2025, The Straits Times reported.
The teen, now 17, pleaded guilty on Jan. 5 to four charges for assault, criminal intimidation, harassment, and cheating by personation.
He had eight other charges that were taken into consideration for sentencing, according to Shin Min Daily News.
The court ultimately ordered him to go for reformative training for at least a year.
Under reformative training, young offenders are admitted to an institution where they undergo programmes including counselling, foot drills, and vocational development.
Arguments
The 2024 incident happened at home, while the father and son were arguing about how much the teen should receive for his allowance.
The teen went into his room and grabbed a karambit, a curved knife, then charged at his father with it.
Less than a year later on Mar. 8, 2025, the teen threatened his father again when they got into an argument about how long the air-conditioner should be left on.
Similarly, the teen got a knife with a 23cm-long blade from his room, then went back to his father.
He stood near his father with the knife in his hand, saying nothing.
The prosecution said that the teen's threatening manner showed he intended to cause alarm to his father, ST reported.
On Oct. 25, 2025, the teen asked his uncle, whom he was living with at the time, for S$30.
When his uncle turned him down, he took a karambit from his room and held it at his uncle's throat, asking the uncle if "he knew he could be killed".
According to ST, the teen also once used a fake identity card to try and collect a mobile phone from a store, in response to an advertisement to earn "fast cash".
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