Filipino helper dies after cabinet falls on her as she sleeps

[SoleSurvivor]

Filipino helper dies after cabinet falls on her as she sleeps

Boy, 5, who was beside her, escapes injury

PUBLISHED : Friday, 03 October, 2014, 5:40pm
UPDATED : Friday, 03 October, 2014, 10:04pm

Clifford Lo [email protected]

The 45-year-old woman was taken to hospital, where she was declared dead. Photo: Xinhua

A Filipino domestic helper died after being crushed by a heavy wooden cabinet that fell from her bedroom wall as she slept early yesterday.

A five-year-old boy who was in her care and asleep beside her escaped injury when the incident happened at about 6.45am, a police officer said.

The 45-year-old woman was in a guest bed that had been pulled out from under the boy’s bed in the apartment in The Metropolis on Mau Yip Road, Tseung Kwan O. The cabinet had been fixed to a wall, directly above the helper’s bed.

“When the cabinet crashed down, the boy ran from the room and woke his [43-year-old] father, who called the police,” the officer said.

The cabinet struck the woman, identified only as Fortes, in the head and she lost consciousness before emergency crew arrived, a police spokeswoman said. She was taken to Tseung Kwan O Hospital, where she was declared dead shortly before 8am.

It is understood the woman had worked for the family for several years. The boy’s father and grandparents were at home when the incident happened.

Police would not say how big the cabinet was or what had been stored inside, only that it was a “heavy wooden cabinet”.

The spokeswoman said there was no evidence of foul play, and that the Labour Department had been informed.

In 2007, two brothers, aged two and four, escaped serious injury when a wooden cabinet fell off the wall in the living room of their Chai Wan flat. They were treated in hospital for shock and discharged.