A stabbing victim in Thar Mway Township in Rangoon was prevented from receiving treatment until a bribe was paid to police, says a neighbor who spoke with the family.

An employee stabbed the victim, who owns a restaurant with her husband, as she slept in her bed at 1am on August 26th. The victim’s husband was out of town, but employees who sleep on the premises heard her screams and immediately rushed her to a nearby clinic.

Doctors at the clinic, however, refused to treat her. “When they got to the clinic, the doctor would not help her because he said he did not know if she was injured because she had committed a crime,” the neighbor said. “The doctor made them wait while he informed the police.”

The injured woman then went to the Thar Mway Police Station, where she was again made to wait. According to the neighbor, the police told them they had to investigate and take pictures of the scene before she could receive medical help.

The investigation seems to have been a ploy to pressure the family into bribing police. Eventually, the family paid police and, at least three hours after the stabbing, the woman received treatment.

She required twenty-one stitches to close a cut that stretched from her mouth to her temple, and a cut on her back required another twenty-eight. A cut from her eyebrow to her nose also needed eighteen stitches, and she lost her left eye.

The perpetrator, Hein Thu Lwin, 17, who lives in Mayamkong Rangoon with his older sister, remains at large. The stabbing occurred as the boy attempted to find the key to a bureau in which money and jewelry is kept. He mistakenly thought the key to be under the woman’s pillow, and attacked her when she was awoken by his search.

“First, I was cut on my back,” the neighbor quoted the woman as saying. “I didn’t know what was happening. I was cut in the eyes a second time when I yelled for help. When I yelled again, he cut me again from my ear and month. When he thought I was dead he ran out the back of the house.”