The developer, named Nicholas Lester, was found strangling his son until the boy’s face was turning red for refusing to stop playing their Nintendo Switch. Luckily, the child was able to call out to their mother for help who came rushing into the bedroom as soon as she heard her child in distress. Based on the mom’s statement, and two other witnesses who were there during the incident, Lester was screaming “I will stop your breathing” as he had his son in a headlock.

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Now after an entire year, Lester has pleaded guilty to unlawfully assaulting his son within the Melbourne Magistrates Court. As a result, he is sentenced to a year of community corrections and must perform at least 100 hours of unpaid labor.

Lester’s wife had informed the court that the couple had disagreements about parenting tactics in the past, but there was never an incident like this. The wife also informed the court that the son will not be making a victim impact statement against his father. The reasoning is believed to be that the child is too traumatized from his father’s abuse and wants to avoid the situation.

Magistrate Caroline Boult, who oversaw the case, condemned his actions. In her statement, she said that it is young children’s nature to act up and resist authority, and it will be that way for a long time. And because of this, Boult says that it is never an excuse for violence, no matter the circumstance. However, Boult also saw that Lester had already suffered enough emotional damage from the incident and had already been taking steps to improve his mental health, so she let him leave without a harsher conviction.

The lack of a conviction is also coupled with the fact that Lester has no prior charges or incidents before this one. On top of this, Boult saw that Lester’s Microsoft job was in Jeopardy after the story came out, so she saw all of this as enough of a punishment. At this moment, Microsoft has no statement over Lester’s job status. However, it is speculated that based on the DailyMail article, Microsoft is already taking steps to remove him from the company.

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Source: Dailymail