Singapore - A housewife and her mother were sentenced to jail terms Tuesday after they pleaded guilty to abusing the family's Indonesian maid.

Loke Phooi Ling, 38, a permanent Singapore resident from Malaysia, was sentenced to eight and a half months while her mother, Teng Chen Lian, 67, received a four-week sentence, the Straits Times newspaper reported.

Both women changed their pleas last week midway through their trial in a Singapore district court.

Loke admitted to grabbing the maid's hair and banging her head against the wall, punching her in the left eye and using implements to hit her from March to July 2007.

Teng said she stamped on the victim's thighs, slapped her and hit her on the head after chiding her for dozing off while cleaning the living room floor on July 5 that year.

The women were charged with Loke's husband, bank executive Stanley Kuah Kian Chong, 38, who like Loke and Teng is a Malaysian living in Singapore. Heo was acquitted of three charges Tuesday by District Judge Jill Tan after he paid compensation of 5,000 Singapore dollars (3,290 US dollars) to the 23-year-old victim.

She suffered repeated abuse during her four-month employment before deciding to escape by climbing out the fifth-floor apartment's kitchen window and making her way across a ledge to a staircase landing.

She found her way to a mosque, and people took her to the Indonesian embassy, after which a police report was made. (dpa)