Soldier accused of torturing daughter

A US soldier has been accused of holding his 4-year-old daughter’s head underwater as part of a waterboard-style torture because she would not recite the alphabet.

Waterboarding is a controversial torture technique, where water is poured over someone so they think they are drowning.

Joshua Tabor, 27, of Yelm, Washington, allegedly beat the child before holding her head under water on Sunday night in the family’s kitchen sink, The News Tribune reported.

Tabor reportedly told a police officer that he and his girlfriend “held her down on the counter and submerged her head into the water three or four times until the water came around her forehead and jawline,” according to the newspaper.

The suspect said he punished the girl for “refusing to say her letters”.

Tabor, a soldier at the Lewis-McChord base in Tacoma, Washington, has been charged with second-degree assault of a child and is set to appear in court on February 16.

The suspect reportedly told police that his daughter was afraid of water “and was squirming around trying to get away from the water”.

“Joshua did not act as though he felt there was anything wrong with this form of punishment,” the police report said.

Tabor’s girlfriend also told authorities that the girl had “severe bruising on her entire back” and had locked herself in a closet to hide from her father, the newspaper reported.