A 67-year-old grandmother has died a week after she was beaten up and robbed by her 19-year-old Indonesian maid, a report said today.

Mok Lan, who slipped into a coma shortly after the incident, passed away yesterday at a hospital in Penang without regaining consciousness, The Star said.

Her daughter Choong Poh Lai told the daily that her mother was tricked into the bedroom by their new Indonesian maid, who then tried to strangle Mok Lan and repeatedly banged her head on the floor.

The maid from Surabaya, who had only worked for the family for nine days, stole about RM100 before fleeing, she said.

Another daughter, Poh Thye, said the maid was a slow worker but they did not suspect anything amiss as she was always smiling and showed no temper or signs of mental problems.

Some 150,000 foreign maids, mainly Indonesians, work in Malaysia.