Foster mom denies starving boy who died in her care

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That poor child was tortured — zip-tied into one piece pyjamas, wet suits and hockey helmets, locked in his basement bedroom for up to 18 hours with no mattress and often no blanket, forced to do burpees and stair climbs, with food withheld or taken away even as he began to wither to a child half his age.

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No, no, accused killer Brandy Cooney testified, she never used food as punishment in dealing with the emaciated 12-year-old who died under the care of her wife and herself.

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The endless heartless texts she sent to her spouse, Becky Hamber, clearly suggest otherwise.

Pleaded not guilty

Cooney, 44, and Hamber, 46, have pleaded not guilty to murder in the Dec. 21, 2022 death of the oldest boy and not guilty to forcible confinement, assault and failing to provide the necessaries of life to his younger brother. The boys, their names covered by a publication ban, came to live with the Burlington couple in the fall of 2017 with the plan that they’d be adopted and this would be their “forever home.”

Instead, the 12-year-old was found unresponsive, soaked in a wetsuit and weighing the size of a child half his age on the floor of his basement bedroom four days before Christmas 2022.

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Cooney is the first to take the stand in her own defence at the marathon judge-alone trial in Milton that began in September. On her second day of cross-examination, the former early childhood educator stumbled and equivocated as Crown attorney Monica MacKenzie confronted her with her own damning words.

The court has heard the moms imposed strict rules about food for the boys — the cupboards were locked and they were given time limits for eating. When they did go to school — they were homeschooled after the pandemic hit — their lunch boxes were zip-tied and could only be opened by an adult.

And they were always complaining of being hungry, MacKenzie said.

“We gave adequate amounts of food for both boys,” Cooney insisted.

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Restricting their food

She agreed she told neighbours, therapists and school officials that restricting their food was the best way to deal with the brothers’ trauma-caused “gorging” and the older boy’s “binge eating disorder” — a diagnosis, she admitted, they arrived at through their own research, but acknowledged “We’re not doctors.”

Cooney maintained the boys were severely traumatized after being physically and sexually abused by a foster father — allegations that led to the man being arrested in 2018 and the charges stayed three years later. The surviving brother has testified the moms coached them into making false allegations.

MacKenzie accused Cooney of fabricating the “preposterous” accusations — the youngest boy was supposedly kept in a barbecue — to help her convince everyone around her that her sons were severely damaged.

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“It’s common ground at this trial that those allegations were not true, correct?” the prosecutor reminded her.

“I don’t agree with that, no,” Cooney said.

Audio clips of tantrums

In audio clips of their tantrums played in court, the boys complained of hunger. On the night the older boy died, he was heard telling Cooney’s father, who also lived in the house, “You’re not giving me my food. I’m so hungry. You’re not going to feed me.”

MacKenzie took Cooney to many deleted texts recovered by police where she tells Hamber she’s punishing the older boy by not feeding him.

“Taking his food away. I’m bored giving them (they considered the boy non-binary) big bite reminders,” she wrote.

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Cooney admitted she took his dinner because he was taking bites that were too big and she worried he would intentionally choke and kill himself.

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In another, she told Hamber the boy suffered cuts on his head as she wrestled away his food and then zip-tied his one-piece sleep sack at the back of his neck.

At another point, she said he “misses dinner if no stairs.”

Cooney insisted the text must have been out of frustration. “We always fed our children.”

MacKenzie showed her another text from 2022 where she referred to him as “it”: “Can I just not feed it at all?”

At another point that year, when Cooney is threatening not to feed the younger child, her wife warned: “Can’t have both being skeletons.

And on Christmas Eve 2021, she texted Hamber that she’d put the older boy in the shower as punishment: “Told them good luck figuring out how to do burpees in the shower when they b—h about never having food.”

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Cooney assured the court that wasn’t done and their messages “don’t show the whole picture.”

“He frequently expressed being hungry, correct?” the prosecutor asked.

Cooney agreed.

“I’m going to suggest to you, ma’am, that (he) had lost so much weight since the age of nine and his height was stunted because you and Ms. Hamber were not feeding him sufficiently and you were, in fact, withholding food from him.”

“Incorrect.”

And they were locking him away, MacKenzie charged.

“His room, which was referred to by you and Ms. Hamber as ‘Cooney-Hamber prison’ really was like a prison — small, hardly any furniture or belongings in it and hardly, if any, natural light, with a lock on a door that he was sometimes restrained inside of, correct?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

The cross-examination continues Friday.

mmandel@postmedia.com

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