Children’s Aid Society alerted multiple times before boy died in Ontario women's care, murder trial told
CBC
WARNING: This story details allegations of child abuse.
In the years leading up to the death of a 12-year-old boy in the home of his prospective adoptive parents, the Children’s Aid Society (CAS) had received at least a half dozen reports from people with concerns about possible abuse and neglect, an Ontario court has heard.
But the boy and his younger brother remained in the care of Brandy Cooney and Becky Hamber for over five years, from October 2017 to December 2022, when the boy was found emaciated, soaking wet and unresponsive in their Burlington home.
He died in hospital a short time later.
The women are now on trial, accused of the first-degree murder of the boy, known in court as L.L., and of confinement, assault with a weapon and failing to provide the necessaries of life to his brother, J.L. The boys’ identities are protected under a publication ban.
Both women have pleaded not guilty.
The judge-only trial in Milton began last month and is expected to continue into December.
No one from the CAS has testified yet about what steps it took to help the boys and the society is not on trial. But the case has raised questions about its involvement in the boys’ lives leading up to L.L.’s death.
The Indigenous boys were wards of the CAS of Ottawa.
L.L. and J.L. were born in Ottawa about two years apart, and initially stayed in that city with their birth parents and grandparents before children's aid sent them to live with Heather Walsh and her family, testified Walsh, their longtime foster mom.
When the CAS began the adoption process with Cooney and Hamber, the boys’ grandmother fought against it in court, but lost, said Walsh.
The boys were moved to Burlington in 2017 and the Halton CAS took over daily supervision, court heard. Hamber and Cooney never completed the adoption process.
Erin Nolan, a therapist at a children’s mental health centre in Oakville, told the court the CAS had concerns about how the women responded to “allegations” made by the children and the two didn’t work well with service providers.
Nolan was part of a team the women were hoping could provide therapy to L.L. and J.L. The team communicated with Cooney and Hamber in 2021 and early 2022.
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