Mother accused in cancer case defends role

Criticizes ex-husband's move stopping son's chemotherapy

"That child has been my world," Kristen A. LaBrie said of her son Jeremy. LaBrie was charged with child endangerment. (FAMILY PHOTO)

The Beverly mother accused of withholding cancer treatment from her young autistic son broke her silence yesterday, saying she has been devoted to the child since his birth and lashing out at her former husband for his decision to stop chemotherapy and not try a bone-marrow transplant.

"That child has been my world," said Kristen A. LaBrie in an hourlong phone interview yesterday. Instead of giving Jeremy Fraser's father custody, she said, she would have preferred that the boy be placed "in a medical foster home, because at this time there is still a chance that my son's life can be saved. . . . Without [chemotherapy and a bone-marrow transplant], there is a zero percent survival rate. With those things, there is a 15 percent survival rate. And to me, 15 is higher than zero, and that is my baby."

She would not comment on why she allegedly interrupted her son's treatment under the advice, she said, of her lawyer, Kevin James of Danvers. James did not return a call yesterday.

LaBrie said she does not know how she will reconcile her feelings if her son dies.

"I guess I'm not going to answer that question," she said. "It would be too emotional of an answer. As a mother, this is a child, an autistic, very sick child who needs assistance with eating, with walking, with breathing, assistance with everything. And I do not see it as a burden, but as my life. Clearly there is no sense of relief from thinking about that not being there anymore."

Three months ago, after Massachusetts General Hospital doctors filed a complaint of negligence against LaBrie, Essex Probate and Family Court awarded sole custody of Jeremy to his father, Eric J. Fraser, 36, of Saugus. LaBrie agreed to this arrangement, according to court papers.

LaBrie was arraigned Monday on a single count of child endangerment at Salem District Court, where she pleaded not guilty. Prosecutors say she repeatedly postponed chemotherapy appointments, failed to administer home doses of chemotherapy, and never collected prescriptions at the pharmacy to keep her son's non-Hodgkins lymphoma in remission. Now, prosecutors say, the boy suffers from full-blown leukemia, and doctors do not expect Jeremy to live to see his ninth birthday on Aug. 2.

LaBrie said she also lost custody of her other child, a son now 15 years old, to his father several years ago.

She lost the child, she said yesterday, because she and Fraser were fighting shortly after Jeremy's birth, and the Massachusetts Department of Social Services told her to either move out of her marital home or relinquish custody of the older boy to his father. She decided to give up the child.

"I was with a newborn, and I didn't have the strength to leave then," she said.

A DSS spokesman said last night that the decision to give full custody of the older boy to his father was made in 2000.

"It was a mutual agreement between the two of them that it would be the best situation for the child," said Juan Martinez, spokesman for the Executive Office of Health and Human Services.

LaBrie said she has identified herself as a mother first since she had her first son.

"My life since I was 20 years old has consisted as, number one, a mother, always, and I will stand firm on that," LaBrie said. "I have these little people to turn into men. That is my life, and that's what makes me happiest. And now that that has been taken away. Everything I knew is now in question. Everything."

Jeremy's father decided to stop treatment, he said in a phone interview yesterday, so his son could enjoy his last days. During the four weeks Jeremy was on chemotherapy, he was sick every morning, Eric Fraser said.

He said he asked Jeremy's doctor whether a bone-marrow transplant would save the boy's life and was told no. "Say my son has five months to live, do I want to see my son suffer for five months and throw up every day to have the same outcome, or do I want to wake up every day knowing he's going to have a good day?" the father said of the decision he made.

He also said he views LaBrie's attack on him as an attempt to deflect the negative attention, and said he will not allow LaBrie to see her son again unless the court orders it. "If she was a functional woman, would she have lost custody of Jeremy to the father?" he asked.

"As a parent, you're supposed to protect your kid and I feel that I'm protecting my kid right now," he said.

John R. Ellement of the Globe staff contributed to this story.