It’s the kind of story that makes your heart sink — a child’s cries lost in plain sight.
In a quiet Ontario neighborhood, 12-year-old LL slowly faded from life while two women he called caregivers inflicted unimaginable cruelty.

Neighbors saw nothing. Doctors missed the signs. Social workers wrote “yellow flags” — but never screamed stop. By the time anyone did, it was too late. The boy had stopped growing. In fact, he had shrunk.

When paramedics found him, he was soaking wet, unresponsive, and so thin his small frame barely filled the blanket that covered him. “He weighed less than he did at six,” a doctor later admitted in court — his voice heavy with regret.

Behind closed doors, Brandy Cooney and Becky Hamber had tied the boys’ clothes shut, forced them to sleep in tents, and punished them in silence. Letters from professionals warned that their “parenting was more abusive than therapeutic.” But no one intervened.

Now, both women have pleaded guilty to first-degree murder. The courtroom sits heavy with questions that can’t be answered:
How many chances were missed? And how many more children are still waiting for someone to truly see them?