https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15291273/ontario-boys-starve-murder-trial-becky-hamber-brandy-cooney.htmlBoy testifies that lesbian parents forced him to wear a helmet and wet suit during five years of torture
By JAMES CIRRONE, US NEWS REPORTER
Published: 16:56, 14 November 2025 | Updated: 17:01, 14 November 2025
A teenage boy testified in Canadian court that his lesbian adoptive parents spent five years torturing him and his brother by forcing them to wear hockey helmets and wet suits for hours on end. The 13-year-old, identified only as J.L., is the prosecution's star witness in the ongoing murder trial of Becky Hamber and Brandy Cooney, who are accused of killing J.L.'s older brother in 2022 by systematically starving him and leaving him soaking wet in their Toronto-area basement. The older brother, referred to as L.L., was found on December 21, 2022, in the couple's Burlington home lying on the floor of the basement, which was locked from the outside. Witnesses told the court he was so emaciated that he looked like he was six years old, even though he was 12, CBC reported. The boy died at the hospital shortly after. J.L. testified on Thursday and was forced to relive the death of his brother and the torment that Hamber and Cooney allegedly put them through. Both women have pleaded not guilty to charges of first-degree murder, unlawful confinement and assault with a weapon. Lawyers for the prosecution showed J.L. a video of him talking to police in January 2023. He told them that Hamber and Cooney bound him and his brother with zip ties and placed hockey helmets on their heads. He added that the couple forced them to wear wet suits and would lock them in their rooms at night, all while constantly monitoring their behavior with security cameras. J.L. reiterated much of what he told the police more than two years ago, but also said that his parents would often forbid him to speak for days at a time. He said that if he or his brother spoke out of turn, the couple would tack on even more days of forced silence, the Toronto Star reported. Prosecutor Kelli Frew showed J.L. a video of his brother, who could be seen wearing a wetsuit and a black hockey helmet. The video showed the boy repeatedly walking up and down the basement stairs. The video was taken in June 2022, six months before the boy's death, and it is one of many pieces of evidence showing similar punishments doled out to the brothers. 'Did you ever have to do stairs like this?' Frew asked J.L.
'I've had to do this, like all afternoon before,' he replied, adding that he sometimes had to sleep in the helmet.
Frew then played a video with J.L. was sobbing and saying: 'I only did one thing wrong, I can't do them all night.'
The boy said he was likely referring to having to go up and down the stairs, though he didn't recall the couple's reasoning for the punishment in that instance. Defense lawyers for Hamber and Cooney, who will cross-examine J.L. next Friday, have said the two boys regularly threw tantrums, destroyed things in the couple's home and punched the women. They have also pointed to J.L.'s admission to police that he bit Cooney. In his testimony, the boy explained that he did that in self-defense when she was trying to put a hockey helmet on him or zip-tie him into a wet suit. The boys first moved to Burlington in 2017, and J.L. said the couple soon stopped the them from playing together because 'sometimes we'd argue'.
Once the couple began homeschooling them in 2020 after COVID-19 hit, J.L. said he began seeing his brother less often despite living in the same house. J.L. also said he slept inside a tent that was tied to his bed. He recalled breaking two or three tents by thrashing around in frustration. This led to the couple allegedly threatening to make him sleep outside if he broke another tent. He testified that it never came to that. The prosecution also showed a video of J.L.'s interview with police in September 2023, when he told them that Children's Aid Society workers that visited the home never saw what went on. He said Hamber and Cooney dressed him in normal clothing during the visits. The trial will resume Monday and is expected to last until December.
