Mom Charged in Autistic Son's Death Not a 'Monster'

July 8, 2009 — -- The mother accused of withholding cancer treatment from her now-dead 9-year-old son broke her silence for the first time since she pleaded not guilty to charges of attempted murder earlier this week.

"I'm definitely not a monster," Kristen LaBrie said in an exclusive interview with ABC News' Boston affiliate NewsCenter 5.

"The people that love me and care about me, they know," LaBrie said in the interview. "I don't think that cases are tried in the court of public opinion. The people that don't know me are the ones that are saying these brutal, vicious things."

Referring to her son Jeremy's battle with cancer, LeBrie said, "We fought together, me and Jeremy."

When asked if she had done everything possible to save her son's life, LaBrie declined to comment.

"I'm not going to answer that question," she said. "I think my story will come out at trial."

LaBrie appeared in a Salem Superior Court in Boston Monday for her arraignment, during which she said nothing other than "not guilty" when arraigned on teh charges.

She was ordered held on $15,000 cash bail on attempted murder, child endangerment and other charges.

The boy's father, Eric Fraser, said he did not know of any religious beliefs or any other reason why his ex-wife would withhold treatment.

"I have no idea," Fraser said before LaBrie's arraignment.

Fraser was unable to be reached by ABCNews.com.

LaBrie shook her head as Assistant District Attorney Kate MacDougall said she repeatedly failed to fill prescriptions for her son and deceived his doctors into believing she was giving him the medications he needed to save his life. The boy died in March.

As a young child, Jeremy Fraser had been diagnosed with a serious form of autism.

In October 2006, he was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, but doctors gave him an 85 percent to 90 percent chance of recovery, MacDougall said. The boy was given large doses of chemotherapy in the hospital and his cancer went into remission.

His mother was given prescriptions for medications he was to be given at home. MacDougall said LaBrie repeatedly failed to pick up prescriptions, but led doctors to believe they were being filled, at one point asking for a liquid version of the medication because her son was having trouble swallowing pills.

"Miss LaBrie never expressed any misgivings about the treatment," MacDougall said.

In February 2008, after one of Jeremy's doctors called LaBrie's pharmacy and learned she had not been filling prescriptions, LaBrie said the pharmacy must have made a mistake, MacDougall said.

It was at that point that doctors discovered that the boy's cancer had returned as leukemia and was untreatable with chemotherapy, she said.

LaBrie's attorney, Kevin James, said Monday that LaBrie was a single mother with "severe financial problems" who bore the burden of taking care of her son.

"She is a victim. She is the mother who took care of her child," James said.

LaBrie, 37, had earlier been charged with child endangerment. A grand jury returned the more serious indictment Friday.

The alleged withholding of medication took place while the boy was mostly in LaBrie's care, authorities said.

LaBrie claimed in probate court documents that Fraser, the boy's father, chronically missed visits with his son and did not have contact with his school or doctors during the boy's chemotherapy.

"No assistance with care," she wrote in documents filed in April 2007.

Fraser, 38, of Saugus, said Jeremy was a happy kid who enjoyed riding dirt bikes and swimming at a family cottage in Tamworth, N.H.

Before the arraignment, he declined to speak specifically about the case against LaBrie, other than to say, "I am relieved that it is moving forward."

LaBrie faces up to 40 years in prison if convicted.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.