Father Fakes Son’s Cystic Fibrosis for Nearly Five Years
Here’s an unbelievable tale from hot tipper Rebecca. I relayed this story to my wife, who kept screwing up her face in disbelief. Let’s see if you share her frustration. According to The Associated Press, Michael Bradway of Cornwall, Connecticut has been arrested on charges that he manufactured doctors’ bills, lied to school officials, and bamboozled his in-laws out of $38,000. Bradway, in short, convinced everybody around him - including his now-10-year-old son - that the boy had cystic fibrosis, and that his condition was getting worse as he got older. Bradway reportedly brought some truth to the lie by keeping his son on a starvation diet that kept the youngster gaunt and frail. (The child bounced back to perfect health after Connecticut Department of Children and Families took him into custody.)
Here’s where my wife’s incredulity comes in. According to this report, the parents were separated. By the sounds of it, Bradway had physical custody of his son, which would explain why he was able to sustain this ruse for half a decade. But my wife can’t help but wonder: Didn’t the mom go to at least a single doctor’s appointment? Wouldn’t you, if you were told your son had a crippling disease? I’m not ready to come down with thunderous judgment on mom yet - but I have to admit, it sounds suspicious. How did this joker get away with this for so long?
Tags: connecticut, cornwall, cystic-fibrosis, father, fraud, michael-bradway, sonRelated Stories
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3 opinions for Father Fakes Son’s Cystic Fibrosis for Nearly Five Years
Parents Behaving Badly by Jay Andrew Allen : 2006 : September : 23
Sep 22, 2006 at 10:24 pm
[…] Father Fakes Son’s Cystic Fibrosis for Nearly Five Years […]
Michael Bradway, Accused of Faking Son’s Illness, Now Faces New Charges - from Parents Behaving Badly by Jay Andrew Allen
Oct 10, 2006 at 11:24 am
[…] It seems that the greedy the rapacious Michael Bradway wasn’t content with convincing everybody that his son had cystic fibrosis in order to profit off of the sympathy. Now Bradway, of Cornwall, Connecticut, has been fired by gay rights nonprofit Love Makes a Family, on charges of accounting regularities. The group has reportedly found that records maintained by Bradway had been altered, and that at least one donation had been mishandled. (I’ll assume that we’re not taking about a mere five bucks in the tip jar here.) And that, it appears, isn’t even Bradway’s first foray into fraud. (Well, ignoring the whole “my son is dying” scam, of course.) In 1994, the faking father was sentenced to a year in jail for embezzling $167,000 from various people in a brokerage scam. […]
John Tucker
Oct 27, 2006 at 3:41 pm
I have had my two children die from cystic fibrosis as a father. My daughter once said it was like having a bag over your head and trying to breath. They only gave him a year, put a bag on that guys head for 1 minute and see if he would fake gasping for air.
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