Jailed mother 'faked daughter's cancer to keep husband'

An Ohio woman who faked her daughter’s leukaemia to rake in thousands in donations said she concocted the scheme to keep her husband from leaving.

In an interview from prison, Teresa Milbrandt told The Columbus Dispatch that she regretted what she did, which included shaving her daughter Hannah’s head and giving her sleeping pills to make it look like she was undergoing chemotherapy.

She also made Hannah wear a protective mask and put her in counselling to prepare for death.

“Last week, I said to someone: ‘I wonder if I could pay the doctor and have him give me a lethal injection’,” she said at the Ohio Reformatory for Women. “I can’t hardly live in my own skin.”

Milbrandt made world headlines when she was jailed for six and a half years after pleading guilty last August to endangering children, grand theft and theft.

Authorities said Milbrandt and her husband Robert fooled 65 people and businesses in their home town of Urbana into donating an estimated $31,000 (€25,700) for Hannah’s treatment.

Robert Milbrandt was sentenced to four years and 11 months in prison. He said his wife handled all doctor visits and medical bills and that he believed her when she said their daughter had cancer.

His wife told the paper the ruse began in early 2002 during intense arguments with her husband.

“I knew how much he cared about Hannah and if she’s sick, I thought, he’s not going to leave us. I just said she had cancer and next thing I know, people were giving me money.”

Hannah, now eight, has been placed in a foster home and is doing well, said James Smith, director of the Champaign County Department of Job and Family Services.