A Scarborough woman who nearly killed her toddler with a cocaine overdose after giving him the drug for 14 months has been sentenced to seven years in prison.

Tamara Broomfield persisted in a pattern of “gross parental abuse over a prolonged period of time against a vulnerable and defenceless child,” Ontario Superior Court Justice Tamarin Dunnet said in sentencing her Thursday.

In 2009, Dunnet convicted the 28-year-old woman of aggravated assault endangering life for giving her son the almost lethal cocaine dose, assault causing bodily harm for multiple rib fractures he sustained, and failing to provide the necessities of life for neglecting to get medical help for his fractured arm.

“As a result of his mother’s actions, her son Malique has sustained permanent and irreversible brain damage causing him to be dependent on others for the rest of his life.”

Dunnet said there has never been any explanation for why Broomfield, who claimed not to be a cocaine user, gave her boy the drug.

“One is left to infer that she made conscious decisions to obtain cocaine to give to Malique for her own selfish purposes.”

When she took her 2-year-old boy to hospital on Aug. 1, 2005, she never mentioned he had ingested cocaine, although that information would have helped doctors in their battle to save his life, the judge said.

Hospital tests showed that cocaine levels in his body, had he been an adult, would place him in the top 5 per cent of users.

Broomfield smiled and chatted with her lawyer Daniel Brown after she was sentenced and before she was led away in handcuffs. The judge deducted 14 months for pre-trial custody.

Broomfield could be back on the street as early next week, because she is filing an appeal and is seeking to renew her bail, Brown told reporters.

Broomfield is very disappointed with her conviction and sentence, and still insists she is innocent, he said. “There were problems with the way this trial was conducted by her previous lawyer and she intends to raise those issues on appeal.”

Brown said the medical evidence used to prove she gave Malique cocaine over 14 months was “novel science” that was never challenged at trial.

Outside court, Steve Fitz-Charles, Malique’s father, said he hopes the publicity surrounding his son’s case will help protect others from the same fate.

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Yuillie Fitz-Charles, Malique’s grandmother, said although Broomfield was handed a seven-year sentence, her grandson “was handed a life sentence.”

“He will forever have to live with his challenges and limitations.”