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It wasn't until months after Michelle Napolitano's children were taken from her that prosecutors learned the extent of the abuse that caused her 5-year-old son's feet to be partially amputated.
During a sentencing hearing Tuesday, the Vernal boy told a judge how his mother tied a rope around his legs and hung him upside-down in a doorway.
Deputy Uintah County Attorney Gregory Lamb said the boy was left hanging for "a significant amount of time — a day, or three to four days."
The loss of circulation from the rope caused an infection that resulted in amputation of all the boys' toes and portions of his feet, Lamb said.
Napolitano, 32, pleaded guilty to a second-degree felony count of intentionally inflicting serious bodily injury on a child, as well as five class A misdemeanor counts of intentionally inflicting serious bodily injury on a child.
On Tuesday, 8th District Judge A. Lynn Payne ordered all six sentences to run consecutively and said he hoped Napolitano would serve every day of the 20-year sentence.
Lamb told The Salt Lake Tribune the true extent and depravity of what happened "trickled out" only after the victim and his five siblings, ranging in age from 2 ½ to 12, were sent to foster homes and gradually became more comfortable talking about events in the family home.
According to statements filed in January by the Uintah County Sheriff's Office, the charges stem from a Dec. 31 visit to the Napolitano home after a state Division of Child and Family Services caseworker complained the boy was not receiving proper medical care.
Sheriff's Detective Leonard Isaacson wrote that Francis and Michelle Napolitano claimed they had taken the boy to a local clinic a week earlier after he complained of itching on one of his feet. The doctor, they said, had "warmed" the foot and sent them home with Benadryl, an antihistamine often prescribed for allergies.
However, when Isaacson looked at the boy's feet, he found that they "appeared to [be] the feet of a severe burn victim with open blisters and bleeding sores on them. The skin was [sloughing off] and curling into the air. The toes were in different stages of decomposition but primarily black and shriveled."
The boy's condition stemmed from an infection, according to the statement. Isaacson said the clinic had no record of having seen or treated the boy.
Napolitano initially told police a sibling had placed an elastic bracelet or band around the boy's feet in late December, which she removed the next day.
Lamb said the boy is "getting around really well," and that one of his foster parents is a physician.
The prosecutor said that before he knew more of the horrific details of what happened, he agreed to recommend that Napolitano serve one year in prison, as long as she relinquished her parental rights, which she did in juvenile court.
Lamb said he stuck by his agreement on Tuesday, but the judge ordered the maximum possible prison time.
Napolitano's attorney, Lance Dean, did not return a phone call requesting comment on the case.
Husband faces child injury charges
Michelle Napolitano's husband, and stepfather to the 5-year-old boy, 54-year-old Francis Napolitano, is charged with one count of second-degree felony intentionally inflicting serious bodily injury on a child. He entered a not-guilty plea to the charge and last month waived his right to a preliminary hearing. He is to be arraigned Aug. 31.