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UTAH STATE PRISON — Nathan and Stephanie Sloop, the couple convicted of the horrific murder of the woman's 4-year-old son, Ethan Stacy, won't get their first parole hearings for 40 years.
Although each was convicted separately and given different sentences, the Utah Board of Pardons and Parole on Tuesday set the original parole hearings for both Sloops in May of 2055.
Stephanie Sloop will be 72 and Nathan Sloop will be 76 when they will have their first opportunity to ask for parole. There is no guarantee that either will be granted parole at that time.
Stephanie Sloop was sentenced in November to 20 years to life in prison for aggravated murder. Nathan Sloop received a sentence of 25 years to life for the same crime after pleading guilty but mentally ill. Both at one point had faced potential death penalties.
In 2010, just a week after arriving in Layton under court order to spend the summer with his biological mother and her fiance, Ethan was severely abused, scalded, beaten, overmedicated and not given the medical care that he needed.
When the Sloops were married on May 6, 2010, they left Ethan at home alone because they didn't want people to see his bruises and swelling.
After he died, the Sloops attempted to hide their crime by disfiguring Ethan's body by burning him, smashing his face with a hammer and then burying him in a shallow grave near Powder Mountain in Weber County where they sprinkled dog food over his shallow grave.
The announcement by the Utah Board of Pardons and Parole on Tuesday comes as charges are pending in a similar case Layton police announced this week. "JJ" Sieger Jr., 2, was taken off life support and died early Monday after police say he was severely abused by his mother's boyfriend while his mother did nothing.
Jasmine Bridgeman, 23, and her boyfriend, Joshua Schoenenberger, 34, were both arrested Saturday and booked into the Davis County Jail for investigation of felony child abuse. When police review the case with the Davis County Attorney's Office they are expected to seek stronger charges in light of the boy's death.
