Police, family member say Va. judge ordered slain boy, 4, to spend summer in Utah with mother

Police: Judge had slain boy spend summer with mom

SALT LAKE CITY — A custody fight in Virginia led to a judge’s order that a 4-year-old boy spend the summer in Utah with his mother, who will be charged as an accomplice to the boy’s killing, police and a family member said Wednesday.

The biological father of Ethan Stacy received a full briefing on the crime Wednesday, he told The Associated Press.

“I can’t talk right now. I just got the horrible news, talking to prosecutors,” said Joe G. Stacy of Tazewell, Va. “Right now is not the time.”

The boy’s body was desecrated and buried in a northern Utah canyon, where it was recovered Tuesday, police said.

The stepfather, Nathanael W. Sloop, 31, of Layton, is being held on suspicion of aggravated murder.

Sloop and the boy’s mother, Stephanie Sloop, 27, face additional charges of desecration of a corpse, along with felony child abuse and obstruction of justice, police said.

The Deseret News of Salt Lake City quoted Joe Stacy’s stepmother saying he was forced by a judge to give up the boy to his mother for a summer visit. Layton police provided a similar account, saying Ethan arrived in Utah May 1 “after divorce and custody issues were finalized.”

Joe Stacy’s stepmother, Freida Stacy, called Stephanie Sloop a “spiteful” woman intent on hurting her ex-husband. The AP has not been able to reach family members of Stephanie Sloop.

“She was just an evil person. There is evil in the world, and she is that,” Freida Stacy told the Salt Lake City newspaper. She did not immediately return a message from the AP.

“I don’t think she cared anything for that little boy. I think she did anything she could to irritate” Joe Stacy, his stepmother said.

Prosecutors said they would file charges Friday against Nathanael and Stephanie Sloop. They have said that Nathanael Sloop was responsible for the boy’s killing, but they didn’t say how. Stephanie Sloop was involved in trying to cover up the crime, police said.

The Sloops are being held at the Davis County jail.

Chief Deputy Davis County Attorney David Cole said prosecutors are awaiting the results of an autopsy of the boy’s body that was under way Wednesday.

The mother initially told officers that Ethan wandered away late Monday from his apartment complex in Layton, police said.

“That appears to have been a ruse by the mother, something to cover the tracks,” Layton police Lt. Garret Atkin said Tuesday.

The Sloops’ story of a barefoot boy wandering outside in his pajamas changed throughout the day, Atkin said.

Police searched overnight and said that by midday Tuesday, the couple had revealed the location of Ethan’s body. The search then shifted 20 miles away to a spot off a wooded trail in Wolf Canyon, which borders the Powder Mountain ski resort, about 40 miles northeast of Salt Lake City.

The remains of the boy were dug up late Tuesday and carried from the woods inside a blue tarp.

Atkin and prosecutors refused to describe the condition of the body.

The couple was married May 6, nearly a week after his mother escorted her son from a former marriage to Utah, police said.

Investigators spent the early morning hours Tuesday combing through the Sloops’ cupboards and closets, and through Dumpsters and the area near the apartment complex looking for the boy. Sex offenders in the area were interviewed and had their homes searched, Atkin said.

Utah State Courts records show that between 2000 and 2003, Nathanael Sloop had several convictions, including for criminal mischief, disorderly conduct and drug possession. In 2003, he served 30 days in jail for one drug possession charge and received a six-month suspended sentence for another.

No criminal history was found for Stephanie Sloop, and records show no criminal activity for Nathanael Sloop after 2003.

Attorney Richard Gallegos, who has represented Nathanael Sloop in previous criminal cases, did not return a message Wednesday.