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A Kentucky couple received prison sentences for the abuse of three children, with one child reportedly so desperate for water that they resorted to consuming insulation from the walls, according to a witness.
Mary Hall and Jerome Norman avoided a trial by pleading guilty to three counts of criminal abuse, as revealed by court documents accessed by Oxygen. The couple’s decision to enter blind guilty pleas led directly to their convictions.
The sentencing resulted in a 20-year prison term for each party, PIke County Commonwealth’s Attorney Bill Slone confirmed to WYMT.
The disturbing case traces back to 2018 when Hall took custody of her sister’s children after their parents died in a tragic car accident, as reported by WYMT.
Concerns about the children’s well-being emerged when teachers noticed unexplained bruises and unusual eating behaviors in at least one of the kids.
“The teachers were looking to make sure he was OK and he was not OK.” Slone said, according to WYMT. “He was practically starving to death.”
In January 2025, Kentucky State Police responded to the couple’s Pike County home, where one child showed “signs of torture,” according to a doctor cited in an arrest warrant viewed by Oxygen.
He had bruises on his body, chipped front teeth and a “busted” nose, per the warrant, and appeared pale, hungry and malnourished.
The child was denied meals as a form of discipline, per the warrant. The boy “gorges himself when he eats at school,” read the warrant. “Today he gorged himself until he got sick and vomited.”
Next, police found a room where the boy had been held—referred to as “the dark room”—which was locked from the outside, per the warrant.
The boy was taken from the home and later suffered cardiac arrest, noted the warrant.
The other children were forced to do manual labor and skip meals, according to WYMT, though one was particularly targeted, according to appointed guardian ad litem Amber Hunt.
“He sucked the insulation in the walls,” Hunt said in court, per WYMT, “to try to get water.”
An attorney for Norman did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Oxygen.
Oxygen could not locate an attorney for Hall.