Natalia Grace who was thought to be 7 years old was adopted in 2010 by Kristine and Michael Barnett. Natalia had a rare form of dwarfism called spondyloepiphyseal dysplasia congenita, which made her look younger than what she appeared to be. A show was inspired by this situation this year on March 19, 2025, which shows the allegations that were made towards Natalia that she was older than her age and even attempted to kill her adoptive parents. Suspicions raised against Natalia when she began to become violent towards Kristen and even towards her 3 younger sons.
In the show Good American family Natalia was never violent towards Michael as she was towards Kristine, she claimed Natalia tried to poison her coffee with cleaning fluid, pushed her into an electric fence, entered the parent’s room at night with a knife and even covered her eyes while driving. In real life though Natalia claimed that she endured abuse from Kristine like pepper spraying her in her eyes, hitting her, and gave her twice the dose of her medication.
Kristine had suspicions about Natalias age and would tell Michael, but he would never listen to Kristine’s accusations. Kristine tried to locate the adoption center for her true age but later found out the center was closed down. They were accused of changing kids ages and even lying about medical procedure for money like they did with Natalia. Michael and Kristine were going through a rough patch when Kristine took herself and her sons to stay at her mom’s house when Michael stayed at their home with Natalia. Michael had a conference call and told Natalia to stay in the other room, Michael says if it goes well maybe the family will come back. Natalia responds with ” No I won’t want them to come back I want them to die”. This raises suspicion in Michael, but he continues with his conference call. A knock then came to the door, and it was the police, Natalia had called 911 claiming she was just hungry and wanted pizza, but this raised more concern in the police as Kristine also claimed Natalia had called Child Protective Services on the family. Michael returns to Kristine at her mother’s house and states he now believes Kristine and they need to get Natalia help. They set Natalia up in her own apartment and even bought her groceries.
Kristine and Michael were charged with Mutiple counts of neglect in 2019, but Michael wasn’t found guilty until 2022, the couple also filed for divorce, the charges were dropped against Kristine in 2023 after Michael testified in her pretrial. 
