The article said that she tried and tried the normal punishments (time-out type stuff) and it didn't work. She has 6 kids, I can imagine it was getting a bit desperate for her to the point where she would try almost anything. That's the point she should have gotten help, but she didn't.
I see this less as a "this evil monster woman, treating her poor child like that! How daaare sheeeee" and more of a "desperate woman looking for something, anything that would work".
I'm NOT saying she was right in what she was doing (if it was that bad, she should have gotten help), I'm just saying that I'm not in her shoes, so I'm not going to judge. I have no idea how she was feeling, and I bet there are some of us on this board who have been to some point where we had PND and didn't act like proper parents should, or we got so upset and frustrated that we did stupid things.
Maybe a bit less jumping on her in the 'how dare she' and more take this as a point to look at our own lives and admit that we are less than perfect.