A Wildomar mother of two accused of putting her 18-month-old daughter's legs into scalding bath water to punish her for wetting her pants must stand trial on abuse and torture charges, a judge ruled Thursday.

Diana Vicky Estrada, 25, is charged with inflicting corporal injury on a child and torture, with domestic violence-related great bodily injury and felony allegations, as well as a prior strike for an earlier child abuse charge involving her older daughter. She could be sentenced to life in prison if convicted on the torture charge alone.

Sheriff's deputies investigating a possible child abuse case called in by staffers at an Urgent Care clinic in Lake Elsinore the afternoon of Aug. 16 found the toddler's legs and feet burned and her skin peeling. The girl was then transferred to a burn center in Colton.

Detectives testified at a preliminary hearing that Estrada told them she had filled the tub with hot water four days earlier to clean bathroom "amenities," such as the soap holder, and left the bathroom for a minute when she heard her daughter screaming.

She said that when she returned, she saw her daughter, Princella Ayala, sitting on the edge of the tub, with her legs immersed in the water.

However, Investigator Joseph Greco testified that Princella's 4-year-old sister, Liliana Estrada, told investigators that her mother had injured her sister by putting the toddler in a hot shower because of a potty training accident.

Greco testified that the girl said her sister "had red blood 'owies' and she cried."

Photos displayed in court showed the toddler's red and swollen feet, with black-tinged toes, four days after she was burned.

Detective Reece Burchett said a forensic pediatrician determined that Princella had "inflicted immersion burns," because there was a clear line where the burns covered her legs and feet, and no evidence that the child had been splashing around, trying to get out of the water.

Riverside Superior Court Judge Mark Mandio ruled that the torture charge could proceed to trial because Estrada clearly showed she hurt the child to persuade her to become toilet trained, and also for revenge because the child had soiled herself.

Mandio said that the exercise in persuasion, if that is what it was, had "gone way way wrong, way overboard."

Liliana was taken into protective custody. Princella is already in foster care.

Liliana was treated at Rancho Springs Medical Center in 2007 for a urinary tract infection, multiple bruises and dehydration, and Estrada pleaded guilty in 2008 to child abuse with great bodily injury and serious felony allegations.

Doctors found evidence that both the girl's arms had been broken at different times, according to sheriff's officials.

Estrada was sentenced to 48 months probation and 180 days in jail on the weekend work release program. She also was required to take parenting classes and enroll in a program for child batterers. She was still on probation when her toddler was scalded.

Her husband, Jorge Estrada, was killed by Fabian Urrea, the father of her older daughter, when that child was just a few days old, because he was upset that Estrada was going to raise the child as his own. He is serving 50 years to life in prison.

While Urrea was awaiting trial, Diana Estrada had Princella, whose father is a third man.

Doctors saved the child's legs and feet but she needed skin grafts, Deputy District Attorney Julie Baldwin said outside court.

"Her legs can't see sunlight for a year," Baldwin said.