Sandra Cantu Case: Huckaby Arraigned for Kidnapping, Murder, Rape, Molestation
Tracy, CA- This afternoon at 1:3o PM PST, Melissa Huckaby, 28, was arraigned for Kidnapping, Murder, Rape, and Lewd and Lacivious acts in the murder of 8 year old Sandra Cantu.
The Aunt of Sandra Cantu, Angie Chavez, and Sandra’s Uncle were in attendance and did not display any outward emotion towards Ms. Huckaby. The Family of Melissa Huckaby was also there, and for the first time, left hurriedly without speaking to reporters.
Ms. Huckaby declined to enter a plea through her attorney, and requested a continuance until April 24th. The Public Defender who represented Melissa on the earlier theft charge, Ellen Schwarzenberg represented her in her arraignment. She also requested a gag order which the court is reviewing, and a second request for a medicine evaluation; leading some to assume she has been denied a form of mediation since being incarcerated.
Huckaby appeared disoriented and wept through most of the proceeding. When the Judge announced the Rape charges in the commission of Felony kidnapping, she closed her eyes and grimaced.
(Editor’s Note: Unless this is a new breed of psychotic, pedaphillic, homicidal sociopath, there is more to this crime than we are being led to believe. Either her family knows alot more than they are willing to admit, or someone (s)else is involved.)
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Bizzare – simply bizzare
She wasn’t dramatically sobbing; I felt as if she were taking the fall for the greater good of evil – protecting something bigger because she screwed up and went too far.
I am afraid for other children in that area – first Klye – now Sandra
I already don’t like her attorney!
There are a few charges pending:
1) Pastor Lawless for hiring a person with a record to teach kids
2) Charges against grandparents for witholding info from police
Also why MH does not live with her parents, they are alive and they have a church too…Is she afraid of them? or something?
I agree with you Pam, and suspect there were more to come, probably her family. She was clearly holding something and protecting something. What could that be? Most likely her family (father or grandfather or something?) IMHO. Why does she care if she was selling to somebody child porn production? The police just searched the 3rd time at the Church and Melissa’s mobile home today!! What sick craps these people are!
The accused looks like a normal mom. What in God’s name happened to this woman? What kind of a life must she have had up to this point that would lead her to kidnapping, drugging, raping and murdering a little girl? I just don’t understand.
B – they went back to the church again today
Blink will you ever approve me for the disscusion thread?
Scared Monkeys?
Did you use email you used here?
Blink, how long would it take to get all the forensic evidence back from Sandra’s body, the church etc?
Is this part of why they don’t want to plea for another 10 days? To see what other evidence arises?
I wonder,if she is responsible for bringing Sandra to someone else that did the abusing and/or killing. If so, and she is covering for that person(s) how long would it take for forensic evidence to be analyzed to show that?
I definitely think there are more people involved with this than just Melissa Huckaby.
JM-
depends on the testing requests. It is my understanding forensics were going to the Sacramento FBI facility.
Keep in mind there is field testing available, which I have to believe given all the warrants, tested positively.
But in short, with the right lab, Blood type is almost immediate, DNA as fast as 7 hours, in a rush with the right lab, other lab but high priority, 24 hours. All assuming a POI or named suspect.
B
Tracy Police officers are examining possible evidence recovered during a third search of the Clover Road Baptist Church.
KRON 4′s Terisa Estacio says investigators spent about 15 minutes inside the church then left with what appeared to be evidence envelopes.
The latest search comes just hours after Melissa Huckaby appeared in a San Joaquin County Superior Court to hear the kidnapping and murder charges read against her. Prosecutors are alleging special circumstances of rape with a foreign object and lewd and lascivious conduct with a child under the age of 14.
Tracy Police spokesman Sgt. Tony Sheneman tells Terisa officers also searched the home Huckaby shares with her grandfather and grandmother
Blink, the fact that the police went back to the church again today really disturbs me. I can not believe that they (LE) allowed those people to hold services in that church when they had not without a doubt completed their investigation. Beyond Stupid!
I am taking that positively. I wonder if she is talking to LE; that is my first reaction. Ready to give someone up?
B
What in the world is going on??? I have been disturbed by the fact that the LE would allow those people into a crime scene to hold Easter Services. It is crazy to think that they would not have that place on lock down until they had without a doubt completed their investigation.
Many open questions
if she has such a loving family – where were they when she was hopsitalized for internal bleeding?
if you watch the charges today with the sound off it is like you are watching an ashamed child
what were they looking for tonight at the church and Lane & Connie’s house and what did they find
so many questions
Big sigh….I really do not want to pay for Melissa’s trial but it looks like most law abiding tax paying citizens will. I do believe that she is covering up for another person(s) who are involved in this somehow. I firmly believe that due to the info being released about her daughter being home bound and friends having to come over and play instead is very telling . It says good old grandma and grandpa are privy to something! If I were their neighbor I would be on their porch demanding how they could have allowed her continued presence without getting her help and warning other people with children. I would not be saying this nicely. Now onto poor Sandra’s death and that suitcase. How in the hell did she get that heavy suitcase into the water by herself??? NO WAY!!!!!!!!!!!, it may not have weighed much but wouldn’t it have been a little unwieldy?????? Lots of questions. I am extremely interested in finding out about her ‘friends” and the people she was DEALING with. emphasis on dealing. I think she was dealing in children. She is disgusting! Of course I will await the trial and the evidence before saying anything else…but my belief in the justice system and its deals is not high.
I saw he Father’s Press Conference on Nancy Grace. When he was asked about Madison and her care, he said he was talking care of the logistics of Melissa’s life. What does that mean? Logistics?
There aren’t a lot of women sexual predators who kidnap, rape and murder children, but they do exist according to Mark Klass, and he would know.
The secret the family is hiding is Melissa is mentally ill. The laywer was referring to her last medicine evaluation when she was evaluated for court, before.
I saw no tears, I saw somebody pretending she was a little girl.
Oh..and Her Father and Gnradmother saw her after court. She told them she was innocent.
“I am taking that positively. I wonder if she is talking to LE; that is my first reaction. Ready to give someone up?”
Bingo!
Someone is egging her on or she’s perpetuating a family tradition. Who knows what this family has been doing among family since she was a child.
Thank you for the reply about forensics Blink.
YW
B
B – yes same email
I was ready to throw her under the jail and throw away the key until I saw her arraignment. Something seems off, and not just her mental stability. For people who commit these types of crimes there is usually some type of symbolism involved on some level. The grandmother said Melissa was only gone for about an hour, and that she returned and seemed no different from when she’d left. I just find it nearly unfathomable that Melissa subdued Sandra Cantu, took her to the church, raped her, killed her (either accidentally or on purpose), put her in the suitcase, managed to get the suitcase into a vehicle, drove the dumping site, dumped the suitcase, and drove home to grandma with nary a tell. Talk about logistics.
I know it’s far fetched but I wonder if the grandfather abused Melissa, and he demanded that Melissa get him a child or that he would somehow victimize her child (Madison), and Sandra was accidentally killed in the process of the abuse. Something just seems so off about this story. Ugh.
Oh, and then you’ve got the strange note, and Melissa immediately telling law enforcement that the suitcase wasn’t her grandfather’s. Um, okay. Why would she go there right off the bat?
I could only imaging her trying to protect anyone if we’re talking about a cult, and that she believes this will save her soul. I think the family’s involved (maybe the grandmother). Who really knows though. She’s totally screwed now. Clearly she’ll break easily under questioning, so expect the whole truth to come out in this one. If she doesn’t kill herself first. I bet she gets life for telling all. She’ll have to be segregated. There has to be justice, on this earth, for these people.
I knew Maria Chavez back in the early ’90s, she was a good friend of my girlfriend at the time. She was a very shy, quiet & nice person, & I feel horrible for the tragedy that she’s going through. I certainly want to see the person responsible pay for this brutal crime!
What bothers me is all the sheeple that are jumping on the “MH is guilty, let’s kill her now” bandwagon. None of us have seen the evidence, & the idea of “the police say they’re guilty, so they must be guilty” makes me uncomfortable. Especially a smaller-town PD under enormous scrutiny & pressure to arrest someone.
It could be that there IS evidence enough to prove this case. But getting the right person should be the priority, not just because of an innocent person being locked up, but more importantly so that there isn’t still a killer roaming free to do this again.
I have had a major red flag ever since the grandmother of Huckaby gave an interview from the car she and her pastor husband were driving. Back before any evidence came out she stated that she didn’t know how anyone could take a little girl and abuse her and kill her. How did she know at that time that abuse was involved? Major red flag. She stated this detail before it was confirmed and reported to the public. She knows something.
This defendant isn’t going to hold up for long.
I believe she acted alone, and isn’t covering for anyone else. What a twisted, sick individual. Has her own child been checked for physical/sexual abuse? She will get on on a plea of insanity. Sandra’s family are in my thoughts in prayers. It would be bad enough to be a stranger abduction, but to think it was someone this family knew and trusted is absolutely sickening.
Hopefully she is spilling now and that is what prompted the searches following her arraingnment
Pam, your soup is done, please check the stove
B
KCRA 3 has learned that investigators close to the case said Melissa Huckaby admitted Tuesday that Sandra Cantu’s death was an accident.
Investigators also told KCRA 3 that Huckaby said she wrote the note she said she found the day after Cantu’s disappearance.
According to Huckaby, the note said, “Cantu, Suitcase, Water. The word ‘suitcase’ was misspelled, and there were two street names including the word ‘Whitehall.’”
Two new search warrants were issued Tuesday in relation to the case.
The focus of one warrant was the West Clover Road Baptist Church and the other was for the Orchard Estates Mobile Home Park home where Huckaby, 28, lived.
The search of the church was completed, but officers said the search of Huckaby’s home is still under way.
stranger and stranger. i can’t think of one person-not my husband, not child, not even my mom, that i would be willing to be sentenced to death for. if there IS a second person (and i can’t say if there was either way) i would have to take it that that person is more important to Melissa than her children, her freedom, her name, and even her life. i would be singing like a bird. and although i have not seen the autopsy report, i wonder if the rape is what killed little Sandra.
Blink, do you have any time-line for this. i’m just thinking that if Sandra was attacked and killed before she was even reported missing, that this lady moved fast with hiding and covering up. Sandra’s body was somewhere before it was in the water. And as far as miss Melissa being “insane” well, she could have some mental health issues, but so do a lot of people who don’t kidnap, rape, and murder little girls. She was so crazy that she decided to hide the body and then dump it. That is not legal insanity. Can’t she just be a cruel and evil person? Why make an excuse like “insane”?
Gawd! her attorney needs to get that hair fixed! It’s worse than JVM’s ( Jane Velez Mitchell )mullet!
Poor Sandra
I pray that the truth comes out. Her poor family. God help them-
The Law Enforcement personel in this case are not stupid. I assume that they are using the church building as a decoy, so to speak. If there is something hidden in the church which a co-perp wants to take out of there, I think LE is watching and will see that if it happens; and who takes it.
I can’t help but wonder if the “little girl” that Melissa supposedly took to the park awhile back (unconfirmed/confirmed??), later tested positively for drugs, lived with her grandmother and mother….was actual Sandra Cantu. Hmmmm
Fred Williams sure couldn’t wait to jump in front of the cameras not too long ago…must be hiding out in the huge, spacious house he lives in now. Do we know if he had access to or drove the same type of vehicle seen by the cadet? My gut instinct is still saying he is involved or had knowledge of this crime prior to the arrest. I saw him on video leaving a card at the memorial site and immediately suspected him as being the author of “forgiven”…(my personal name for that card/note).
She is the strangest sociopath, molester, kidnapper in my personal opinion. Me thinks she is not alone in this…reminded me of a teenager who got caught sneaking out at night…not a person who just heard charges against her for the most henious of crimes! AAGGHH! — My heart weeps for Sandra’s family!!!!!
Blink, what about my scared monkey soup??
Here is one possible theory on why she didn’t allow Madison to go to other houses to play: Maybe Melissa had been possibly abused as a child and didn’t trust her daughter to be around others. Or right, could be more tragic than that….
Nancydrew, I addressed Connie’s stmt about abuse on another thread. First, didn’t we all assume Sandra had been abused once we knew she was dead? Maybe Connie was merely voicing her belief.
Other thing is she had just returned from hours of questioning by the police. They may very well have shared she was abused.
Common interrogation tactic is to pull on the heartstrings of witnesses to try and get them to tell all. She was a great-grandma after all. I could very easily see the cops saying we just want to find out whoever is responsible for whoever abused and murdered this poor girl. I don’t place much weight on that stmt from her at all… But, that’s me…
Anyone that wants to join SM can, if your a forum person it is the best their is
B
I concur. I think the additional searches tonite are a good sign. MH is saying more….
obliquity, all of that may not have happened in that hour (if it really was only an hour.) Some have surmised that after Sandra’s death, she hid the body and returned later to dispose of it.
As far as the weight and transportation issue, the missing person flyer indicated Sandra only weighed 45 lbs. That is not that much especially when one has the motivation like MH would have had then.
It is hard to watch that arriagnment video and not have the impression that Melissa is guilty as charged, yet has terrible remorse over her actions.
Previous reports had her under a suicide watch in the hospital. Melissa’s emotional response to the charges the attempted suicide match up.
I have not forgotten Johnny Williams statement that he saw the church caretaker on a boat with a child recently. We know the child wasn’t Sandra, but Johnny said, he’s the guy. (The one he saw on TV.)
I always thought that the police so openly stating “we don’t expect anymore arrests” rang false. It was just too quick and too pointed, as if to ease someone’s mind in the hopes that the person slipped up and made a mistake.
Also, coolio, I agree that Melissa wouldn’t have had much difficulty lifting the suitcase, but it still would’ve been awkward, and it would’ve taken time. When would she have moved her? It wasn’t that long after Sandra went missing that the neighborhood began looking for her. I know Melissa was at the church, but it seems like she was able to do a lot on her own without detection, unless there’s a huge cover-up within the family. For me, that’s the missing piece of the puzzle — someone else had prior knowledge of or participated in Sandra Cantu’s death. Another person being involved just makes the puzzle pieces fit together better and easier.
I know that Melissa had prior arrests, but a lot of people steal and don’t escalate to pedophilia. That’s not a natural progression of crimes. I can buy that she may have been participating in some child porn ring, or that she was a runner of sorts, but something about her demeanor and this whole case is off. In part, it’s because she’s a woman, and I do believe that women are capable of doing things like this. I’m just questioning if this woman committed this crime, alone, or was she acting under the direction of or on the behalf of another?
wasnt there a previous interview by the press of Pastor Lawless mentioning he had a suitcase stolen…?
maybe shes covering for him, and was it just me or was he a no show at the arraignment? maybe he knows melissa is getting ready to give him up….
I just hope they find out the full truth IF there is other people involved…they ALL deserve to pay.
B, I was being similar to Pam and saying when am I going to be approved for the SM forum?? My request made last Friday. I took your response to her to be you have since approved her so I was looking for my SM soup as well….
I took Pastor Lane’s no show differently. He’s disgusted by her and believes she really did this…. so he’s NOT being a George & Cindy.
So, IF death was accident, what do we think happened there? Drug overdose?
obliquity, my comment about the weight/transportation issue was directed to meregoddess’ post of NO WAY could MH handle it herself.
Sorry, not always easy to go back and respond to each person by name, but rather by statements rendered
I think she is protecting somebody. I dont think so she had done all alone. I think her grandfather is like god for her.
If Huckaby is part of a child porn ring, I am concerned about other kids attending her “sunday school”, as in that case it was the “cover” of her evil “work”. Do you think LE is aware of that, blink?
Blink, I think you’re right on the money when you write about how unusual this would be if she turns out to be a pedophile. Aren’t her past crimes related to stealing money? I think she could have conceived a terrible plan to drug her daughter’s playmates for the purpose of taking explicit photos/videos of them. That would be a quick way to get some cash. Maybe it’s because my mind refuses to go there, but I can’t believe she was getting her “jollies” out of this. Perhaps she inadvertently gave poor Sandra an overdose.
Like you, I think there are other people connected to this situation. Maybe they didn’t take part in this specific crime, but certainly Ms. Huckaby is aware of others who are involved in making money from exploiting children.
Also, has the main stream media picked up on her hospital visit as a suicide attempt yet?
Blink, thank you so much for covering this case so well. I am with you, there is no convincing me that Melissa did this on her own. There were others involved and I pray they will be found, whether Melissa helps LE or not.
My heart is hurting so badly for Sandra’s family.
Sorry, just had to add my two cents’ worth about the weight of the suitcase. I am 47 years old, and I haven’t done any formal exercise for nearly 10 years. I do, however, work in my garden and tend to my landscaping all year ’round. I have absolutely no problem toting around two 40-pound bags of topsoil at a time. I can chuck ‘em a pretty fair distance, too, if I work up some momentum with a swinging motion.
Given the right motivation and enough adrenaline, I could wade and swim right out into the middle of a dairy pond with a big ol’ suitcase, especially if I brought along a kickboard, a swimming ring or something similar to float it on as I pushed it.
You can see Melissa’s personality change right before your eyes at the court hearing. She morphs in and out of being a child. It is freaky to watch. I may need to take a break from this case, really makes my stomach rumble.
I agree I was just flabbergasted at what I saw yesterday, and that is not easy to do.
B
I have wondered if her grandfather molested her inside a church and in some sick way she did this in his church to get back at him. Her grandfather looked quite sad when he sat in his vehicle being questioned by reporters. I feel he knew all along it was Melissa.
mamacrazy30
Me thinkest perhaps the reason MH’s daughter was ‘taken on vacation’ -read ‘being held ransom’ by grandma is to prevent her from ‘singing like a bird’.
mamacrazy30 wrote:
…. [snipped] stranger and stranger. i can’t think of one person-not my husband, not child, not even my mom, that i would be willing to be sentenced to death for. if there IS a second person (and i can’t say if there was either way) i would have to take it that that person is more important to Melissa than her children, her freedom, her name, and even her life. i would be singing like a bird.
…. [snipped]
Blink, I am sure you have your hands full, but the story of another beautiful 8 year old girl missing. Victoria Stafford, have you heard anything? I just read this on Scared Monkeys, she too caught on tape walking away with an unknown woman from her school 4 days ago. I am just horrified.
I am surprised that the mobile home park neighbors are not spilling more information about pastor’s family?
Somebody there must be their friend, given they have a church…
Hope Tracy press interviews parents of all kids in that sick Sunday class.
How much do you want to bet she was on antidepressants when this happened. They’re well known to cause certain people to have a ‘lack of reflection and guilt’ while on them, especially those that are bipolar, and now that she’s off them she’s feeling the very guilt and reflection that would have prevented her from committing the crime in the first place. This has been shown in several school shooting incidents as well as sex crimes. Two more lives ruined by the good old pharma companies. Ka-Ching…they don’t care.