Rape And Molestation Charges Filed

[NRN]

Hoover parents?

Sure! :laugh: That's when the kids think the parents SUCK!! (I think I'm gonna form a support group....)

 

[yosande]

Formal charges have not been filed, but San Joaquin County Deputy District Attorney Robert Himmelblau said Monday a murder charge against Huckaby could include the special circumstances of rape with a foreign object, lewd and lascivious conduct with a child and murder in the course of a kidnapping.

WTH?
Professional DAs don't go around talking about what they might do, or could do, they just do it.
This is sensationalism imo, and disgusting if this deputy DA actually stated this. This information should not have been released until charges had been filed or were about to be filed. I'd like to know his motive for making this statement, if he in fact did.
I personally think this statement is in poor taste, and should not have been made, especially with the memorial service coming up on Thursday. moo

 

[Salem]

((((())))) Right back at'cha!

Hi Salem!!!!! ((((()))))) I was just thinking the same thing about her daughter, M. So sad. So sick and depraved!

Also, not sure if the tracypress article was posted:
http://www.tracypress.com/pages/full_story?article-Rape-%20molestation%20-likely-%20to%20be%20alleged%20in%20girl-s%20slaying%20=&page_label=home&id=2310960-Rape-+molestation+-likely-+to+be+alleged+in+girl-s+slaying&widget=push&instance=home_news_bullets&open=&

I would love to see a picture of the child. But NO - I don't want it posted all over the internet.

Here's a snip from your article:

~snip~ In 2002, she worked as a cashier at a grocery store near the mobile home park. The following year, in May 2003, she filed for bankruptcy, listing just over $5,000 in assets and more than $26,000 in debts. She was 22 and expecting her first child.

According to court documents, Melissa Lawless owed more than $17,000 in medical expenses, including two debts to ambulance services and $10,000 to a Tracy hospital. She earned a total of $10,525 in 2002 while working at the grocery store.

She left the market in 2004. Around this time that she married and had M. She soon divorced.
~end snip~

My bolding - does this mean she has two children? Did she have a miscarriage? or dad has custody? or what?????

Salem

 

[yosande]

SS...You might remember me going semi-ballistic several days ago concerning the California Amber Alert Guidelines. It is time for ALL states to come together on the guidelines! That means the average citizen must get involved. It might save their own children someday. The following are the guidelines in Tennessee. I Bolded what is the big difference that allows our state to issue an alert and have the age come into play.

To activate an AMBER ALERT, there must be accurate information on at least one of the following: description of child; description of suspect; description of vehicle; Child must be 17 years of age or younger; There must be a belief that the child is in imminent danger of bodily injury or death.
The following factors may be considered as placing the child in imminent danger: The missing child is believed to be out of the zone of safety for his or her age and development stage. The missing child is drug dependent, on prescribed medication and/or illegal substances, and the dependency is potentially life threatening. The missing child has been absent from the home for more than 24 hours before the incident was reported to the police. Based on available information, it is believed that the missing child is in a life-threatening situation. Based on available information, it is believed that the missing child is in the company of adults who could endanger his or her welfare.

Haleigh had an Amber Alert and they didn't know the circumstances of her disappearance. They still don't!
Sandra should have had an Amber Alert out for her. She had just turned 8 years old. They had nothing to lose and everything to gain by having one. moo

ETA; Haleigh's amber alert wasn't quick enough imo. They shouldn't waste time. When I worked at Walmart many years ago, they would put out a Code Adam the instant they knew a child was missing. There is nothing to lose and everything to gain to let everyone know a child is missing. Both employees and customers would stop what they were doing and look for the child, and as soon as the child was found they would cancel the alert. They would put people at all the exits, and go out into the parking lot to look. It's just stupid to not consider the child abducted from the onset until you know further. Time is crucial at the beginning stage. moo, and this is a pet peev with me

ETA: the family had already spent 1-2 hours searching already and couldn't find her. The alert should have gone out stat imo.

 

[nursebeeme]

PattyG has posted all the nancy grace, jvm, and prime news videos... (((thank you pattyG!))) In the third video on prime news Ms wadsworth, the Tracy reporter, was asked if she knew of any of the inconsistancies btwn Melissa's stories to police and herself. Wadsworth stated that she heard that Melissa had told Police that Sandra came over to play with her child. She told Wadsworth that she turned Sandra away because she had to pick up toys.

 

[gitana1]

Nursebee, I absolutely agree! It drives me nuts when people second guess and blame it on the parents ... "why weren't they in absolute constant communication and control of their child!!!" Of course, there is a level of NORMAL care .... The relatively new phenomenon of "Hover Parents" (a major problem not just for public schools anymore, but for colleges, too) cause problems that are just legion in the adjustment of their children!

I, too, thought Sandra's parents behaved as very many parents do and were not neglectful in the least. Their child was playing with friends. She checked in once and then went out again to play. I believe she said where she was going.
Sandra's mom knew everyone in the MHP. I'm sure that gave them a sense of security, whether misguided or not. I know that I would not let my child be unattended at that age for any real length of time because I am very aware of the dangers out there, albeit statistically rare, and I would never take the chance. It's too scary and I'm paranoid.
Nevertheless, this is a crime that could have occurred even if Sandra's mom walked her to her friend's house and knew where she was. Crazy MH could have simply said, "Oh, Sandra left to go back to your house hours ago!" I mean, who the heck suspects the MOTHER of a playmate? I sure wouldn't. At least until now. What a world!

 

[White Hawk]

Haleigh had an Amber Alert and they didn't know the circumstances of her disappearance. They still don't!
Sandra should have had an Amber Alert out for her. She had just turned 8 years old. They had nothing to lose and everything to gain by having one. moo

I think Haleigh was "Out of her zone of safety before she even went missing"!

 

[Atanua]

I was also sooo hoping that this was some sort of accident and death came fast. How appalling that a 'mother' could do this to a child that was her own child's playmate! I also hope they put the death sentence on the table. Of course, I am sure she's 'insane' and that will be her defense.

 

[nursebeeme]

Formal charges have not been filed, but San Joaquin County Deputy District Attorney Robert Himmelblau said Monday a murder charge against Huckaby could include the special circumstances of rape with a foreign object, lewd and lascivious conduct with a child and murder in the course of a kidnapping.

WTH?
Professional DAs don't go around talking about what they might do, or could do, they just do it.
This is sensationalism imo, and disgusting if this deputy DA actually stated this. This information should not have been released until charges had been filed or were about to be filed. I'd like to know his motive for making this statement, if he in fact did.
I personally think this statement is in poor taste, and should not have been made, especially with the memorial service coming up on Thursday. moo

------------------------------------------------

Deputy District Attorney Robert Himelblau said today that San Joaquin County prosecutors plan to accuse Huckaby of murdering Sandra Cantu with special-circumstance allegations that the killing was committed during a kidnapping, involved a lewd or lascivious act on a child and involved rape with a foreign object.
The special circumstances are what would make Huckaby, 28, eligible for execution. Himelblau said prosecutors would decide later whether to seek the death penalty if Huckaby is convicted.

Himelblau suggested that prosecutors would not immediately provide a theory for why Huckaby might have killed her daughter's playmate.
"We want to know the motive," Himelblau said, "even though the motive doesn't always make sense to us."
Prosecutors went to the Orchard Estates Mobile Home Park in Tracy to discuss the charges personally with Sandra's family. They said the girl's relatives were enraged to hear the crime was apparently even more gruesome than they had believed

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/04/13/MNAB171O1O.DTL

perhaps this is why they decided to release their "plan" (different wording in this article and a direct quote from DA) a day early due to it's explosiveness and aberrative nature.

 

[White Hawk]

I was also sooo hoping that this was some sort of accident and death came fast. How appalling that a 'mother' could do this to a child that was her own child's playmate! I also hope they put the death sentence on the table. Of course, I am sure she's 'insane' and that will be her defense.

That won't fly. She knew right from wrong. You can tell that by the statements she was making and that is what is going to shot down the insanity plea. (I think your statement was sort of 'tongue in cheek' but I wouldn't put it passed her to try anyway.

 

[nursebeeme]

Prosecutors went to the Orchard Estates Mobile Home Park in Tracy to discuss the charges personally with Sandra's family. They said the girl's relatives were enraged to hear the crime was apparently even more gruesome than they had believed.
"This puts salt right into the wound," said Angie Chavez, Sandra's aunt. "I am just sick about this."
Chavez said word of the new charges sent Sandra's mother, Maria Chavez, into new depths of grief and anger

another snip from the above article I posted.

I think if they would not have let the 'cat out of the bag' today... it would have been leaked or come out in one of the many interviews with Angie Chavez. I think it was better, (just my opinion) to come from the horses mouth than be some rumor that grows into some other rumor on the internet and by mouth. This case is beyond even the word aberration. This is a whole new animal (I hope it doesn't wake up similar animals either..)

 

[nursebeeme]

According to court documents, Melissa Lawless owed more than $17,000 in medical expenses. She earned a total of $10,525 in 2002 while working at the grocery store.
Amid the financial chaos, Melissa married Johnny Huckaby on May 10, 2003, four months before giving birth to M Huckaby in San Joaquin County, according to court documents.
The pair moved south to Fontana, but the marriage quickly soured, with Melissa and her daughter moving out of their apartment by May 2004. Melissa took her daughter to mother Judy Lawless' Cypress home and separated from Johnny Huckaby in August 2004, according to the divorce file.
On Jan. 19, 2005, after almost a year living with her mother, Melissa Huckaby filed for divorce, citing irreconcilable differences, court records show.
Melissa's relatives have said the divorce caused mental issues for her. Melissa came to Tracy eight months ago with her daughter to help care for her grandparents in their mobile home park, a few units from where Sandra lived.
In 2006, Huckaby was convicted of petty theft in Los Angeles County. Information about her sentence wasn't immediately available.
Separately, in January, she pleaded no contest to a petty theft charge in San Joaquin County. She was sentenced to three years of probation on the condition that she participate in a county mental health program.
She had been scheduled to go to court this Friday to report on her participation in that program.

snipped from this... http://www.mercurynews.com/crime/ci_12135348

 

[yosande]

Nursebee, I absolutely agree! It drives me nuts when people second guess and blame it on the parents ... "why weren't they in absolute constant communication and control of their child!!!" Of course, there is a level of NORMAL care .... The relatively new phenomenon of "Hover Parents" (a major problem not just for public schools anymore, but for colleges, too) cause problems that are just legion in the adjustment of their children!

Imo, parents should know where their children are at all times, especially that age. When my grandson stayed with me at age 9, he had to tell me where he was going and I would tell him when to be back. He had to make frequent check ins when he was riding his bike. every 1/2 hour and there were boundaries he could not cross. He had to stay on our block.
Once he went missing. He had gone to a friends house, but then they went to another friends house and were playing video games and lost track of time. It wasn't hard to find him though. I just went to the mom of the first friend and asked her where they were, and she thought she knew, and she was correct.
He broke the rules though in not telling me when he left that first friends house, and he got grounded for it, along with many hugs and I love yous, and you scared us. His older sister freaked out when she couldn't find him when I sent her to go get him. She thought they were both missing. lol
imo Sandra's family was lax because they thought she was in a safe neighborhood. MHPs do criminal checks on all residents 18 and over. They aren't to blame but they should have been more diligent, and I'm sure they will be in the future. I hope they knew where she was at all times, but it sounds like Sandra wandered around looking for playmates and was not aware of any danger lurking around when there was apparently more than anyone could have known. moo

 

[daisy.faithfull]

I have no doubt that I could pack the suitcase and get it to the car, in the car, out of the car, on the road ..... but how did it get to the middle of that irrigation pond? There is no way she picked it up and threw it (I just watched Strongest Man and MH doesn't look like any of them).

I wonder how far out it was originally, before the farm guys pulled it to the shore? Do you think MH rolled that suitcase out there? If so, that means she got in the water - so she was wet! Maybe good forensics here, if she dripped all over her car. What about her shoes? They would have had mud in/on them.

It could not have been easy rolling that suitcase in the wet mud under the water. I don't think those ditches are all that deep generally, so probably not more than waist deep, if that. She might have carried it out there? We are talking about 60-80 pounds. I can lift 100 lbs of dog food, but I can't carry it very far. She had to get the suitcase down the embankment, which doesn't look that high, but unless she is pretty strong, it would have been difficult. I wonder if she fell down? I wonder if LE found her clothes from that night?

What did her grandparents see when she got home? Do you think maybe the grandparents saw some really unexplainable things and they are the ones who called the tip line? Maybe MH came home all wet and soggy and told some tale that was just unbelieveable? Grandparents probably didn't think much about it until that suitcase showed up...... Maybe the grandparents started putting 1 and 1 together and coming up with 2 which deserved a call to the tip line.... hmmmmm

This is ALL speculation on my part,

Salem

I've brought a suitcase the size of the one that MH used over a gravely potholed parking lot. I would use the handle, watch my balance because the suitcase was really unstable behind me and rolled it across the parking lot. If I would've walked backwards and used both handles it might have gone quicker, I don't know. I think that MH could have rolled it like that over to the edge of the pond, pushed it over the edge and it either tumbled end over end or slid down into the pond. It looks like the wall down to the water is sloped. Thats how I account for it to being on the edge of the pond-- at least that's where I saw it at first, but I assumed that the workers hadn't moved it at all. Maybe I'm interpreting the dynamics of the pond differently than you.

Here's a picture that I found in the media thread:
http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?sec...bay&id=6747604 ...its a multiple picture frame, the one I'm referring to is the first one

So I don't know if she would have gotten muddy. Certainly dirty... She might not have been too disheveled, especially if she was able to stop at the church and tidy up. But that's splitting hairs.

I wondered the exact same thing about her grandparents when I heard that the police had received a tip. I wonder if there have been suspicions about past behavior, or like the Anthony's just had a bad feeling in their gut. I didn't see the grandparents at the press conference that the family gave before the Easter service. I'm wondering if it has any connection.

My other thought for the tip was the parent of one of MH's past victims.

I hope this hasn't been discussed, I started the message and then got caught up in CSI Miami before I finished. :sunshine:

 

[breanna]

I guess I'll chime in here. I've been checking in on and off. When I saw this earlier today I felt sick and dirty. I wanted to take a shower. This case makes me so sick. WTH?

Why?? Good Lord.

I know some posters said earlier that this was just the beginning and we would all be shocked when the truth came out. Well isn't that the dang truth? Ugh.

Poor little Sandra. I am absolutely DREADING the autospy results

 

[laini]

Well my opinion may not be a popular one, but I don't think Sandra was kept safe. Remember all of the possible suspects when Sandra went missing? That many questionable men in her life and she was a walking target IMO. (and then it turns out to be a woman!)
I have no doubt her family loves her VERY much and I suppose it could be said there is no point in discussing it now,
but she wasn't protected. In the beginning threads when Sandra was first missing there were even those here at WS who were defending the man who kissed her at the pool! I was and am still shocked about reading posters here defending him
here at WS. I really hope the majority of posters here at websleuths wouldn't agree that is okay because that goes against what WS is IMO.
And she went to another adult man's house (with his wife?) to hang out regularly. It was said she had adult friends in teh MH Park. She was a target and not protected.

I respectfully disagree that "hover"parents who fight their kids battles at school (which I don't do!) is the same thing as protecting them from sexual predators in the neighborhood. Two totally different things!

Yes, this was her playmates mom. But she was victimized before and who knows how long she was victimized by Melissa and said nothing. As long as pedophiles, etc... are not given mandatory life sentences and as long as people/parents turn their eyes away and live in denial, our kids are not safe. It is our job to do everything possible to protect them. IMO. Someone might bring up that Melissa wasn't a pedophile released from jail, but that is the point. YOu can't tell by looking.

 

[laini]

Imo, parents should know where their children are at all times, especially that age. When my grandson stayed with me at age 9, he had to tell me where he was going and I would tell him when to be back. He had to make frequent check ins when he was riding his bike. every 1/2 hour and there were boundaries he could not cross. He had to stay on our block.
Once he went missing. He had gone to a friends house, but then they went to another friends house and were playing video games and lost track of time. It wasn't hard to find him though. I just went to the mom of the first friend and asked her where they were, and she thought she knew, and she was correct.
He broke the rules though in not telling me when he left that first friends house, and he got grounded for it, along with many hugs and I love yous, and you scared us. His older sister freaked out when she couldn't find him when I sent her to go get him. She thought they were both missing. lol
imo Sandra's family was lax because they thought she was in a safe neighborhood. MHPs do criminal checks on all residents 18 and over. They aren't to blame but they should have been more diligent, and I'm sure they will be in the future. I hope they knew where she was at all times, but it sounds like Sandra wandered around looking for playmates and was not aware of any danger lurking around when there was apparently more than anyone could have known. moo

I couldn't find the thank you button, and wanted to say thanks for your post! I agree 100%!

 

[Salem]

Respectfully snipped for length ~

I've brought a suitcase the size of the one that MH used over a gravely potholed parking lot.

I think that MH could have rolled it like that over to the edge of the pond, pushed it over the edge and it either tumbled end over end or slid down into the pond. It looks like the wall down to the water is sloped. Thats how I account for it to being on the edge of the pond-- at least that's where I saw it at first, but I assumed that the workers hadn't moved it at all.

Here's a picture that I found in the media thread:
http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?sec...bay&id=6747604 ...its a multiple picture frame, the one I'm referring to is the first one
:sunshine:

Sgt. Sheneman said in one of the pressers that the workers had pulled the bag to the edge of the pond. So the workers brought the bag to shore from somewhere in the pond - but how far out is the question? MH could have done just as you said - stood at the top of the embankment and rolled the bag into the water - but it wouldn't have gone very far.

We have not been given any indication of how far out the bag was, that I know of

Salem

 

[Silver~Bell]

Some of it still doesn't make sense to me. IF MH had drugged Sandra before, why on earth would she have been allowed to roam around? Even if they didn't know WHO had drugged her, that would have precluded ANY free-roaming due to the danger!

I felt this case was going to turn putrid from the get-go.

People think that women do NOT do abberant things. They are very much UNDERESTIMATING the criminal/evil minds of some women, just as they underestimated the number of men involved in child molestation/*advertiser censored* for decades and STILL are underestimating the numbers...

I know other WS'ers must have noticed that in the recent past, many many news articles have come out with elementary and middle-school female teachers molesting children of both sexes. I taught 1st and let me tell you, I was highly disturbed by some of the female teachers they had in our district teaching the 4th - 6th graders. They were never married, they dress as males practically, seem to say off-color things, and just set my hinky meter right off. And the vast majority of molestations or inappropriateness goes UNREPORTED by the victims.

Poor Sandra. I will be surprised if LE does not uncover even more peculiar stuff associated with the case.

 

[SuziQ]

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