Sandra Cantu Murder Suspect Melissa Huckaby Tied To Case Of Missing Girl Who Was Found Drugged

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Cantu Murder Suspect Tied To Girl's Drugging

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Apr 20, 2009 11:15 pm US/Eastern

Cantu Murder Suspect Tied To Girl's Drugging

TRACY, Calif. (CBS) ―

Click to enlarge 1 of 2: Melissa Huckaby, 28, appears in a courtroom in Stockton, Calif., on April 14, 2009. Huckaby was charged with murdering her daughter's friend, 8-year-old Sandra Cantu, in a gruesome crime that has shocked and terrified residents of Tracy, Calif.
Paul Sakuma/AP
Click to enlarge 2 of 2: CBS

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Huckaby Now Tied To Jan. Missing Girl Case

A Tracy police report has tied 28-year-old Melissa Huckaby -- the suspect in the kidnapping and murder of eight-year-old Sandra Cantu -- to another missing girl case in January, and Huckaby acknowledged in a CBS interview that she was with the girl during the time she was reported missing.

According to the police documents, a family who resides in the Orchard Estates Mobile Home Park reported at 5:17 p.m. that their seven-year-old daughter had been missing for four hours on the afternoon of January 17. Police arrived quickly and reportedly discovered at 5:31 p.m. that she was with Melissa Huckaby at the park.

When Huckaby found out the girl's family was worried, she returned the girl to her mother at about 5:43 p.m., and police soon left the scene without making any arrests, CBS station KOVR-TV reported.

About five hours later, the girl's mother took her to the hospital, and police were called back once a doctor determined that the girl was under the influence of Benzodiazepines, a muscle relaxant. Police were not able to prove that Huckaby gave the girl the drugs due to the time that had passed before the girl was taken to the hospital.

On the day she was arrested, Huckaby confirmed with a CBS correspondent from San Francisco by phone that she had been with the girl during the time she was reported missing.

"I had taken my daughter and one of her friends to the park, which I had done for the third time that week," Huckaby said on April 10. "Her mother was, I guess, at work, and the grandmother had told the little girl that she could go to the park, which she does all the time. When the mother came home, she didn't know where she was."

Huckaby said she had given her cell phone number to the girl's mother, but the mother said she lost it.

The police report of the January incident says that the suspect allegedly took the girl in a purple Kia Sportage. Police towed a purple Kia Sportage registered to Melissa Huckaby after farmworkers found Cantu's body inside a suitcase in an irrigation pond.

Huckaby was charged with murdering Cantu, with the added special circumstances of rape with a foreign object, lewd or lascivious conduct with a child under 14 and murder in the course of a kidnapping.

The 28-year-old divorced mother is due back in court this upcoming Friday, when she is expected to enter a plea.