Darrel Mohler has been charged with two counts of rape, Lafayette County Sheriff Kerrick Alumbaugh said at a news conference. Missouri police did not have Mohler in custody earlier.

On the request of Missouri officials, Marion County authorities went to Mohler's home in Silver Springs, Florida, and caught him just before he pulled into the driveway, according to a news release from the Marion County Sheriff's Office. He was subsequently arrested.

Mohler told police he "was aware of what was going on in Missouri," and that he had not been there since the 1980s, according to the sheriff's office.

Five members of the Mohler family of Lafayette County, Missouri, were arrested earlier this week after six alleged victims, who are relatives of the five suspects, made accusations of sexual abuse. A sixth person, described as an "associate" of the family, was arrested Thursday but released Friday, police said.

The six alleged victims -- all now adults -- came to law enforcement authorities with stories of sexual performances, mock weddings, rape with various objects and a forced abortion during their childhoods, according to court documents obtained by CNN affiliate KSHB in Kansas City. CNN does not identify alleged sexual assault victims.

Police did not have enough to charge Darrel Mohler earlier, but after examining the victims' statements, obtained enough information to charge him, Alumbaugh said. He added that he does not think Darrel is on the run.

Darrel Mohler, 72, is the younger brother of Burrell Edward Mohler Sr., 77, according to KSHB. On Tuesday, authorities arrested Mohler Sr. and his sons Burrell Edward Mohler Jr., 53; David A. Mohler, 52; Jared Leroy Mohler, 48; and Roland Neil Mohler, 47.

More charges against the family members are expected next week, the sheriff said. Current charges for some of the arrested include rape, deviate sexual assault and use [of] child in sexual performance, according to Missouri State Courts online case management system.

Alumbaugh said that Larry Kidd, 55, of Kansas City, Missouri -- an "associate" of the Mohler family -- was picked up by police following a tip, cooperated with police and has been released.

The alleged abuse took place from the mid-1980s until 1995 and possibly beyond, the sheriff said earlier. The documents provide graphic details of the alleged abuse provided by one of the alleged victims. All of the charges stem from those documents, Alumbaugh said.

Mohler Sr., David Mohler and Jared Mohler are all lay ministers in the Community of Christ, the Independence, Missouri-based organization said in a statement.

Lay ministers are volunteers who do not receive compensation, said the organization, and none of the three served in leadership roles or worked with children.

Mohler Sr. went through the group's registered youth worker program, but "his youth worker registration has been terminated and we understand he had no contact with children or youth in church programs," the statement said.

Some lay ministers might help take care of the church, while others might speak at services, said the organization's spokeswoman, Linda Booth.

The Community of Christ is an offshoot of the modern-day Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It split off from the Mormon church in the 1800s, and in 2000 changed its name to Community of Christ from the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Investigators earlier this week searched several properties for evidence, but there were no plans to continue the searches, Alumbaugh said Friday. He declined to comment on any evidence found.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/11/14/missouri.child.sexual.abuse/index.html

She described Brian David Mitchell, her alleged kidnapper, as "evil, wicked, manipulative, stinky, slimy, selfish, not spiritual, not religious, not close to God."

Smart testified in U.S. District Court in Salt Lake City as part of a competency proceeding for the man charged in her 2002 kidnapping.

Mitchell has twice been found incompetent for trial in state court. Mitchell and his estranged wife were found with Smart nine months after she disappeared from her Salt Lake City home.

A judge ruled earlier this week that testimony from Smart, now 21, is relevant to the mental competency of Mitchell, who was removed from the courtroom before Smart arrived and taken to a holding cell where he could listen to the proceedings.

Smart was poised and composed while testifying for just under two hours.

She was 14 when she was abducted from her Salt Lake City home at knifepoint in the middle of the night. Shortly after her abduction, Smart said Mitchell took her to a mountain camp and performed a ceremony she said was intended to marry the two.

"After that, he proceeded to rape me," Smart said.

She said he held her captive with a cable attached to her leg that had a 10-foot reach. That line was attached to another cable strung between two trees.

Smart said Mitchell plied her with alcohol and drugs to lower her resistance.

"He said that he would kill anybody that would come into the camp, or kill me if I ever tried to escape or yell out," Smart testified.

Smart said Mitchell was motivated by sex and used religion to get what he wanted.

Mitchell's defense attorneys had sought to limit Smart's testimony to her experiences with Mitchell, without her opinions about his mental state.

The defense objected to the 39 so-called "lay witnesses" proposed by prosecutors, including Mitchell's family, friends or workers at Utah State Hospital, because they lacked the expertise to evaluate competency.

In a ruling Monday, U.S. District Judge Dale Kimball rejected the argument as it relates to Smart, saying her testimony may help the court settle differences in the findings of experts who have evaluated Mitchell.

Experts have split opinions over Mitchell's competency and have relied on statements from others -- including Smart -- and past evaluations to prepare reports for the court. Kimball's ruling said Mitchell has been uncooperative with evaluators and refused to participate in diagnostic tests.

In the state court system, Mitchell was twice found incompetent to stand trial.

Smart was rescued nine months after her abduction when a motorist spotted her walking through a suburb with Mitchell and his estranged wife, Wanda Eileen Barzee.

Last year, Mitchell was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of kidnapping and unlawful transportation of a minor.

Once an itinerant street preacher, Mitchell is said to have wanted Smart as a polygamous wife and may have taken her to fulfill a religious prophecy he laid out in a 27-page manifesto drafted in April 2002.

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/10/01/elizabeth-smart-testimony_n_305995.html

John D Ahern was arrested on January 1, 2006 by Texas Rangers but is free again and is a Wanted Sexual Predator - WANTED - for failure to register as a Sex Offender.

He is believed now to be in the Corpus Christi, Texas area.

Convicted Pedophile Felony Child Molestation, Sexual Assault, Statutory Rape, Criminal sexual contact toward a minor - Child Rape - Sexual Intercourse - Unlawful Sexual Intercourse Without Consent - Rape Sexual Penetration Victim - [ 16 years or younger without consent ] - Unlawful Flight to Avoid Prosecution - Failure to Register as a Sex Offender

Please see: http://www.aninchfrommurder.com/john_daniel_ahern/

"God done this in his own time," said Ruthie Lunsford, Jessica's grandmother, who said Couey's death Wednesday morning from anal cancer came as a surprise. "I am not crying."

Her husband, Archie, said his emotions were torn between vengeance and his religious beliefs.

"Death is always sad to me," the 76-year-old grandfather said. "I'm just glad that it's over with. We never got to see him put to death. But we wouldn't have lived that long. No way."

Jessica's father, Mark Lunsford, took a long motorcycle ride to reflect on the day's events. He said he wanted Couey to die from lethal injection.

"My daughter's murderer died today," Lunsford said Wednesday evening. "And it wasn't by our hands. ... John Couey got off easy."

He said he had not been aware that Couey had cancer.

"Cancer is an awful disease," Lunsford said. "Today, it's a good disease."

The prosecutor in the case, Pete Magrino, said he was relieved to hear the news.

"It matters not to me how he died, just that he's dead and he won't be able to victimize anyone ever again."

The Lunsfords endured years of investigation and a lengthy trial ending with a conviction and death sentence for their neighbor, who abducted the child, raped her and killed her in 2005.

Now, it appears that grief seemingly perpetuated for four years by a methodical but at times frustrating legal system may be alleviated - at least as much as it can be for surviving relatives of a young girl who died with such brutality.

According to prosecutors, Jessica - her parents always called her Jessie - was abducted from her home in the middle of the night in February 2005.

Couey kept her in the closet of his nearby mobile home and sexually molested her before binding her wrists and ankles with speaker wire, stuffing her inside two black plastic garbage bags and burying her alive in a 4-foot-deep hole.

Couey, 51, was on death row at the Florida State Prison near Starke until Aug. 12, when medical personnel there sent him to Jacksonville Memorial Hospital, which has a contract with the Florida Department of Corrections to treat inmates when prison doctors can't. He died at 11:15 a.m. Wednesday, corrections spokeswoman Gretl Plessinger said.

She said that during Couey's two years in the prison, he never had a single visitor.

A date for Couey's execution had never been set.

Citrus County Sheriff Jeff Dawsy became intimately involved with the case and often appeared with Lunsford lobbying for stricter sex offender laws.

"I know (Couey) didn't suffer the way Jessie did when he killed her," Dawsy said in a statement released Wednesday evening. "I'm sorry I won't get to look him in the eyes as he died, but I'm relieved to know he'll never hurt another child again."

Couey had been convicted of a sex offense years earlier, but no one in the neighborhood knew about it at the time. He even did some work at the elementary school Jessica attended.

In the years that followed Jessica's death, Mark Lundsford focused on the passage of "Jessie's Law," lobbying across the nation for more stringent restrictions on convicted sex offenders. Florida was the first state to pass the law, and within two years of her death, more than 20 other states followed.

The Jessica Marie Lunsford Act, passed by the Florida Legislature in May 2005, requires school districts to do background checks on contractors and vendors who may come in contact with children.

The law also requires sex offenders to register in person every six months.

Reporters Catherine Dolinski, Josh Poltilove, editor Howard Altman and News Channel 8 reporters Samara Sodos and Krista Klaus contributed to this report.

http://www2.tbo.com/content/2009/sep/30/010250/john-couey-dies-cancer-prison/news-breaking/

This is what Angel, 11, and Starlit, 15, have faced since the arrest last week of Phillip Garrido, charged with the 1991 abduction of Jaycee Dugard, now 29.

"They thought Jaycee was their sister," Dugard's stepfather, Carl Probyn, tells PEOPLE. "People have to realize this will take years of therapy."

Still, there have been encouraging signs the healing has begun. Dugard's reunion with her mother, Terry Probyn, has been "the happiest time of her life, and they are bonding," says Carl, who split with his wife amid the stress of his stepdaughter's kidnapping (Carl was briefly treated as a suspect, then cleared).

Carl Probyn says what the girls and Jaycee need now is to avoid the media. To that end, they're not only turning down interviews and TV shows, he says, but they're not returning with Terry to Riverside, Calif., because the family doesn't want the girls to be seen by paparazzi.

The family members were in a Concord hotel for a few days, but checked out when paparazzi went looking for them, and they are now in an undisclosed house that's under guard by the FBI, Carl tells PEOPLE.

He says it's unclear what the family's costs will be over the next few years. Jaycee hasn't been to school since she was 11, and her daughters have never been to school. They also need lots of counseling. The cost of all this, he says, is anyone's guess.

"This has never happened in history – for someone to be recovered 18 years after an abduction," says Carl Probyn.

http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20301831,00.html

***************************************************************

Call it mother's intuition. Call it a police officer's intuition. But Allison Jacobs knew something was wrong.

The University of California, Berkeley, police officer was sitting in on a meeting with a man named Phillip Garrido, who wanted to hold an event on campus, and Lisa Campbell, special events manager for the university police. Garrido brought along two young girls, introducing them as his daughters.

Jacobs' and Campbell's intuition, authorities said, led to the arrest of Garrido, a registered sex offender who along with his wife, Nancy, now faces 29 felony charges in connection with the 1991 kidnapping of Jaycee Dugard, who was then 11. Both have pleaded not guilty.

Police have said Garrido kept Dugard in a series of sheds in his backyard for 18 years, fathering two children with her -- the 11- and 15-year-old girls he brought with him to the meeting.

In a Friday interview with CNN's "AC360," Campbell said Garrido had approached her August 24 with the two girls in tow, asking about holding his event. She had another commitment, so she asked him to return the following day.

"He was clearly animated, he was very passionate, he was full of life about the things he wanted to talk about," Campbell said. "The girls sort of were recessed in the background. And they were young. It was one o'clock in the afternoon. They weren't in school. They were pretty much unresponsive emotionally, extremely pale ... there was just something about the girls that wasn't right."

She thought the encounter was strange enough to run a background check on Garrido, which revealed that he was on parole after a rape conviction and was a registered sex offender. Campbell asked Jacobs to sit in on the meeting the next day.

Jacobs said she began talking to the girls, trying to engage them in conversation. Checking for any abuse, she asked one girl about a bump on her eye, and the girl told her it was a birth defect, she said.

"They both said that they were home schooled," Jacobs said. "And when I asked about that, they said that the mom and the dad both home schooled them. And then they mentioned an older sister."

"The youngest girl was across from me," Jacobs said. "And she was very intently staring at me and smiling in a very eerie way. The older daughter was looking at Mr. Garrido, and not looking at us, not making eye contact with us. And her eyes were darting around at the ceiling, and [she] would give really quick, clipped one-word answers and would glance at us and back up at him."

She said, "My police intuition was kicking in, but I would say it's more of a mother's intuition. I was worried for these little girls. I knew something wasn't right. I could kind of see it in their eyes, although I really didn't know what it was. And just being the protective mom that I am, my reaction was to try and do what I could to help them."

Jacobs called Garrido's parole officer to tell him about the meeting. "And he stopped me dead in my tracks," she said. "And he said, 'He doesn't have daughters.' And that's when my heart kind of sunk down into my stomach. And I said, 'Well, he introduced them as his daughters. They had his blue eyes. They were calling him "Dad." They even mentioned an older sister at home. So I had no reason to believe that they were anything but his daughters.' "

The parole officer called Garrido in for a meeting Wednesday. He attended, along with his wife, the two girls and another woman named Allissa, police have said. "Allissa" was eventually identified as Dugard. Scott Kernan, undersecretary of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, told reporters Thursday that Garrido admitted abducting Dugard.

"The parole agent called me on my way home from work," Jacobs said Friday. "And he was all excited ... and he said that ... he was involved with a kidnapping case and ... because I called it in, it helped solve this FBI case that was 18 years old."

"We're never going to forget this day," she said. "And I'm glad that Jaycee is safe and working on her road to recovery."

Police acknowledged Friday that someone called 911 in 2006 to report that children appeared to be living in tents in a neighbor's backyard. Contra Costa County Sheriff Warren Rupf told reporters a deputy visited the Garrido home after the call, but did not go in the backyard. "This is not an acceptable outcome," Rupf said.

In a jailhouse interview Thursday with CNN affiliate KCRA, Garrido would not discuss the abduction, but said he had "completely turned" his life around in the past several years.

"You're going to find the most powerful story coming from the witness, from the victim," he promised. "If you take this a step at a time, you're going to fall over backward, and in the end you're going to find the most powerful, heartwarming story."

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/08/31/missing.girl.officers/index.html

Knox, 21, from Seattle, Washington, distanced herself from the confused and conflicting deposition she gave to police just days after her roommate, British student Meredith Kercher, was found dead.

Wearing a white short-sleeve shirt and beige trousers and with her hair in a ponytail, she spoke first in English. She said she was under the influence of marijuana when she spoke to police and did not realize at the time that her police interview was on the record.

She had no attorney during the questioning, Knox said.

"The declarations were taken against my will and they were taken in a state of confusion and pressure by the police," Knox testified before a packed courtroom, filled mostly with members of the media.

Kercher's body was found half-naked in her bed Nov. 2, 2007, at the villa she shared with Knox. Prosecutors have said Kercher, 21, died in a "drug-fueled sex game" with Knox and Knox's then-boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito.

Knox and Sollecito, now 25, are charged with murder and sexual assault.

A third person, Ivory Coast native Rudy Hermann Guede, was convicted of murder in a fast-track trial in October and sentenced to 30 years in prison. He is appealing the verdict.

Kercher suffered a knife wound to the neck. In court papers, prosecutors alleged Sollecito held Kercher by her wrists while Knox poked her with a knife and Guede sexually assaulted her.

Prosecutors say they have physical evidence placing the defendants at the scene, and that the suspects gave investigators confusing and contradictory statements about their whereabouts the night Kercher died.

Knox first said she was at the house she shared with Kercher, then changed her story, according to court records. Sollecito, meanwhile, said he was never at the house, but was at his apartment, watching a movie on his computer with Knox. Later, he told investigators he did not remember whether Knox was with him the entire night.

Knox testified Friday that she was confused and scared when police interviewed her. She said an interpreter was there and encouraged her to remember facts, which led her to say things that she later retracted.

She said police repeatedly called her a liar and mistreated her. When a prosecuting attorney pointed out that police offered her tea at the end of questioning, he said it indicated that they treated her well.

"No," Knox replied firmly.

Knox, who later testified in fluent Italian, also answered questions about local bar owner Patrick Lumumba. He was arrested early on in the case but was later released for lack of evidence.

Lumumba is now suing Knox for defamation of character because she claimed in the deposition that he was present when Kercher was killed. Knox, who had worked at Lumumba's bar, later changed her remarks.

The trial against Knox and Sollecito began January 16 in Perugia, a university town about 185 kilometers (115 miles) north of Rome.

Knox's testimony may continue Saturday, said Luciano Ghriga, one of her lawyers.

Defense lawyers are expected to argue that the physical evidence was tainted by sloppy police work.

The case is being heard by a panel of eight judges. The trial has drawn more than 140 journalists from 86 news outlets to the courthouse in Perugia.

The presiding judge in the case, Giancarlo Massei, has barred cameras from the courtroom and said he could completely close portions of the trial dealing with the most graphic sexual assault allegations.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/06/12/italy.amanda.knox.trial/index.html

According to all three friends, Melissa Huckaby was 18 at the time and living with her parents in La Habra, Calif. The friends, who asked that their names be withheld, did not know each other. But each told the same story that Huckaby was date raped by a police officer shortly after she graduated from high school in 1990, the paper said.

Each said the rape, which Huckaby never reported to police, occurred during a difficult period in her life, when her first boyfriend and best friend had both moved away and she was having trouble getting along with her parents.

One friend also shared private letters suggesting that Huckaby had suicidal episodes since the sixth grade.

Huckaby's ex-husband told ABC's 'Good Morning America' Friday that his ex-wife was generally carefree but "had her struggles" and suffered from depression.

"I do believe the emotional issues came into play quite often in her lifetime," Johnny Huckaby said on 'GMA.' "She did suffer from depression. She did have issues with ... her self-persona, who she saw herself as."

Yet Johnny Huckaby said he could not imagine his former wife, a Sunday school teacher, would be capable of such a hideous crime as the murder of Sandra Cantu. The little girl's body was found stuffed into a suitcase left in an irrigation pond.

"My initial reaction was shock and complete disbelief," Johnny Huckaby said of his ex being the prime suspect. "It's not something you want to think anyone possibly [is capable] of doing -- let alone somebody that you knew. And that's a mother of your child."

The Huckabys wed in August 2003, when Melissa was pregnant with their now 5-year-old daughter. The couple separated a year later and divorced in September 2005.

Johnny Huckaby said, as far as he was aware, his wife was "a good mom" to their daughter.

http://www.momlogic.com/2009/04/sandra_cantu_murder_suspect_raped.php

Melissa Huckaby, 28, was charged with murdering her daughter's playmate, Sandra Cantu, in a gruesome crime that has shocked and terrified residents of Tracy, a Northern California city of about 78,000, 60 miles east of San Francisco.

Huckaby, who volunteered as a Sunday school teacher at her grandfather's Clover Road Baptist Church in Tracy, was due to be arraigned Tuesday afternoon.

Prosecutors filed the murder charge Tuesday before Huckaby's scheduled court appearance and included in their allegations the 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 special circumstances mean Huckaby, if convicted, could face the death penalty or life in prison without the possibility of parole. Prosecutors have said they have not decided whether to seek the death penalty.

Sandra disappeared March 27, last seen on surveillance camera video skipping outside the Orchard Estates Mobile Home Park where she lived just five doors from Huckaby.

A 10-day search by law enforcement and the community ended on April 6, when farmworkers draining an irrigation pond a few miles away from the mobile home complex found the suitcase containing Sandra's body.

Police have said Sandra was found wearing the same clothes she had on when she was last seen: a pink "Hello Kitty" T-shirt and black leggings.

They have not said how, why or where she was killed, and the coroner's office has said autopsy results are pending.

Huckaby was arrested Friday, hours after she told a Tracy Press reporter that the suitcase was hers but it had been stolen the day Sandra went missing.

http://www.cleveland.com/nation/index.ssf/2009/04/woman_sunday_school_teacher_ch.html

"Just utter shock and disbelief," Sandra's aunt, Angie Chavez, told CNN affiliate KOVR. "I can't imagine a mother doing this to a child."

Melissa Huckaby, 28, was booked into the San Joaquin County Jail early Saturday and faces charges of kidnapping and murder in the death of Sandra in Tracy, California.

Sandra was last seen March 27 in the Tracy mobile home park where she lived with her family -- the same mobile home park where Huckaby lives.

The girl's body was found Monday, stuffed into a suitcase submerged in a pond at a dairy farm.

"We have to live the rest of our lives without Sandra. [Huckaby] is in jail. She can still see her little girl grow up," Sandra's uncle, Joe Chavez, told KOVR.

He said the family is "shell-shocked" and hopes that in time they can learn to trust people again.

"Who can you trust at this point?" he said. "Who do you know?"

A police spokesman told reporters Saturday he "couldn't begin to theorize" a motive for Sandra's death.

Huckaby is the granddaughter of Clifford Lane Lawless, pastor at the Clover Road Baptist Church, which was searched as part of the investigation, Tracy police Sgt. Tony Sheneman told reporters. Huckaby taught Sunday school at the church, he said.

In addition, Huckaby's 5-year-old daughter was close friends with Sandra, who often played at Huckaby's home.

Earlier Saturday, Sheneman said he did not believe Huckaby had retained an attorney.

In a Friday interview with the Tracy Press newspaper, Huckaby acknowledged owning the black rolling suitcase that held Sandra's body, but said she reported it missing the day before the girl's body was found. She said it disappeared the same day the girl was last seen.

"There's been a lot of speculation on the news about what happened to my suitcase," she told the newspaper. "It's not my granddad's. It's mine, and someone took it."

Police said Huckaby lives in the same mobile home complex where Sandra lived with her family; the Tracy Press reported Huckaby lives with her grandparents.

Police noted "inconsistencies" between comments Huckaby made to the newspaper and a previous statement she gave authorities, Sheneman said. It was one reason police asked her Friday to come to the station to be interviewed again. She drove there about 6 p.m. Friday, he said.

Authorities believe Huckaby lied about the suitcase being missing, Sheneman said.

Asked whether authorities believe Sandra's death was planned, Sheneman said the question is "not something I can answer right now" but "we do have an indication." He said authorities have found where they believe the girl was killed, but would not divulge that location to reporters.

"I couldn't begin to theorize what her motive is," Sheneman said of Huckaby.

During the Friday night interview with police, Huckaby was "very relaxed for a bit, and then she became very emotional, and then she became relaxed again" before appearing resigned, Sheneman said. He declined to say whether Huckaby had confessed, but said "she revealed enough information that we had probable cause to arrest her."

Huckaby was booked into the San Joaquin County Jail about 3:25 a.m. (6:25 a.m. ET), according to the county sheriff's Web site. She is set to appear in court Tuesday.

Police took Huckaby into custody about 11:15 p.m. Friday (2:15 a.m. ET Saturday), Sheneman said, but she chose to continue talking with them for more than two hours.

Authorities told Sandra's family of the arrest about 2:15 a.m. local time, he said. "They were in disbelief."

Police have had contact with Huckaby before, but she does not have a record of violence, Sheneman said, but did not elaborate. He said no other arrests are expected in Sandra's death.

Citing court records, the Tracy Press reported Huckaby pleaded no contest January 9 to a felony charge of second-degree commercial burglary and a misdemeanor charge of property theft with a prior theft, burglary or robbery.

A criminal complaint says she was jailed in Los Angeles County on a property theft conviction in 2006 and that she attempted to steal from a store in November 2008. According to the complaint, she is on probation in San Joaquin County and is due back in court April 17.

Asked about the court records, Huckaby told the newspaper it wasn't her and that she did not know why the address and cell phone number in the court documents match her own. "I don't know what to say," she said. "That's not me."

Police believe that by the time Sandra was reported missing, she was already dead, Tracy Police Chief Janet Thiessen told reporters Saturday.

"There was some speculation early on that [the suspect] would be a man," Sheneman said Saturday. "It's unusual for a woman -- statistically, according to the FBI -- to be involved in anything like this."

The day Sandra was last reported seen, she returned home from school, kissed her mother and left to play with a friend who lives nearby.

A short time later, wearing a pink Hello Kitty T-shirt and black leggings, she left to go to another friend's home, according to a family spokeswoman. Police said the girl's clothing helped them identify her body.

Huckaby told the Tracy Press that Sandra stopped by her home that day to ask if she could play with Huckaby's daughter, but Huckaby refused because she wanted her daughter to pick up her toys. Sandra left for another friend's home, Huckaby told the newspaper.

How Sandra died has not been made public. An autopsy was conducted earlier in the week, but CNN affiliate KRON-TV said results are not expected for weeks. Thiessen said Saturday any autopsy information as well as search warrants filed in the case remain under seal.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/04/11/california.girl.arrest/index.html

Melissa Huckaby, 28, was arrested at 11:55 p.m., about five hours after she drove herself to the station at the request of police, according to Tracy Police Sgt. Tony Sheneman.

"She gave enough information to us during the course of the interview that probable cause was there to arrest her," said Sheneman.

A massive search for the child, Sandra Cantu, included hundreds of volunteers and law enforcement officials. The search ended April 6 when farmworkers who were draining the irrigation pond to water fields found a suitcase.

Pictures of the girl with dark brown eyes and light brown hair were posted all over Tracy, a city of 78,000 about 60 miles east of San Francisco.

The slain girl's aunt, Angie Chavez, said in a phone interview with The Associated Press early Saturday that she was happy to learn of the arrest.

"I want to know why she did it, if she did it," Chavez said.

Huckaby previously told a local newspaper that Sandra visited her home March 27, the day she disappeared. Huckaby also said she had left her suitcase in the driveway that day, and that it was missing.

Huckaby is the granddaughter of Pastor Clifford Lawless, whose Clover Road Baptist Church was the subject of a police search. Huckaby taught Sunday school at the church.

Huckaby's family had been questioned at length during the investigation, and their homes and vehicles had been searched, Sheneman said.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090411/ap_on_re_us/missing_girl;_ylt=AsCEa7p8IqXIp.K8xr8QPS6s0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTJkc3R2YWpmBGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMDkwNDExL21pc3NpbmdfZ2lybARjcG9zAzIEcG9zAzcEc2VjA3luX3RvcF9zdG9yeQRzbGsDY2FsaWZzdW5kYXlz

The Clover Road Baptist Church was cordoned off Tuesday afternoon as FBI agents combed over the property and hauled off items, KOVR-TV reported. Agents would not comment on what they were searching for.

The church's pastor, Lane Lawless, became a focus of the investigation a day after Cantu's body was found. Authorities searched his home Monday night and again on Tuesday morning. Lawless and his wife were questioned for hours.

Police point out that, contrary to some media reports, that Lawless has not been arrested, only questioned, "like hundreds of people," said Sgt. Sheneman. Officials stressed that they are not focusing on any one person in the investigation, but say the case is shaping up to head in a particular direction.

That direction, Sheneman said, is confidential. "To comment on that would compromise the investigation and I cannot do that," he said.

"They took the usual stuff, phone, computer, things of that nature," said Connie Lawless, the pastor's wife. "We were very open to them taking anything they wanted to take. We were not at all disturbed by that. We feel that the more people they can eliminate the quicker they will be able to get to the truth of the matter."

Connie said she suspected that police were interested in her husband's church because Sandra often played at their house with the Lawless' granddaughter.

"It breaks our heart that someone would take such a sweet child," she said.

Officials say they suspect the culprit is a local resident, given that the area that Sandra's remains were found in. She was stuffed into a suitcase and dumped into an irrigation pond, in a rural area about two miles from where she lived.

"I've lived here for almost 12 years, I've worked here for nine years," Sheneman said. "The location where Sandra's body was found I'm completely unfamiliar with. Someone would have to be familiar with the area to know to go there to place that suitcase."

A local defense attorney and DNA expert that has worked on several famous cases -- including the Unabomber, O.J. Simpson and the Phil Spector murder trial -- says that critical details of the case will point police to Sandra's murderer.

"The fact that she was still clothed in the clothes she had [the day she disappeared] suggests to me that whatever happened probably happened very quickly," said Bob Blaiser.

Surveillance video showed Sandra Cantu skipping away from her mobile home park the day she disappeared, and Blaiser says that was opportunity the killer was waiting for.

"It may have been what attracted the person who kidnapped her, the fact that she was also alone," Blaiser said.

The fact that Sandra was found so close to her home suggests that the murder was a crime of passion, he added.

Blaiser criticized the Tracy Police Department's handling of the case, saying that they took too long to bring in scent dogs to track down the missing eight-year-old girl, a move he said could have "absolutely" saved her life.

"It's very sloppy police work," Blaiser said. "They can't think of everything, but that's sort of the very obvious thing that you expect them to think about."

Tracy is a city of 78,000 about 60 miles east of San Francisco.

http://cbs2chicago.com/national/sandra.cantu.missing.2.979073.html

Authorities grimly announced Monday evening that they have conclusively identified the remains found sealed into a suitcase that was dumped into a Tracy pond as missing eight-year-old Sandra Cantu, news that stunned the local community.

At a press conference at Tracy City Hall, Police Chief Janet Thiessen and Sgt. Tony Sheneman confirmed that the container found by farm workers in an irrigation pond contained Sandra's body, and vowed to find the little girl's killer.

"We will be determining the person or persons responsible for this reprehensible act, and we will bring them to justice," Chief Janet Thiessen said.

Sgt. Sheneman said the dark suitcase was found around 11:40 a.m. Monday while workers drained a pond near Tracy Boulevard and Bacchetti Road. Search and rescue teams had already canvassed the area, but did not see the suitcase in the dirty, murky waters.

The farm workers had heard of the search for Sandra, and the farm owner immediately called authorities. The owner said that the pond had been empty two weeks ago, and when they filled it with water, there was no suitcase in the area.

Authorities were able to quickly identify Sandra by the clothes that she was wearing, a pink "Hello Kitty" T-shirt and black leggings, when she went missing on March 27. An autopsy will be performed Tuesday to determine the girl's cause of death.

Investigators have not released any other information on the case.

Somber crowds gathered at the Orchard Estates mobile home park, where Sandra Cantu lived and was last seen before she disappeared. A weeping mother and daughter embraced in the crowd, and the mother said she didn't know how to come to grips with the tragedy.

"That was my daughter's friend," she said through tears.

Casey Goodall, associate superintendent of the Tracy Unified School District says additional counselors will be brought to Sandra's school to help classmates cope with the loss.

The Search For The Killer Begins

At around 11:40 p.m. Monday night, Tracy Police officers sealed off the mobile home park with yellow tape and said they were treating the park as a crime scene. A large number of investigators from the Federal Bureau of Investigation were seen driving into the park and were seen searching either a home or garage. Authorities were tight-lipped about the focus of their investigation. They left the park at around 3 a.m. with multiple evidence trailers.

Police were also at the Clover Road Baptist Church Monday night gathering evidence. The church, which hasn't been tied to the case until now, is located about 1/3 mile from the mobile home park. It too is surrounded by yellow crime scene tape. According to a resident at the park, a resident of the park who was questioned last night is a pastor at the church.

Authorities said earlier in the investigation that they had questioned every resident of the park multiple times, and several cars had been towed away last week, stained with fingerprinting dust.

Two residents of the mobile home park had been investigated as persons of interest, and one of them admitted to kissing Sandra on the lips two years ago, but flatly denied having anything to do with her disappearance.

Police called an end to large-scale ground operations in the search for missing eight-year-old Sandra Cantu. About 300 volunteers and law enforcement officers fanned out across an area of open fields Saturday.

Over the weekend, Sandra's mother told CBS13 that she thinks Sandra did not run away. "I think somebody took her. She wouldn't walk off. She wouldn't leave the mobile home park at all. I think somebody has her," Maria Chavez said.

Police had received more than 1,000 tips since the little girl was last seen on March 27.

http://cbs13.com/local/tracy.pond.tony.2.978107.html

The grainy scene appears for about eight seconds before she disappears from view. Police Lt. Jeremy Watney showed the clip Saturday at a news conference, but offered no details.

"I can't get into specifics of where it came from. That's all part of the investigation," he said. "The CD will show you exactly how she looked on that particular day when she went missing."

In the video, the girl emerges from a pathway at the Orchard Estates Mobile Home Park into what appears to be an alley. To her right is the corner of what looks like a wooden deck; there seem to be deep shadows on the left.

Watney said authorities initially thought Sandra was carrying a purse or backpack, but the images turned out to be shadows. He said authorities have "hundreds of hours of videotapes" in the case.

The day the child disappeared, she came home from school, kissed her mother and left to play with a friend who lives a couple of homes away. A short time later, she left that home to go to another friend's home, according to a spokeswoman for her family. She was reported missing about 8 p.m.

Sandra was wearing a pink Hello Kitty T-shirt and black leggings.

Watney said the reward for information leading to her whereabouts has increased to $26,000, and authorities are following more than 800 leads. More than 300 trained searchers from 17 agencies were out on Saturday.

Earlier in the week, authorities impounded and searched a car -- the fourth one to be seized -- that was parked near the mobile home park. They also sifted through garbage and searched a nearby

On Monday night, Tracy police and FBI agents searched six locations, some in the Orchard Estates Mobile Home Park and some in Tracy. All of the places were connected to two men who live in the mobile home park, officials said.

Authorities have not called the men suspects and have not named them publicly. They did not say how or if they might be related to the case.

Police have said they do not believe Sandra ran away.
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The girl's aunt, Angie Chavez, told CNN Headline News' Nancy Grace that Sandra's father lives in Mexico and was not around the day she disappeared.

Tracy is about 60 miles east of San Francisco.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/04/04/california.missing.girl.videotape/index.html

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Daniel Cantu, the father of missing Tracy girl Sandra Cantu, was interviewed Wednesday by police, but he was not detained, an official said.

The information emerged just minutes after Lt. Jeremy Watney told reporters during a morning news conference in Tracy that investigators did not know the whereabouts of the father.

"If we need to go locate him, we'd be able to," Watney said.

Watney called the slow progress in finding Sandra Cantu "frustrating," adding that investigators have been busy sifting through nearly 500 leads from the public.

The 8-year-old girl was last seen Friday afternoon walking in Orchard Estates Mobile Home Park, located just off West Clover Road. A reward for information leading to Cantu's return has grown to $17,000.

"We want her back safe," Watney said during the news conference. "I mean, that's the bottom line."

Officials earlier focused their search on two men who live in the mobile home park, but Watney said Wednesday that nobody had been ruled out.

"Everybody is of interest," said Watney, who called the investigation "extremely frustrating."

Police planned another news conference at 3:30 p.m. Wednesday to offer an update.

Meanwhile, Sacramento bounty hunter Leonard Padilla is offering a $10,000 of the $17,000 reward for information about the whereabouts of the girl.

Cantu is 4 feet tall, 45 pounds and has brown hair and brown eyes. She was last seen wearing a pink Hello Kitty T-shirt and black leggings.

Anyone with information may call the Tracy Police Department at 209-831-4550. Investigators said anyone wishing to donate money for the reward fund may call police.

http://www.kcra.com/news/19064633/detail.html