Surprise guilty plea in Sandra Cantu murder

Source: SF Chronicle

A Tracy woman pleaded guilty today to charges that she murdered 8-year-old Sandra Cantu, a surprise move in a case that garnered national attention.

Appearing in San Joaquin County Superior Court, Melissa Huckaby, 29, entered her plea to murder with a special circumstance for kidnapping, said Deputy District Attorney Robert Himelblau. Huckaby faces life in prison without the possibility of parole when she is sentenced June 14 by Judge Linda Lofthus.

Huckaby's plea in a Stockton courtroom took place at what had been scheduled as a procedural hearing in advance of a trial set for this fall. Prosecutors had been urging for the case to move along since the Sunday school teacher's arrest in April 2009.

In exchange for her plea, prosecutors agreed not to seek the death penalty and dropped other charges, including child endangerment and furnishing a harmful substance for allegedly drugging a 7-year-old girl and a man in the months before Sandra died.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/05/10/BAH01DC7P9.DTL&tsp=1

Hideous. That poor little girl!!!