Commentary: Substance Melissa Huckaby is accused of using on two others shown on police log to be a tranquilizer of the same description

Hat tip: Logical (May 23 Crimesearchers discussion on blog post, “Melissa Huckaby charged with poisonings”)

As I was looking into today’s announcement of a true-bill indictment of Melissa Huckaby on five counts, including the murder, rape and drugging of Sandra Cantu, I revisited a Crimesearchers discussion back in May in which research hound extraordinaire Logical dug up an article from the Tracy Press (http://tinyurl.com/pnp6lx) about an encounter with Daniel Plowman, the drugging victim named in the fifth count of the indictment. In that article, it was revealed that the police log showed one of Huckaby’s other alleged drugging victims, the otherwise-unnamed seven-year-old “Jane M. Doe” (referenced in counts three and four), was “high on benzodiazepine.”

Being no medical expert, I looked up benzodiazepine in an online medical dictionary (Healthline.com) and was flabbergasted to discover that the form of benzodiazepine known as chlordiazepoxide is the formula that is commercially marketed by the Pfizer pharmaceutical company under the brand name Xanax! Looking at the incident with the seven-year-old described in the indictment, I noted that it dates back to January 17, 2009, and at that time discussion was still hot and heavy about toxicology and the possibility that Casey Anthony may have used Xanax as a babysitter—we do know that in one text conversation with Jesse Grund Casey mentioned the possibility of “hit[ting] up Annie” for Xanax. We have since learned that, ostensibly, toxicology reports have come up either negative or inconclusive with respect with Caylee, but the coincidence is still striking, and does raise at least the outside chance that copycat crimes might be in view.

Having taken a step back from the Cantu case, it looks likely to me that Huckaby may have been working her way up to the degree of crime for which she was eventually arrested; and it also occurred to me that, in a manner of speaking, she could have been attempting to turn the tables on having to take anti-anxiety drugs herself. (Whatever could possess anyone—much less a Sunday School teacher—to add murder and rape to this kind of crime, however, is far beyond my comprehension.) Please, please, bear in mind that in this commentary I cannot say with certainty that any of this is true, but merely possible, and I raise these issues for discussion. 

Huckaby Indicted On Murder, Rape, Kidnap Charges By Jury

The Associated Press  |  Monday, August 17, 2009

STOCKTON - A San Joaquin grand jury has indicted a Sunday school teacher on charges she kidnapped, raped and killed an 8-year-old girl and drugged two other people.

Twenty-eight-year-old Melissa Huckaby broke down in tears as Judge Linda Lofthus read the indictment against her Monday.

Prosecutors convened a grand jury in late July rather than hold a preliminary hearing to determine whether Huckaby would stand trial. A trial date has not been set.

Huckaby previously pleaded not guilty to murdering 8-year-old Sandra Cantu, whose body was found stuffed in a suitcase pulled from an irrigation pond in April.

She also pleaded not guilty to charges drugging a 7-year-old girl as well as a 37-year-old man, whom police believe she had dated.

Link: http://www.fox40.com/news/headlines/ktxl-news-huckaby0817,0,7005606.story

Link to indictment document (pdf): http://www.fox40.com/news/headlines/ktxl-acrobat-huckabyindictment,0,4506508.acrobat