The Abduction & Murder of Sandra Cantu | The Interrogation Room hosted by Vivica A. Fox | Forensic Files

(tense music) - [Vivica] Observing the signs. - She brings her legs in quite tightly
and she wrings her hands together. - [Vivica] Detecting changing stories. - [Tim] Who wrote this note?
- [Melissa] I have no idea. - Who wrote the note? - [Tim] Who do you think wrote this note?
- It was a repetitive question. - [Vivica] Spotting when to hold back, and when to close in.
- [Tim] I think you're our witness. - [Melissa] You think I'm the witness? - She's no longer the helper.
She is now the suspect. (ominous music) - I'm Vivica A. Fox. As an award-winning actress,
I know how to play a part and convince audiences I'm someone else. I can spot the signs when someone is playing a role
and not being honest. We'll expose the lies and uncover the shocking truth on our journey to discover
the secrets of the interrogation room. - No matter how much physical evidence you have,
you always want a confession. (apprehensive music) - [Vivica] In the small town of Tracy, California,
Homicide Detective Timothy Bauer has called a 28-year-old woman into the interrogation room.
- [Tim] I wanna make this clear. You're not under arrest. You know that? - [Melissa] Yeah.
- [Tim] Okay, anytime you wanna leave, you can. Not a big deal. Okay, if you don't wanna talk about anything, you can leave.
(light pensive music) - [Vivica] It's been a week since the cops have received an emergency call.
(phone dialing) (phone ringing) - [Vivica] When eight-year- old Sandra Cantu went missing,
her mom Maria's call to police sparked a major investigation. - [Tim] Sandra Cantu lived in a trailer park
here in the city of Tracy. She was very fun loving kid. She made friends very, very easily, very vibrant kid.
- When a child goes missing, it's the job of the Federal Bureau of Investigation to assist.
Details of a missing child are immediately entered into a national database that is monitored by the FBI.
In Sandra's case, this meant that the Tracy Police Department received expert advice
on the same night she vanished. (eerie music) - [Tim] Within about four hours of Sandra missing,
we enter her into a national database. And so, shortly after midnight, I was contacted by the FBI,
and they were wanting to know what assistance we needed from them. - [Vivica] When Sandra Cantu disappeared
on March 27th, police and volunteers launched an intense search. The FBI provided local cops with the profile of the suspect,
advising they needed to look for a man who Sandra may have known. - Profile typically is a white male,
25 to 37 years old, might possibly know the victim. So we pull our sex registry list for our city
and interview them to either rule them in or rule them out as part of the investigation.
- [Vivica] In those first few days, the team focused on five male suspects who lived in the same trailer park as Sandra.
Meanwhile, the close-knit community prayed for the little girl's return. - When anytime a child is missing,
everyone is on a heightened sense of alert. - Every parent is going to be fearful--
Who's out there? What's gonna happen to my child? And there's a sense of urgency.
- [Vivica] 10 days later came the news that nobody wanted to hear. - [Tim] On Monday, April 6th, about 10:15 in the morning,
a farmer located a suitcase in a pond just outside the city limits. - Inside the suitcase,
cops found Sandra's decomposing body. (sombre music) The missing person's case was now a murder investigation.
On the same day that Sandra disappeared, a neighbour had her suitcase stolen. Melissa Huckaby lived just down the street
from Sandra Cantu's family, and her daughter Madison was friends with Sandra. Like the rest of the community,
she was desperate to help find the little girl's killer. (sombre music) Police asked Melissa Huckaby
to provide a statement about the stolen suitcase. (sombre music) - [Tim] You know, just plain putting it out there,
we need your assistance in however way you can help us in figuring this whole thing out
and figuring, you know, what happened and that kind of thing. So... So the house you're staying at,
you live with your grandma and grandpa, right? - Yes. - And he's the one that's the pastor of the church, right?
- Yeah. - Okay. - [Paul] The purpose of a police interview is to get to the truth,
to find out what's actually taken place. - [Melissa] I was doing the bulletin board for the Sunday school.
- [Paul] So it's to obtain the best evidence from that person, whether they be a suspect or a witness.
- [Tim] So you said one of your suitcases was missing or something? Or what was it? - [Melissa] It was stolen.
- It was stolen? - Yeah. - I wanted to develop some type of rapport and relationship with her
that she trusted me. Did you report it stolen? - [Melissa] I had called, before we even had found out that Sandra was gone.
(camera whirring) - [Vivica] Melissa Huckaby explains that she had mistakenly left the suitcase on her driveway
in the trailer park when she packed up her car to go to church. When she got there, she called her grandma.
- [Melissa] I asked her where my suitcase was, if she went outside and check, because it dawned on me that I didn't have it.
'Cause after I unloaded everything, in my car-- - [Darren] I think a lot of the interview,
she was quite relaxed. There was nothing to suggest that she was implicated or involved.
- [Melissa] I told her, I asked her if she thinks that I should-- - [Vivica] Investigators want to establish
if there's any connection between Melissa Huckaby's stolen suitcase and the one they discovered in the irrigation pond
containing Sandra Cantu's body. - [Tim] I wanna show you a picture of two different pieces of luggage.
One's a black suitcase, and one's another piece that possibly could go with it or something like that.
Tell me if you recognize either one of these or if they look like yours. Take a look at this one right here.
- [Melissa] I have that one. - [Tim] Okay, that's one? - [Melissa] Yeah. (eerie music)
- [Vivica] It's a breakthrough. Melissa Huckaby confirms her suitcase looks identical to the one Sandra was found in.
- She's been interviewed briefly, for 30 minutes or so. - [Tim] Let me turn this thing on.
- [Paul] And then she's allowed to leave the station. - [Tim] Your car, where are you parked? Downstairs?
- [Melissa] It says "police parking". - Having answered the questions about her suitcase,
Melissa Huckaby leaves the station. But even as she's traveling home, the cops are uncovering new evidence
that raises more questions about this young mother's connection to the murder of Sandra Cantu.
Within 24 hours, Melissa Huckaby will be back in the interrogation room. Coming up,
why a mystery note could be a key to solving this crime. - There is a note that only somebody with intricate knowledge
could have written. - [Vivica] And the revelation that leads to a change of heart.
- Just admit to me you're lying. 'Cause if you're lying about this, I know you're lying about other things.
- [Tim] All right. Thanks for coming. - [Melissa] Oh, no problem. (light pensive music)
- [Vivica] 24 hours after her first interview with the police, Sunday school teacher Melissa Huckaby
is invited back into the interrogation room. - [Melissa] Oh, they go to my church.
- Chatting with Detective Bauer, she reveals a background in Criminal Justice Studies.
- [Melissa] Criminal Justice. I went to Fullerton College for Criminal Justice for two years.
- [Tim] When was that? - [Melissa] That was when I just got out of high school in '99.
- Detective Bauer plays her personality traits absolutely superb. She's almost flirtatious with him.
(Melissa laughs) - I'm not gonna tell you the dates. You said '99. - [Melissa] Well, you don't look old.
- [Tim] Yeah. Well. (Melissa laughs) - [Maleary] The best skill that an investigator, detective,
interrogator should have is communication. You should have the ability to talk and listen in equal measure.
- Melissa Huckaby has been invited back to police headquarters to talk about the day after Sandra Cantu went missing.
That night, the local community held a candlelight vigil in the hope of finding little Sandra alive.
While it was going on, Huckaby says she found a note blowing on a pathway in the trailer park.
- [Tim] It was a Saturday evening. Melissa Huckaby went to the manager's office
just next to the entrance of the trailer park, to report her suitcase lost or stolen from the previous day.
While she was walking to the manager's office, she located a note that she found was suspicious
laying on the sidewalk, and then she picked up the note and gave it to us. She became upset, started crying.
Kind of appeared frantic to a couple of our police officers that were at the trailer park.
- It's not surprising the note caused distress. Written on it was Sandra Cantu's name
and the words "stolen suitcase" and "witness". It also gave the names of two streets,
which would eventually lead cops to Sandra's body, locked in a stolen suitcase belonging to Melissa Huckaby.
- [Tim] What'd you see? - [Melissa] I saw, like, a little paper on the ground and I just kicked at it,
and it had some, like, dirt on it and I saw the word "Cantu" on the top. And so I, like, picked the note...
- The note is probably the most important part of the investigation at this point.
- [Vivica] It's a startling piece of evidence, and it's attracting interest from local TV and press.
- I know there's been speculation on the news about, like, a note being in the suitcase
or being by my suitcase, or... - [Tim] That's what the news is saying? - [Melissa] Yeah.
- [Vivica] Maybe it's the criminology student in her, but Melissa Huckaby seems almost excited
to be involved with the case. - [Melissa] A lot of people texting me everywhere.
Oh, down in Orange County, people are... 'Cause they know, they've been watching the news.
And they're like, "Hi, you're all over the news." And I'm like, "I don't even watch the-"
- I think her ego is percolating a little bit, and she's really feeling good about herself.
- [Melissa] I left for an hour, not even an hour, to go get my prescription at Walgreens
and I had 22 messages on the phone. - [Vivica] It's taken a week for Melissa Huckaby to be interviewed.
That's because she was admitted to the hospital after swallowing razor blades. She said this happened by accident
while she was sleepwalking. While she was being treated, the suitcase containing Sandra's body
was pulled out of the water, making news headlines. - [Tim] Did you ever see one of those pictures on the news?
They kept showing it on the news. - [Melissa] I didn't see it on the news. I just saw it on the picture that my mom sent me.
- [Tim] We had one of our undercover officers standing, unbeknownst to Melissa,
in the doorway of her hospital room. - When the police observed her in the hospital,
when the body was found, I think the primary reason for their observation was to gauge her reaction.
- And she just kind of blurted out spontaneously, "That looks like my suitcase."
- [Melissa] I saw it on the news later on, and it didn't look like my suitcase.
It didn't look like my suitcase at all. - [Vivica] Huckaby's lie sows a seed of doubt
in Detective Bauer's mind, and he probes a bit deeper about her relationship with her daughter's friend Sandra.
- [Tim] Why did they pick Sandra that day? - [Melissa] She just wanders around.
She's lonely. She wanders around by herself. She doesn't play with a lot of the other kids.
I know a lot of kids- - [Tim] As a detective in a case like this, it's my job to try to have
the best understanding I can of Melissa. - [Melissa] And she gets along better with Sandra.
- [Vivica] One detail that emerges is that Melissa Huckaby seems to have issues
with Sandra's friendship with her daughter Madison. - [Melissa] Sandra kind of has a tendency
to be a little bit bossy, and try and get Madison to, like, get into things she's not supposed to.
- Oh, really? - Yeah. - She did not like that, in her view, that Sandra received more attention in that trailer park
and appeared to be more likeable or more fun-loving or more charismatic than her own daughter.
- [Vivica] This revelation persuades Detective Bauer to ramp up the pressure on Huckaby.
(tense music) - [Tim] Do you find it ironic that YOU found that note? Nobody else found it.
- [Melissa] Yeah, I do. To be honest, I do. - [Tim] And do you find it ironic that
it talked about a stolen suitcase and your suitcase was stolen? - [Melissa] Yes.
- Officer Bauer starts to press around who wrote the note. - [Tim] Who wrote this note?
- [Melissa] I have no idea. - "Who wrote the note?" - [Tim] Who do you think wrote this note?
- It was a repetitive question. - [Tim] I mean, IF you had to speculate or estimate or-
- [Melissa] Looks like a kid wrote it. - [Maleary] At this point, Huckaby realized
that she's no longer the helper. She is now the suspect. - [Tim] The only person that could have found this note
either wrote this note or who knew wrote this note. That's why they put "witness".
And you're the closest person to that witness because you found this note. - You can physically see her whole being change
as a result of the questioning that he was giving. - [Tim] I think you're our witness.
- [Melissa] You think I'm the witness? - [Tim] Yeah, I think you're the person that can help us.
- And her posture's quite telling because she withdraws inwards. She brings her legs in quite tightly
and she wrings her hands together. - [Melissa] Do you think that maybe somebody knew that it was my suitcase,
and then maybe put the note where I was? No? - No. - [Darren] The whole body's been withdrawn inwards
and that's a key point of it. You know, she knows she's caught, really. (ominous music)
- My problem is we have a dead eight-year-old girl found in a suitcase that looks exactly like yours,
and that suitcase, where it was stolen from, is the same place where that little girl Sandra was last seen,
your daughter's best friend. - [Vivica] Just as things are starting to heat up,
there's an interruption. (door knocking) - [Tim] Hold on a minute. - You have a phone call. - All right.
Hold on real quick. I'll be right back. - [Melissa] Okay. - Any time a detective leaves the interrogation room,
there's a purpose behind them leaving the room. The detectives are going to talk to each other
and discuss a new direction, a new strategy going forward. - [Vivica] Huckaby is left on her own
for more than five minutes. It's a deliberate tactic to increase the pressure.
- [Robyn] It is certainly going to leave the suspect to feel isolated, alone, start to think about what they've said,
try and come up with strategy in their mind. - [Vivica] When Detective Bauer returns,
Melissa's mood seems to have changed. - [Tim] All right, sorry. - [Melissa] I'm ready to leave now.
It's not eight something, it's 10 something. - [Tim] No, it's nine... Oh, crap. - Yeah.
- [Tim] Okay, give me a couple more minutes. I'm gonna ask you something. I'll tell you about something I found at your house.
- [Melissa] Okay. - They've now turned to presenting evidence to Melissa. - [Vivica] It starts with the paper note
Huckaby said she found on the street. - [Tim] We found, in Melissa's bedroom, a notebook that had some ripped-out pages.
I looked at that spiral notebook that we took, and there's a couple interesting things we found.
We were able to take that notebook and match the paper from the notebook as the same exact paper
as the note that Melissa found on day two of the case. - [Tim] And I took the paper and I put it on it,
and it covered up 'IN'. The exact same design. Dude, I'm not kidding you, I'm being dead serious.
- They go to her house, find a notebook that the page was torn out of. They find the imprint where she had written, on the below page.
- [Tim] This is where Sandra was found. Exactly what this note says. EXACTLY what this note says.
(light music) - [Vivica] It's been three hours since Melissa Huckaby stepped into the interrogation room,
and attention turns to some crossed-out words on a post-it note. - Now, let me show you.
In the glove compartment of her vehicle, we located a blue sticky note. Two of the words that were written on it
were Whitehall Rd and Bacchetti Rd, which was the intersection where the suitcase was found.
- [Tim] This is the paper. Do you know what kind of piece of paper it is? - [Melissa] Post-it note.
- [Tim] What colour? - [Melissa] I don't-- Turquoise. - That's another psychological effect.
Blow up the note big. Make it a lot larger than it actually is and it overwhelms them.
- [Tim] Do you know where I found this? - [Melissa] In my car? - [Tim] Where? - [Melissa] In the dashboard.
- [Tim] What does it say? - [Melissa] It says the two street names. - [Ciolino] The goal of any interrogation
is to get an initial confrontation that you've been lying. We want that one little lie.
It might not be the big lie, but just admit to me you're lying, 'cause if you're lying about this,
I know you're lying about other things. - [Tim] What's this word right here? - [Melissa] That is...
Bacchetti. - Mm-hmm. Bacchetti what? - And Whitewall. - [Tim] And what? Whitehall. - [Melissa] Whitehall.
- He was showing her that she lied, we knew it, and it was the biggest sign to show that she was lying.
And from that point, she started to crumble. - [Tim] What? (pensive music) - [Vivica] Huckaby now claims
that having found the note with the street names on it, it prompted her to go and look for Sandra,
and that this was the reason for the Post-it note in her car. - [Melissa] I don't know why I didn't tell you that.
- [Tim] Well, let's talk about it. Why? - [Melissa] Well... - [Tim] Possibly. - [Tim] Mm-hmm. (Melissa sobbing)
- Every time a suspect starts to change their story in an interview, it makes them less and less believable.
The detective knows that he's onto something. Now her resolve is weakening. - [Vivica] Now that she's admitted to
lying about the note, Detective Bauer wants to know about Huckaby's visit to the local church
on the day Sandra disappeared, the visit that gives Melissa her alibi. - [Tim] What did you do when you went to the church?
You went the church for about two and a half hours. - [Melissa] Yeah, for about two and a half hours.
- [Tim] Did you ever leave the church? - [Melissa] Umm... Not that I remember.
- He's picked apart her lies and he's left the best bit to last. It's the closing scene of the show.
- [Tim] When you enter in the keypad, do you know what that does? It's like, what happens when you call a phone?
- [Ciolino] He's got her, because she hit the alarm code and they've got the security company records.
- [Tim] It has a timestamp on it, right? - [Melissa] Yeah. - And only she had that code.
- [Tim] I can show it to you like this through evidence, or you could just tell me about it.
Um... But you weren't at the church the whole time. I know that, and you know that.
You left the church. - He moves slightly closer. He leans in a lot more. The voice tone of the policeman goes up
and the voice becomes louder. So he is pushing Huckaby to give him the truth. - [Tim] Your car left the church parking lot
for a significant amount of time on that Friday the 27th. - [Ciolino] Now she's really screwed.
And now we'd moved into the mode of "How do I minimize this damage?" - [Melissa] To tell you the truth, right now I think I want a lawyer
because I'm not... with it right now. - [Tim] You're not with it? - [Melissa] I'm not feeling very well.
- [Tim] You don't wanna talk anymore? - [Melissa] No. - [Vivica] Almost instantly,
all conversation in the interrogation room comes to a halt. - She asked for a lawyer, and Bauer, appropriately, goes,
"Done. Can't help you. I'm out of here." (paper rustling) - [Maleary] With the theatrical movement of exhibits,
the closing up of books... it was well exaggerated. It gave her the view that Officer Bauer had enough.
- [Tim] You know, we're not gonna talk anymore 'cause you want a lawyer. But I'll tell you this, we can't make any of this up.
Okay? (tense music) - [Vivica] Melissa Huckaby is left in the room again, but this time it's only for a few minutes.
- [Tim] Melissa, let me see your purse real quick. - [Vivica] And this time when he returns,
Detective Bauer is not alone. - [Tim] Can you stand up? - Are you arresting me? - Yep.
Turn around that way. Put hands behind your back. - They cuff her up. She gets hysterical.
- [Melissa] Oh, my God. (sobbing) I didn't even do anything. - [Tim] You're under arrest for Sandra Cantu's murder.
- [Melissa] Oh, God. - [Tim] Go downstairs and process you. - [Melissa] This isn't happening.
(indistinct) - Despite Melissa Huckaby's arrest, the job for this investigating team is far from over.
To secure a conviction, the police will need a confession. There's still a way to go in this interview.
(apprehensive music) - [Melissa] This is not happening to me. I didn't... - [Vivica] Coming up, Huckaby makes a surprise return
to the interrogation room. - In her mind is that "I got some big problems, but I could figure my way out of this one."
- [Vivica] And Detective Bauer is challenged with a whole new version of events.
- [Vivica] In Tracy, California, The discovery of eight-year- old Sandra Cantu's body,
dumped in a suitcase, landed Melissa Huckaby in the interrogation room. - [Melissa] To tell you the truth right now, I think I want a lawyer.
- He had got into her head. - Once she asked for a lawyer, Detective Bauer is required to stop any questioning.
In order to keep her at the station, he's forced to make a formal arrest and put her in a cell.
But after just 10 minutes, she asked to return to the interrogation room. (apprehensive music continues)
- [Tim] We're not playing a game, are we? - [Melissa] No, I just... I didn't murder her.
I don't know why you think I did it. I wanted... (sniffles) - Hold on. Don't talk yet. No talking yet. Hold on.
- Once she realized the sort of seriousness of her position, she totally just withdrew inwards.
- [Tim] You want a tissue? - [Melissa] Yes. - [Darren] You could see there's complete sadness,
astonishment on her face. - Listen, I need you to tell me about what happened when you and Sandra are at the church.
- [Tim] You were. Remember, we're trying to get the whole evidence thing now? I don't wanna beat that thing into the ground.
- [Maleary] Throughout the process, Huckaby was fishing for information and evidence.
- [Melissa] You said you had a video and you were gonna show me, before I told you I want a lawyer.
- She's concerned about self-preservation. "Tell me what other evidence you have."
- [Melissa] I want you to show me or prove to me that I did it, because I didn't do it.
- [Tim] You were at the church for about an hour, a little bit more than that,
and then your car's seen going eastbound on Clover towards Tracy Boulevard, and then the light turns green and you go northbound on Tracy.
Then you go under the freeway and you start driving north out towards Howard Road.
- [Tim] I'm really positive. I'm serious. - [Melissa] And that's what you're basing
me murdering her on? - [Tim] No. There's more. - So I think she underestimated our ability
to collect the correct evidence, and she underestimated our ability to persevere.
- [Melissa] I seriously don't remember. - [Tim] You don't remember driving your car?
- [Melissa] No, I don't. - So you just... - I do have blackouts. - [Tim] But you can't drive if you ever blackout.
- [Melissa] No, I don't. - [Ciolino] Now the excuses start coming out of her mouth.
"I'm blacking out. I have medication. "I don't remember doing it. "I have no recollection."
(mysterious music) - [Vivica] Only now does Detective Bauer reveal his most damning piece of evidence,
that despite her denials, Melissa Huckaby was seen at the location where Sandra's body was found
in the crucial time period. - [Tim] Between 5:30 and 5:40, two people saw your car stopped on Whitehall Road.
They saw you come from out the bushes on Whitehall Road and someone asked you why.
- [Tim] Mm-hmm. What were you doing, Melissa? (Melissa sobbing) - [Vivica] Finally, Melissa Huckaby admits
she's to blame for Sandra's death. (Melissa sobbing) - [Maleary] To delay the most vital evidence to the last
is a great tactic. By saying that there is eyewitness evidence to support the fact that Huckaby had disposed of the body
was so overwhelming that there was nowhere for her to turn. - [Tim] Why is it an accident? You tell me.
I'll listen. (Melissa sobbing) - [Melissa] I can't live with myself. I deserve to just die.
- I think in that moment, it's like relief. The fact she's finally able to let out that real emotion.
So I do feel, in that particular moment, she was, you know, showing remorse and a willingness to...
It's almost like the beginning of the end, really. (Melissa sobbing) (light mysterious music)
- [Vivica] Huckaby says she can now explain how Sandra's body ended up in her suitcase.
A key piece of footage from cameras installed outside of Sandra's own trailer recorded the little girl heading home
on the afternoon of March 27th. - [Tim] She's seen skipping to her trailer. Right before she skips and passes her trailer,
she turns and goes to Melissa's house. - [Melissa] And she came up to the car and I didn't know that she was there until I turned around.
- [Tim] Mm-hm. - [Tim] Sandra wasn't outside? - [Melissa] She wasn't outside. - [Tim] Where was she? - [Melissa] I didn't know.
(light mysterious music) - [Vivica] Huckaby now changes her story. Instead of claiming she left her suitcase on the driveway,
she now says she drove to the church with the suitcase, not knowing Sandra was inside.
- [Tim] What did she look like? And she couldn't breathe and she wasn't waking up.
She didn't have a pulse or nothing. - It's perplexed me, because how does the suitcase
get from her house to the church without her noticing that there's something that's moving inside the suitcase.
- [Tim] Did you take her out of the suitcase? - [Melissa] Well, I just... - [Tim] How did you giver her mouth to mouth?
- [Tim] And what did you do? (ominous music) - [Vivica] Huckaby then claims she panicked,
and put Sandra back into the suitcase. She drove to the irrigation ponds used by local farmers.
- [Tim] No, you don't. You're telling the truth. (Melissa wailing) - The reason he suggested that it was an accident
is that to get any form of confession... ...would be better than no confession.
Then they can work with that and prove her lies once more, and make sure that this becomes a murder charge.
- [Vivica] But Huckaby is confessing to an accident, and there's a lot about her story
that doesn't fit the facts. - [Tim] Tell me about the cloth that we found on her
when we opened the suitcase. - [Melissa] Cloth? - [Tim] When we found Sandra, when we opened the suitcase,
she was in there. You remember how... - [Tim] Yeah. - [Tim] Are you sure? - [Tim] Why was it tied in a knot, in a circle,
like to go over her mouth? - [Melissa] No, I didn't do that. I swear. - The officer made it quite clear that
Sandra didn't die of suffocation in the suitcase. - [Tim] How could someone die
and not have any really visible marks? - [Tim] And how do you stop someone from breathing air?
- He knows a lot more than he's letting on to her. And with every statement she's making, almost,
she's getting buried. I didn't do that. I promise you. (siren wailing) - [Vivica] It's time to confront Huckaby
with the findings of Sandra's autopsy. First of all, the eight-year- old had been drugged.
- [Tim] Listen, did you give her any of your medication? - [Melissa] No. - Are you sure? - Yes.
- The drugs that were found in the body of the victim were the same drugs that had been prescribed to the suspect.
- [Vivica] Huckaby claims that when she realized Sandra was dead, she tried to take her own life.
- [Tim] Where'd you spit it at? - [Tim] It landed on her? - Yeah. - Where at? - [Tim] Inside the suitcase while she was in there?
- She came up with some spurious excuse that she spat the drugs out and that's how the drugs had got into the child.
- [Vivica] But the autopsy revealed something even more disturbing. - [Tim] I think something else happened at the church.
- [Melissa] What? - [Tim] What did you tell me you thought might have happened to her?
- [Melissa] She was molested or something. (tense music) She was? I never molested her.
(tense music swells) - [Tim] The entire interview, that's the hardest for her to say,
because you're talking about her admitting to sexually assaulting a child of similar size and age as her own daughter.
- [Melissa] I'm telling you the God's honest truth that she was not molested. - [Tim] She was too.
We got our evidence back. She was molested. But she wasn't molested by a guy.
(tense music) - [Vivica] Of all the evidence collected by the investigators, it's these findings which are the most horrific.
- [Tim] We located a rolling pin at the church that was significant, because through further testing,
we discovered that Sandra's DNA was on it. (sombre music) - [Tim] We have experts, expert doctors, and examiner,
they can tell us exactly what happened. And I think that that part was staged.
(sombre music swells) - [Robyn] I think she used her quasi knowledge of criminal investigations
to believe that the sexual assault would divert their attention to a male, and therefore, they would not be looking at her.
- [Melissa] I didn't do that, I promise you. You could give me a lie detector test right now.
- [Darren] What some people tend to do is they'll tend to use grandiose language like,
"I swear on my kids," "I promise," you know, "trust me." You know, things like that.
So it's just an attempt to hoodwink the officer. - [Tim] The scariness of possibly being exposed to the death penalty
didn't allow her to admit to that. And I think she was also exhausted at the end of the interview.
- [Melissa] I didn't molest her, I swear. (ominous music) - It's been a tough night in the interrogation room.
And Melissa Huckaby's admission of responsibility for Sandra's death is a breakthrough.
But she's still insisting it was an accident, and refusing to accept any role in the sexual assault of the little girl.
Coming up, the evidence that exposes Huckaby's lies. - [Tim] We found an article on your computer
about a four-year-old girl that was put in a suitcase and she was found in a body of water two weeks later.
- [Vivica] And thoughts turn to what happens next. - [Melissa] What will I be charged with? - [Tim] What do you think?
- [Melissa] I don't think I should be charged with murdering her. - [Vivica] Unravelling the events
that led to the death of eight-year-old Sandra Cantu has been a gruelling process.
Melissa Huckaby still insists that she did not set out to kill the little girl. And she's scared about what charges she might face.
(ominous music) - [Tim] When you leave here and I leave here tonight, then I won't see you again until we go to court. Okay?
- [Melissa] What am I gonna be charged with? - [Tim] What are you gonna be charged with?
What do you think you should be charged with? - She holds out to the bitter end in denial.
- [Melissa] I don't think I should be charged with murdering her. - [Tim] Let me ask you something.
- [Lee] It's just amazing that you could lie for that long. - [Vivica] But a police search of Melissa Huckaby's computer
provided chilling evidence. - [Tim] We took Melissa's personal computer and we were able to do a forensic analysis of her computer.
We found an article on one of the computers. There's about a four-year-old girl
that was molested by her grandfather and put in a suitcase, in Israel. And she was found in a body of water two weeks later.
I can get you the article. We printed it out. But it's kinda weird, it's kind of similar to this case.
- [Vivica] The computer search also revealed evidence of Huckaby's attempt to cover her tracks.
- [Tim] She had another search on the internet. And in that one her search question was,
"What are the side effects of swallowing a razor blade?" which we found significant
since she had been in the hospital for swallowing a razor blade for a few days.
She saw that the investigation was possibly starting to point at her. Her mindset was, if she was in the hospital,
then maybe we wouldn't come bother her, or maybe we would look at her as being this injured person.
And it was kind of to redirect our focus off of her onto someone else. - [Vivica] Investigators discovered
Huckaby had even practiced aspects of her crime, drugging another child in the trailer park
and an ex-boyfriend. - We saw a pattern in that, and that showed us pre -planning.
The criminal justice background that Melissa had from her college courses kind of directed her actions on why she did what she did
and wanted to make this challenging for us, right, to make this kind of like a drama that would unfold
and we would have to, you know, figure it out. - [Vivica] Far from a tragic accident,
this was starting to look every inch like a premeditated murder. - [Tim] Why did you go on around that video camera?
- [Vivica] But there's one aspect of this gruesome case which Huckaby consistently denies: the sexual assault.
- [Tim] Who assaulted her? - [Melissa] I don't know. - [Tim] Someone did. I'm not making this up. I'm not trying to make this any worse than it is.
- I know. - Someone assaulted her. If it wasn't you, it was someone else. - She's still trying to minimize what she did.
"Maybe there's hope for me." And now she's thinking, "Well, maybe I won't go to jail for life.
Maybe for 20 years, and I'll be out in 18." - [Tim] All the evidence led us to believe
that more than likely, the actual murder and sexual assault occurred at the church.
- [Lee] She took the child to the church and she murdered the child at the church.
And then put the child in a suitcase after the murder, at the church. - [Officer] Put your palms together.
(handcuffs click) - [Vivica] Melissa Huckaby is charged with first degree murder, kidnapping,
and sexual assault against a minor. At trial, this would've meant that Huckaby faced the death penalty,
but it never went that far. - [Reporter] This Sunday school teacher accused of kidnapping, raping, and killing
an eight-year-old playmate of her daughter pleaded guilty, Monday, to murder. - Huckaby's lawyers struck a deal
under which she pleaded guilty to first-degree murder and kidnapping in return for them dropping the sexual assault allegation.
- [Ciolino] Any good defence lawyer is gonna say, "Hey, we gotta plead. 'Cause we go to trial,
"you'll never see a crack a daylight again." - [Robyn] A conviction is the most important part of this case,
for the family and for the community. It will also prevent the family going through the trauma of a trial
where the details of what happened to Sandra would be brought up. - Had she been taken to trial and found guilty,
she could have very well have been sentenced to death. So she did the math and she took the easiest way out.
- Thanks to the careful, methodical work in the interrogation room, Sandra Cantu's killer was brought to justice.
But the reason why a mother and Sunday school teacher would carry out such a terrible crime remains a mystery.
- I've never been 100% on my answer, but my theory is Melissa had this jealous, attention-seeking personality
that really struggled with other people getting attention. I think she struggled with the love that
the people at the trailer park had for Sandra Cantu, not for Melissa's daughter.
(melissa speaking indistinctly) - For me, there's gotta be more of a break in this person's psyche,
and I do believe that she wanted to kill this child. I think that there was a rage in this woman,
and she was gonna kill no matter what. (light music) - [Tim] For Sandra, you gotta remember her
skipping to her trailer. That, 100%, is how Sandra lived her life. She was happy, she was friendly,
and I think that's how her mom would like her remembered. - This was a shocking crime
that took away the life of an eight-year-old child and devastated a community.
Sandra's family knows that her killer is behind bars, but nothing can bring back their little girl.
(light music ends) (apprehensive music) (apprehensive music ends)

When 8-year-old Sandra Cantu is reported missing, police grow suspicious of Melissa Huckaby; a local woman who claims that her luggage was stolen on the same day of Sandra’s disappearance. As the investigation unfolds, police are shocked by the chilling admissions made inside the interrogation room. Hosted by Vivica A. Fox, THE INTERROGATION ROOM is a brand new true crime series that brings viewers behind the scenes, where real-life murderers and detectives play cat and mouse. Behind every shocking crime is a detective racing to uncover the truth, and it all comes down to the wire inside the interrogation room.

=============== Like, comment and subscribe if you’re ready for more true crime. Your favorite shows like World’s Most Evil Killers, Meet Marry Murder, Forensic Files, Unsolved Mysteries, Murdered At First Sight and Bloodline Detectives are all available to stream 24/7 for free via the FilmRise Streaming Network. You can access The FilmRise Streaming Network through most free App Platforms and Smart TV portals such as Amazon Fire TV, The Roku Channel, Android, iOS and many more.

Brief Summary

Melissa Huckaby is interrogated for the murder of Sandra Cantu, revealing shocking evidence and her eventual confession to the crime.

Key points

The Missing Girl. Eight-year-old Sandra Cantu goes missing, prompting a major investigation.
A Shocking Discovery. A farmer finds a suitcase containing Sandra's decomposing body, turning the case into a murder investigation.
The Note. Melissa Huckaby finds a suspicious note with Sandra's name, leading to new questions.
The Interrogation Intensifies. Detective Bauer confronts Melissa about the note she found, raising suspicions.
Melissa's Arrest. Melissa Huckaby is arrested for the murder of Sandra Cantu, leading to a dramatic interrogation.
Confession of Guilt. Melissa admits responsibility for Sandra's death but insists it was an accident.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

I think you're our witness.

Tim suggests Melissa may be key to the investigation.

0:27WatchJun 6, 2023

Tension

85/ 100High tension

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