Dad murders 10-year-old son; custody rights not yet "settled" (Stanislaus County, California)

So why do you suppose Mom wanted to take her son and "start their own life together elsewhere?" Maybe because she knew that Dad ANTHONY LEE WILLIAMS was capable of violence, and, very likely, had behaved in a violent and/or threatening manner in the past? But given that we don't give mothers automatic custody rights to their own children, authorities claimed they had "no standing" when Daddy took off with the boy--and shot him to death.

My friend Annie did a little digging and found out this mother had applied for an order of protection, but had been denied. And now the county no longer allows public access to family court documents. Well, I'm sure that helps them avoid acccountability, doesn't it....

http://www.recordnet.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20110604/A_NEWS02/106040323/-1/A_NEWS02

Father, son dead in likely murder, suicide
By Christian Burkin
Record Staff Writer
June 04, 2011 12:00 AM
CORRECTION: June 4, 2011

The age of a Patterson man and the date of communication with his wife were incorrect in the print and initial online version of this article. The error has been corrected.

LATHROP - A 51-year-old Patterson man and his 10-year-old son were found dead Friday morning in a van parked on farmland east of Tracy.

Investigators believe the father, Anthony Lee Williams, shot his son, Hussan Williams, and then himself.

Deputy Les Garcia, a Sheriff's Office spokesman, said Williams and his wife, Hussan's mother, were going through a divorce.

The bodies were discovered at about 8 a.m. Friday on a levee road near Paradise Cut, just west of Interstate 5 and north of Interstate 205. Garcia said a security guard found Williams' van during his regular rounds.

"He's the one who found the van and then alerted us," Garcia said.

Deputy Raj Singh of the Stanislaus County Sheriff's Department said Hussan was at a friend's house Thursday when his father arrived to pick him up. Later, Singh said, Williams called his wife and said he and his son were going to start their own life together elsewhere.

Singh said though the couple had separated, custody rights had not been settled. Hussan had reportedly gone with his father willingly, and authorities had no standing to take him back.

"There was no abduction, no threat," Singh said.

There was some communication between Williams and his wife Thursday night as authorities attempted to arrange Hussan's return, but the two stopped talking to each other, Singh said.

There were two other murder-suicides in San Joaquin County this year, one of them in Stockton and another in Acampo. Those were also domestic, but the victims in both cases were adult women. One was killed by her fiancé, the other by her husband.