WEST VALLEY CITY -- In e-mails to family and friends, Susan Cox Powell poured out her heart about her troubled marriage to Josh Powell.
"I want him in counseling, on meds, I want my husband, friend, lover back no more crazy, outrageous, outlandish beliefs/opinions," she wrote in a 2008 e-mail to friends and family.
The e-mails were published over the weekend by The Salt Lake Tribune, which said it obtained them from a friend shortly after her disappearance in 2009. The contents of the e-mails surprised her parents, their attorney Anne Bremner said Monday.
"He could hurt her physically, that he could kidnap Charlie and Braden like it said in the e-mail," she said. "They didn't know about those kind of extreme circumstances. She comes alive in those e-mails in a way that breaks your heart. You just kind of want to reach out to her back then and say, 'Get out! Grab your kids and get out!' "
Many of Susan's family and friends that FOX 13 spoke with said they knew the marriage was in trouble, but never suspected she would disappear and her husband, Josh, would be suspected in it.
"She never said to me that she was afraid for her life," said Kiirsi Hellewell, Susan's best friend. "She told me several times, 'I don't think Josh would hurt me.' She said, 'I think he might kidnap the kids if we ever get divorced, but I don't think he'd hurt me.' "
