TACOMA, Wash. — The family of missing West Valley City mom Susan Cox Powell plans to appeal a lawsuit filed against Washington’s child protective services agency.
In a notice filed with the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Susan’s parents, Chuck and Judy Cox, said they intended to appeal a federal judge’s ruling dismissing their lawsuit over the 2012 deaths of their grandchildren, Charlie and Braden Powell. The children were killed by their father, Josh Powell, who attacked them with a hatchet and then blew up the home they were in after a child protective services caseworker dropped them off for a visit with him.
The Cox family has alleged CPS should not have allowed Josh Powell to have visitation with his children because they knew he may have been involved in his wife’s disappearance. Powell was the prime suspect in the 2009 disappearance of Susan Cox Powell. She vanished from her West Valley City home and has never been found.
In October, a federal judge granted Washington’s Department of Social Health Services immunity and dismissed the lawsuit.
