Though Utah authorities believed six months ago that missing mother Susan Cox Powell had been murdered, authorities in Washington state were not notified.

On Sunday, Josh Powell, who has been under suspicion in his wife’s disappearance since 2009, killed himself and the couple’s two children when he blew up the home where he was staying in Graham during what was supposed to be a supervised visitation with the boys.

Last Wednesday, Powell was denied custody of his children but was still allowed supervised visits.  At the time of the custody hearing, neither the Department of Social and Health Services nor the Attorney General’s Office was aware that Utah police believed Susan Cox Powell had been killed.

In light of the Powell boys’ murders, Attorney General Rob McKenna said his office and the social worker should have had that information, but they were never told.

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“It’s always disappointing when communication isn’t at the level that it could have been,” McKenna said in an interview on Thursday with KIRO 7 Eyewitness News Senior Political Reporter Essex Porter. “I don’t know why they didn’t share that information with us, and therefore, we had to act on information we did have.”

Though a Utah court issued a gag order related to information that Utah police sent to the custody hearing last Wednesday, the Assistant Attorney General, who was handling the custody case, said that information was about disturbing images and not the information that said Susan Powell was believed to have been killed. 

John Long, Washington state's assistant attorney general who handled the Powell custody case here, told Porter he always argued the case as if Josh Powell were responsible for his wife's disappearance and that while he would have wanted to know that Utah authorities thought it was a homicide, he doesn't believe it would have made any difference.

“I think the social worker would have liked to have known that, if Utah had chosen to share that information,” McKenna said. “There’s going to be a lot of second-guessing there, and I’m sure in Utah, officials are wondering whether they should have done things differently.”