Kansas suspect denied trip to son’s custody hearing

? A former Missouri city official accused of killing four family members in Kansas won’t be able to attend the custody hearing for his son, who survived the carnage.

An Osage County District judge ruled Tuesday that James Kraig Kahler will not be taken to Wichita for the May 26 custody hearing for his 12-year-old son. The Topeka Capital-Journal reports that the judge suggested Kahler could participate by phone.

During his father’s preliminary hearing, the boy testified he saw Kahler shoot his mother.

The 48-year-old Kahler, of Meriden, Kan., is charged with killing his wife, two daughters and his wife’s grandmother in November 2009 in Burlingame.

Kahler, a former director of the Columbia, Mo., water and light department, was in the midst of a divorce with his wife at the time.