Casey Anthony was portrayed by the defense and much of the media as a cold-hearted mom capable of killing her 2-year old daughter so she could return to a life of partying. The defense characterized Casey as a young woman with a history of incest who reacted to the accidental death of her daughter as if it was an incestuous family secret that needed to be covered up. Although the truth may never be known, Casey's behavior seems most consistent with the latter characterization and is therefore nothing more sensational than a young woman traumatized by incest and thrust into a situation she was psychologically unprepared to cope with.
Casey Anthony Trial
The murder trial Florida vs. Casey Marie Anthony turned into a national sensation because of the alleged attempt by 25-year-old Casey Anthony to cover up the murder of her own 2-year-old daughter, Caylee Anthony (Alvarez, 2011). On July 5, 2011, after nearly six weeks of courtroom testimony and just 11 hours of deliberation, the jury found Casey Anthony not guilty. The prosecution's failure to convince the jury of her guilt was widely perceived to be the result of the circumstantial nature of the evidence presented at trial.
Casey Anthony had initially blamed the disappearance of her daughter on a kidnapping by a babysitter called Zenaida Herndandez-Gonzalez (Lohr, n.d.), but a series of lies, a month-long delay before contacting the police, a nonexistent babysitter with that name, and reports of partying since her daughter went missing, helped the prosecution cast Casey as a mother capable killing her own daughter so that she could return to a life of partying (Times Topics, 2011). The prosecution alleged that Casey taped Caylee's mouth closed with duct tape, killed her with chloroform, and then buried her body in the woods (Colarossi, 2011).
Caylee's Murder Investigation
Caylee met her tragic fate on or around June 16, 2008. Testimony by Casey's father, George Anthony, suggested Caylee was last seen leaving with Casey with backpacks on. Telephone records indicated that later in the day Casey made a flurry of phone calls to family and friends that lasted for about four hours (Lohr, n.d.). The next day the name of the alleged babysitter appears on a visitor's card at Casey's apartment complex. Two days after the last sighting by the father, Casey borrowed a shovel from a neighbor and backs her car up to her parent's garage. For the next two days Casey is seen hanging out at a club in Orlando. A month later, on July 15, 2008, Casey's mother makes three 911 calls asking that her daughter be arrested for stealing money and a car. During the last 911 call the mother claims that the trunk of her daughter's car smells like a dead body had been stored there and she believes her granddaughter is missing.
Over the next five months the investigation centers on a forensic analysis of the car's trunk and an analysis of the air in the trunk confirms the trunk at one time held decomposing human remains (Lohr, n.d.). Trace evidence from the car also revealed that Caylee was deceased (Lohr, n.d.). A Florida grand jury eventually hands down a 7-count indictment against Casey Anthony on October 14, 2008, alleging Casey is guilty of first degree murder, aggravated child abuse, aggravated manslaughter of a child, and four counts of providing false information to the police. Two months later, on December 11, a utility worker finds the remains of a small child and eight days later the coroner confirms that it is Caylee Anthony.
Who is Casey Anthony
What captivated the public was the demonization of Casey by the prosecution as a cold-hearted mother intent on getting rid of Caylee so she could resume her life as a party girl (Colarossi, 2011). It didn't help any that all the lying and fumbling by the defendant, and her family, was perceived by many as a sign of either stupidity or guilt, or both. As a result, the case turned into a national spectacle resembling a Shakespearean play.
HLN, formerly called Headline News, stood out from the media crowd by both assuming that Casey Anthony was guilty and then covering the investigation and trial as though it was reality TV (Shelter, 2011). When the channel's main protagonist Nancy Grace signed off for the night she would state "seeking justice for Caylee." This sentiment actually became the channel's logo. Grace would routinely refer to Casey as the "tot mom" and "callous party girl," which only fed into the sensationalism surrounding the trial. This 'journalistic' approach was obviously self-serving and encouraged by the executive in charge of HLN, Scot Safon. He would tell his staff to treat the trial as a "bigger story," complete with family dynamics, personal choices, and attempts to cover-up misdeeds. The public rewarded these efforts as the number of primetime viewers almost tripled in the months leading up to the trial. It truly is hard not to equate this behavior with the carnival atmosphere that would surround executions in ancient England or hangings in the American West.
The defendant's lawyers cast Casey as troubled young woman that had been sexually abused by her father (Times Topics, 2011). This history of sexual abuse encouraged Casey to develop the habit of lying in order to cover up her father's criminal behavior, thus explaining how she reacted to the accidental death of her daughter. Caylee's demise, the defense argued, was the result of an accidental drowning in the pool at the parent's home. Casey was therefore as much a victim of her upbringing as Caylee was.
Three months after the trial George Anthony, Casey's father, suggested on the television show "Dr. Phil" that Caylee may have been the victim of 'chemical babysitting' gone wrong (Lynch, 2011). Her father believed that it was possible that Casey was drugging her daughter so that she could go out and party, but on the same television show Casey's mother, Cindy Anthony, suggested that Caylee died as a result of an accidental drowning and the trauma of the loss caused Casey to try and cover up her daughter's death.
Although Casey never testified at the trial, she was interviewed by two psychiatrist hired by the defense. These experts never gave testimony, but the transcripts were eventually released to the public and thus Casey was finally given a public voice. She related a history of sexual abuse by her father and to a lesser extent by her brother, and therefore was constantly afraid of leaving her daughter alone with her father. On the morning of the 15th or 16th of June 2008, Casey remembered waking up to see her father walking into the bedroom with a dripping wet and lifeless Caylee in his arms and accusing her of homicidal neglect.
If the history of abuse is true then it would likely explain Casey's inability to manage not only her own life effectively, but also the loss of her daughter. The continued close contact with her father and brother would have added to the strain she was under, so her story seems plausible. Unfortunately for the media though, this tale isn't as titillating and thus marketable as that of a mother capable of killing her 2-year-old daughter so that she could return to a life of partying.
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