Orlando, FL – Casey Anthony was found not guilty Tuesday of killing her 2-year-old daughter in a case that captivated the nation as it played out on national television from the moment the toddler was reported missing three years ago.
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Anthony, 25, wept as the judge read the verdict, which jurors reached after less than 11 hours of deliberation over two days. She was charged with first-degree murder, which could have brought the death penalty if she had been convicted.
Instead, she was convicted of only four counts of lying to investigators looking into the June 2008 disappearance of her daughter Caylee. Her body was found in the woods six months later and a medical examiner was never able to determine how she died.
She will be sentenced by the judge on Thursday and could receive up to a year in jail for each lying count.
Anthony’s attorneys claimed that the toddler drowned accidentally in the family swimming pool, and that her seemingly carefree mother in fact was hiding emotional distress caused by sexual abuse from her father.
Prosecutors contended that Caylee was suffocated with duct tape by a mother who loved to party, tattooed herself with the Italian words for “beautiful life” in the month her daughter was missing and crafted elaborate lies to mislead everyone from investigators to her own parents.
Captivated observers camped outside the courthouse to jockey for coveted seats in the courtroom gallery, which occasionally led to fights among those desperate to watch the drama unfold.
Anthony did not take the stand during the trial, which started in mid-May. Because the case got so much media attention in Orlando, jurors were brought in from the Tampa Bay area and sequestered for the entire trial.
Anthony’s attorney, Jose Baez, conceded that his client had told elaborate lies and invented imaginary friends and even a fake father for Caylee, but he said that doesn’t mean she killed her daughter.
“They throw enough against the wall and see what sticks,” Baez said of prosecutors during closing arugments. “That is what they’re doing … right down to the cause of death.”
He tried to convince jurors that the toddler accidentally drowned in the family swimming pool and that when Anthony panicked, her father, a former police officer, decided to make the death look like a murder by putting duct tape on the girl’s mouth and dumping the body in woods about a quarter-mile away. They said that Anthony’s apparent carefree life hid emotional distress caused by sexual abuse from her father. Her father firmly denied both the cover-up and abuse claims. The prosecution called those claims “absurd,” saying that no one makes an accident look like a murder.
Lead prosecutor Linda Drane Burdick concluded the state’s case by showing the jury two side-by-side images. One showed Casey Anthony smiling and partying in a nightclub during the month Caylee was missing. The other was the tattoo she got a day before her family and law enforcement first learned of the child’s disappearance.
“At the end of this case, all you have to ask yourself is whose life was better without Caylee?” Burdick asked. “This is your answer.”
Prosecutors hammered on the lies Anthony, then 22, told from June 16, 2008, when her daughter was last seen, and a month later when sheriff’s investigators were notified. Those include the single mother telling her parents she couldn’t produce Caylee because the girl was with a nanny named Zanny — a woman who doesn’t exist; that she and her daughter were spending time in Jacksonville, Fla., with a rich boyfriend who doesn’t exist; and that Zanny had been hospitalized after an out-of-town traffic crash and that they were spending time with her.
What a terrible miscarriage of justice. Just shows how dumb the jurors are and how lawyers are liars. What a shame.
She was so innocent. It was obvious.
An opposite world: Rubashkin gets 27 years for paying Farmers 10 days later! A mother is found Not guilty for Murdering her own child !
What a day!
Finally some “Justice” in the “Justice” system , for a change.
Old me followed the case closely and I wasn’t lazy to get in to the details.
I felt all along the trial that while this mother urgently needs a good shrink – The evidence presented by the prosecution was very very very weak!
Yes; She does have serious “issues” to take care of; she may be guilty of not calling 911 when her beautiful girl disappeared ETC… But here we are talking whether there is evidence proving ‘beyond a reasonable doubt’ that she murdered her.
It’s good to see that the jurors did not decide based on their emotions but based on the facts.
It gives us all some hope that there still is a chance to get a jury that is ready to use their brain instead of their heart.
This verdict doesn’t pass the “smell-test”. She admitted to putting the duct tape, and hiding the child only after it was clear that she could not get away with it. Where is her credibility, and why was she not allowed to take the stand? And how could the jury only deliberate for two days on this?!
Gotta love America!!! No evidence, no crime! Yaaaay!
opposite of the oj simpson case! she was innocent!
there was nothing to base this case on no motive no weapon. the jury did what it needed to do just like the DSK case it should not have come to court with so little evidence other then a young foolish woman
Disgusting. Jurors today demand an air-tight case against the defendant… at least when it comes to white, xian defendants. That is not their job. Their job is to weigh whether the charge holds up beyond REASONABLE doubt, not any and all possible doubt.
I don’t know how it is in other parts of the country, but we here in FL have been bombarded with coverage since the trial began.
I have paid pretty good attention to the witnesses and the events as they occurred. While the state’s case was not air-tight, it was certainly WELL beyond “reasonable doubt”. The chloroform and duct tape put me at 70%. The photos of her dancing drunk in a bar in the days following her daughter’s “disappearance” put me at 85%. The lies about the nanny, and then the drowning, and then the finger pointing at her father with no proof put me at 95%. That’s beyond reasonable doubt to me.
Rubashkin gets a sentence in great excess of the crimes he committed, and this girl got away with murder. If she needs a new place to live, maybe she can stay at the Simpson house…. OJ’s kids are apparently very welcoming to cold-blooded killers.
OJ was not guilty, too…
In order to convict there has to be guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. How could there not be reasonable doubt if there was no solid evidence as to how the child died? The jury did its job. now it’s the Judge’s turn to determine sentencing for the lies she told… This all happened a while back and she sure has come across as remorseful – unlike the stone-faced characters who show not a shred of emotion throughout trial and conviction process. Will the Judge be moved to give her a chance at turning her life around – such as sentencing her to community service on condition that she gets professional help and straightens out? Or will she sit and languish in prison at taxpayer’s expense? Can’t wait to find out…
All the members of the jury were death penalty qualified; yet, they appeared to be in agreement that the prosecution failed to present its case beyond a reasonable doubt (with the exception of the misdemeanor charges). All of the jury members were polled by the Clerk of Courts. For all of you who are not happy with the outcome of the case, that is your right. However, this is America, and Ms. Anthony was found not guilty by a jury of her peers. We don’t live in an autocratic dictatorship, where defendants are presumed to be guilty, until proven innocent.
If someone here has any evidence that Casey Anthony killed her daughter please contact 911.
The jury of her peers was only presented “CIRCUMSANTIAL“evidence.
There was no absolute “proof” that Casey killed Caylee so the death penalty is out. There was enough proof that Casey was a neglectful mother on at least one occasion, she was the last one to have seen and to have been with Caylee. There was no Zanny, Tony didn’t have her, Cindy didn’t, George didn’t, Lee didn’t, her friends didn’t! Abuse, mental and physical abuse did take place on at least one occasion by Casey. George and Cindy probably perjured themselves to cover up facts for whatever reason, but they did not kill their granddaughter.
I THINK ITS INSANE THAT SHE WAS FOUND INNOCENT!!!! WHO PUT THE DICH TAPE ? WHAT SMELLED IN HER CAR? WHO DUMPED HER THER IN THE WOODS? SHE WALKED? HOW STUPID COULD YOU BE TO BELIEVE THAT SHE IS INNOCENT? IV BEEN FOLLOWING THE CASE AND WAS SURE THAT SHE WILL BE FOUND GUILTY!! IM SHOCKED BEYOND WORDS!!!!!!THERE WAS ALL THE EVIDENCE IN THE WORLD THAT SHE DID IT, TO BLAME HER FATHER FOR HER LIES I SO CHILDISH!! CANT BELIEVE THE COURT BOUGHT IT?????SHE SHOULD BE LET OFF BEC OF HER YESTER YEARS SHE SHOULD HAVE GROWN UP AND TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR HER OWN ACTIONS AND FORGET ABOUT WHAT SHE GREW UP WITH!!!! SHES AN ADULT SHE CHOSE TO BRING HER ON TO THIS WORLD SHE CAN MAKE HER OWN DECISINS AND SHE CHOSE TO KILL HER DAUGHTER!!!! SHE DEFINITLY GUILTY!!!! A MATURE ADULT DOESNT KILL HER DAUGHTER AND THEN GO PARTY AND REPORT A MISSING CHILD A MONTH LATER!!!! PLEASE GIVE ME A BREAK!!! SHE DESERVES THE DEATH PENALTY!!!!!