The Casey Anthony Case: Disturbing Questions Remain

Since the mainstream media frenzy has continued almost a week after the jury rendered its verdict in the Casey Anthony trial and subsequent sentencing, with no fewer than a dozen prime time cable news programs dedicated to dissecting this case and its three year investigation, I thought I would also set forth my post mortem on this highly publicized Florida case (which seems to be one state that has had more than its share) and the questions I and many have remaining which have not been satisfactorly answered.

Before I pose my questions, it has been interesting in just how many people are now coming out of the woodwork in order to capitalize on this case to be "reimbursed" for their costs, in addition to most of the cable news networks with their massive profits on this case, for their investigative work during the time Casey Anthony was leading law enforcement officials down blind alleys while the search for CAYLEE was expanding but just never seemed to be concentrated by any of those private and public investigative units less than a quarter mile from her home where little Caylee's body was eventually found.

I mean three long years ago, weren't those private companies representing that their services were being donated?

And just who was paying for her defense costs other than the Florida taxpayers?

Be that as it may, I guess the most glaring and obvious error to me was simply in the charges which were filed against her, which were never amended after her "arrest."

Instead of first degree murder charges, for which there was little evidence to begin with, or aggravated manslaughter, doesn't Florida have a statute that deals with negligent homicide? Or, since Ms. Anthony clearly admitted to lying to investigators about Caylee's whereabouts and had no idea where her child was after a full month, what about child abandonment or accessory to murder given the eventual discovery of her body six months later?

Why were those charges never amended to reflect at least charges which the prosecutor had a better chance of even proving, given the evidence he was relying on for a conviction?

I am once again wondering about not only America's criminal justice system and court procedures in capital offenses such as this one, but also the education of our lawyers which also seems to have been missed.

And given that Ms. Anthony will be free on Sunday, from my understanding although she was charged and arrested, wasn't she also then placed in a protective custody situation given the media coverage of this investigation where there were concerns for her safety within the prison population while she was awaiting trial? So in actually, has she really ever spent any real time in "jail?"

And what about those recorded "jailhouse tapes" where the family was recorded while she was in custody, but had as yet to be charged with a felony even. Just why were those tapes allowed into evidence to begin with, given that I'm sure there was no permission sought to release those tapes to the public and were also highly publicized by most of those cable news stations while the investigation was ongoing?

There is so much troubling in this case and its prosecution and defense, and its media coverage, that if I was one of those conspiracy theorists it seemed as if this "trial" resembled more than anything some of those "mock" trials that are held during most law students' studies.

Who is going to profit from this case, other than Ms. Anthony, for any of those exclusive interviews that have also been bantered about when she is released on Sunday, within a week of this highly publicized trial, by those whose post mortems are geared more toward upping the ante for these cable news networks for the lucky "winner" of that all important first person interview?

I wonder, will Barbara Walters or Diane Sawyer get that coveted prize?

And now the media is focused on the legal challenges to the judge's ruling on sealing the names of the jurors in this case, with civil rights lawyers and "corporate" lawyers representing the media flooding the courts with requests to have those jurors names released, basing their arguments that "it has always been done" that such names are a matter of public record.

And that "Constitutionally" this is a "right" to have those names made available.

For what purpose, any reasonable person would ask?

To harass those jurors, whose task involved hearing the evidence and facts as presented to them in order to make their determinations on the only charges which they were given?

Jurors are not public officials, they are private citizens who are merely serving in a public capacity so long as the jury is needed.

From that point on, after rendering their verdicts, they are private citizens and it should be they, and they alone, who agree through the courts to having their names made public "after the fact," in this writer's opinion.

It seems to me that the coverage lately has been to now target those jurors with all the media attention given those unhappy Americans with this verdict, whose behavior seemed more of the "vigilante" style of justice.

I even read an article about one unidentified juror who has since moved out of the state, and whose husband has related that this juror would rather go to prison than serve on another jury in a capital murder case.

Maybe this is the agenda after all.

Malign our jury system, so that the jury then falls out of favor in this country through mass media propaganda and those privatized prisons can then get a steady stream of inmates for profit fed through judge determined verdicts, with the state then acting as both prosecutor and jury for the accused.

With the one barrier then removed against governmental abuse, what with all the progressive laws which have occurred at both the state and federal levels which have no Constitutional basis whatsoever in so many areas it is astounding.

I mean I once served on a jury whose sole purpose appeared to me to "convict" the accused so that my former home state could then receive its federal grant monies for targeted offenses to continue to balance then its court budgets, and during which time a judge instructed the jury that they were precluded from even visiting the scene of the "crime" involved and needed to make our determination without such information, and only based upon the provided statute involved, and testimony of the accused - the only witness, although another individual was present at the time the offense occurred.
Seemed quite strange to me also that on my jury of six there were not one, not two, but four city/county officials on the jury panel even with only two of us "civilians."

Maybe instead of the names of jurors being provided, their occupations might be more enlightening in seeing just how many of those selected are not "peers" at all, but government employees.

The progression of this trial, and its media coverage which has been the prime time focus of more than one cable news station consistently in analyzing every facet of the case, has left me with the uneasy feeling that what went on in that courtroom had nothing to do with discovering the truth of this young toddler's disappearance and then claimed "murder", but a whole lot more.

Several Florida legislators are now proposing new legislation, based simply on the outcome of this case, in order to make it a criminal matter to NOT report a child missing based on this one case in which, to me, the proper charges against this woman were not even filed under which the prosecution had at least a good chance for a conviction.

I can now see now all those parents of ten year old runaways who run away from home after a spat with their parents, and who are then picked up by police then get brought up on charges of "failure to report."

Do you really think someone such as Casey Anthony would comply if there was such a law, based upon what actually occurred in this case?

I think not.

And I guess what is really most disturbing about this case is that nothing whatsoever makes sense from the outset of the investigation, then through the mock trial.

But I'm sure either Barbara or Diane will fill us in.

At least, the mainstream media version.

As a postscript: Not that it matters much at this point, but since Casey Anthony did admit to having been employed by Universal Studios, I couldn't help noticing that she also resembled some of those Snow Whites or princess characters hired by Disney at their theme parks.