DP Hearing 5/11/10 (Criminal)

Will Casey Face Death Penalty?

Tuesday, May 11, 2010 5:07:42 AM
Reported by Mark Jenkins

ORLANDO -- Judge Belvin Perry may decide today whether Casey Anthony will face the death penalty in her murder trial.

A hearing will be held this morning at the Orange County Courthouse.

Although prosecutors are seeking the death penalty, Anthony's lawyers say it is unconstitutional.

This could also be a strategic move by the State Attorney's Office.

Anthony's defense team believes this is an attempt to break her financially.

She has already been declared indigent, so the state will be picking up the tab on today’s hearing.

The defense could argue that added expense of a death penalty case could be more of a burden on taxpayers.

"I'm a little bit biased to that fact,” said Anthony’s attorney Jose Baez. “We think there's some serious issues with it. The Florida Death Penalty is unique to other states. There's some serious problems with it. Obviously, the death penalty in our position doesn't work. So you're probably going to hear all those arguments and more."

Those arguments are not likely to come from Baez, but from co-council Andrea Lyon.

Lyon filed the motion saying, "The prosecution knew this would financially break the defense."

The hearing is scheduled to begin at 9 a.m.

http://www.cfnews13.com/News/Local/2010/5/11/will_casey_face_death_penalty.html

Casey Anthony death penalty?

Updated: Tuesday, 11 May 2010, 6:57 AM EDT
Published : Tuesday, 11 May 2010, 6:25 AM EDT

By NICK FOKIANOS | FOX 35 News

ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. (WOFL FOX 35) - Casey Anthony is expected to be back in front of an Orange County judge today.

Today we could learn whether her attorneys can turn the judge away from the death penalty in her case.

Anthony's attorneys say the law is unconstitutional in this case and not-applicable.

The defense claims there is only circumstantial evidence linking Casey to Caylee's murder.

Her attorneys want the court to make the prosecution prove it has enough evidence to warrant the possibility of the death penalty.

Before Caylee's remains were found prosecutors had taken the death penalty off the table. But after that fateful day in December of 2008, the State Attorney's Office changed their mind.


During yesterday's hearing, it was decided that jurors in the trial will be picked from outside Orlando and then brought back to Central Florida for the trial.

Chief Judge Belivin Perry said he will grant a change of venue motion at the appropriate time. Once the judge picks a location, he will tell the attorneys and then place a gag order on them.

Anthony's attorney Jose Baez had argued that Orlando-area residents had been tainted by negative media exposure.

Baez then argued for pictures of Anthony partying, supposedly during the time that Caylee was missing, to be sealed. Judge Perry deferred a decision on that motion, asking both parties to work together on which photos they intend to use.

Near the conclusion of the hearing, Baez played a video which included clips from several television outlets in the Orlando area as well as individual video blogs, coverage he described as a media "frenzy." There were some technical difficulties during the playback of the video and the video appeared pixelated at times.

Last week Judge Belvin Perry denied a request from Anthony's attorney to seal all records related to the public funding of her defense.

Judge Perry said Anthony's attorney failed to prove that releasing the information would jeopardize her right to a fair trial. Jose Baez had argued that making the records public could reveal strategy and the type of expert witnesses the defense is hiring.

Anthony has been declared indigent, allowing public money to pay for expert witnesses and other costs but not attorney fees.

Anthony's murder trial is set to begin on May 9, 2011. All depositions of witnesses are to be completed by October 31, 2010. She remains jailed on a charge of first-degree murder in the death of her daughter Caylee who was last seen in June of 2008, but she was not reported missing until a month later. Her remains were found in woods near the family's home on December 11, 2008. Investigators say the toddler's body was found with duct tape over her mouth.

http://www.myfoxorlando.com/dpp/news/anthony_case/051110-Casey-Anthony

Casey's Defense Poised To Fight Death Penalty

Posted: 6:30 am EDT May 11, 2010
Updated: 7:34 am EDT May 11, 2010

ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. -- Casey Anthony is expected back in an Orange County courtroom for a second consecutive day as her attorneys argue that she should not face the death penalty if she is convicted.

Casey's lawyers say the death penalty is unconstitutional, but previous presiding judge Stan Strickland refused to take it off the table.

The defense also believes the prosecutors in this case are pursuing the death penalty in order to force Casey to accept a plea.

On Monday, Casey's attorney Jose Baez did not want to bet on his chances that new presiding judge Belvin Perry will take the death penalty off the table.

"I'm not Las Vegas, or anything like that. I'm not a bookie, I couldn't' tell you," said Baez.

Tuesday morning, Baez will have to step aside because he is not qualified to try death penalty cases alone. Chicago-based attorney Andrea Lyon will once again fight to keep Casey from serving the death penalty if she is found guilty of murdering her daughter, Caylee.

"I completely and totally trust on her and her position," said Baez.

The defense's position is that Casey should not be put to death because prosecutors cannot prove she killed her daughter in a cold, calculated and premeditated manner.

However, prosecutors argue Caylee Anthony's killer had to use physical force or chemicals to subdue the child because otherwise she would have been able to remove the three pieces of duct tape found covering her nose and mouth.

The defense says, all that aside, the death penalty in Florida is flawed, but Casey's attorneys did not offer up specific reasons why.

"There are some serious problems with it. Obviously, the death penalty here doesn't work," said Baez.

Casey's defense team believes that jurors hearing death penalty cases are more likely to convict. However, to this point there has not been any mention of specific Florida cases that would back up that notion.

WFTV will be in the courtroom Tuesday morning and will have a full report on Eyewitness News at Noon.

You can also watch the hearing live on WFTV.com.

http://www.wftv.com/news/23514611/detail.html

Perry Hears Death Penalty Motions: Hearing in the murder trial of Casey Anthony

Tuesday, May 11, 2010



Today's hearing has just ended and I'm staring at piles and piles of notes. There was a great deal of back-and-forth between the defense and the prosecution and a surprise witness. Today's hearing was one rich in eloquent lawyering, and I recommend you watch some of it for the details I have not included!

I must also say that it wasn't a good day for Casey Anthony. Everything heard by the court today dealt with the death penalty. She fidgeted a great deal and had some "teary" moments when she wiped her eyes with her tissue or wiped her eye with her finger and wiped her finger on the tissue.

The defense, represented by Andrea Lyon, presented a total of six motions today, which leaves eleven outstanding.

The first motion discussed was the MOTION TO PRECLUDE THE STATE'S IMPERMISSIBLE, GENDER BIASED, REQUEST FOR IMPOSITION OF THE DEATH PENALTY.

(I have had difficulty getting individual links to work and you need to go to the site and click on them as listed on the lower right-hand side.)

Andrea Lyon presented a surprise witness, Elizabeth Rapaport, an attorney from the University of New Mexico School of Law. Assistant State's Attorney Jeff Ashton objecting, indicating that the defense had not listed this person as a witness, nor had he received a copy of her CV.

Read the rest:
http://sprocket-trials.blogspot.com/2010/05/perry-hears-death-penalty-motions.html

Television takes note of her tears

posted by halboedeker on May, 11 2010 1:12 PM

Judge Belvin Perry today rejected death-penalty arguments made by Casey Anthony’s defense team.

And television took note of how the defendant was reacting. She is charged with first-degree murder in the death of her daughter, Caylee. The trial will be next year.

“It was an emtional day in court for Casey. She cried during a break,” WFTV-Channel 9 anchor Barbara West said.

WFTV’s Kathi Belich also noted that “Casey broke down and cried during a break in the court hearing today after her mother appeared to try to communicate with her, possibly mimic a hug.”

Central Florida News 13’s Mark Perkins said Cindy Anthony attended the hearing, but George Anthony wasn’t there. “You could see Cindy a couple of times with her hand over her face, her head down, just kind of praying, as the judge was reading out his orders,” Perkins said. “We did see her as she came in. She mouthed the words ‘I love you’ to Casey Anthony as she was sitting with her defense attorneys.”

WESH-Channel 2’s Todd Wilson said, “You have to say that the state came out on top in this hearing.”

Wilson noted that Perry rejected a defense motion that the death penalty is applied unfairly to women and another defense motion accusing the prosecution of trying to bankrupt Anthony’s defense by seeking the death penalty.

WKMG-Channel 6’s Mike DeForest explained the one win for the defense. ”If she is convicted, and if this goes to the jury as a death-penalty case, prosecutors are going to have to show aggravating factors,” DeForest said. “Today, the judge ordered that the prosecutors must turn over to Casey Anthony’s defense team all of those aggravating factors that could be used during the death penalty phase, if it reaches that.”

http://blogs.orlandosentinel.com/entertainment_tv_tvblog/2010/05/casey-anthony-television-takes-note-of-her-tears.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+entertainment%2Ftv%2Ftvguy+%28TV+Guy%29

Casey Anthony Gets Emotional At Hearing
Judge Rules To Allow Prosecutors To Seek Death Penalty

POSTED: 3:09 pm EDT May 11, 2010
UPDATED: 4:33 pm EDT May 11, 2010

ORLANDO, Fla. -- Judge Belvin Perry ruled on Tuesday that prosecutors in the Casey Anthony case can continue to seek the death penalty.

Anthony's defense team failed to convince Perry to grant four motions that would have removed the death penalty, but not before making their case that the prosecution is seeking the ultimate punishment because of how their client acted.

It was a gut-wrenching day for Anthony as the defense presented testimony from Elizabeth Rapaport, a University of New Mexico professor, who said women accused of murdering their children are painted as bad mothers by prosecutors and the media -- and are more likely to face the death penalty instead of life in prison.

"In some of the blogs, they suggest I should die with her, but that's neither here nor there," defense attorney Andrea Lyon said.

Anthony started crying as Lyon tried to prove her motion that prosecutors seeking death in the case are biased against women.

"I think the deviant mother is in trouble," Rapaport said.

Rapaport testified that prosecutors and the media are titillated with accused female child murderers and are more likely to play up stories of them sleeping around and partying. They pointed to prosecutor Linda Drane Burdick's reference on Monday to Anthony's party pictures, where she was "scantily clad."

"Women are often tried for the crimes they committed but also their degree of non-conformity with traditional gender types," Rapaport said.

"Our law permits jurors to assess the character of individuals when deciding the death penalty," Ashton said.

Ashton argued the defense provided no evidence that this prosecution team was gender biased. In denying the motion, Perry agreed.

"The defense has not met their burden in this case," Perry said.

There is one woman on Florida's death row, who was convicted of killing two adult non-family members.

http://www.wesh.com/news/23519965/detail.html

Judge: Death penalty not sexist in Anthony case

By Jean Casarez, In Session
April 7, 2010 1:01 p.m. EDT

(CNN) -- Casey Anthony will face the death penalty, a Florida judge ruled, rejecting defense arguments that capital punishment in her murder case was sexist and unduly harsh.

Judge Belvin Perry Jr. also rejected defense arguments that prosecutors were seeking the death penalty as a means to bankrupt Anthony's defense.

The judge did grant one defense request -- that prosecutors disclose evidence supporting the aggravating factors they intend to cite if Anthony is convicted of premeditated murder and they ask jurors to return a death sentence.

In death penalty cases, jurors are asked to weigh aggravating circumstances that make a crime especially heinous against mitigating factors that favor the defendant, such as a lack of prior offenses.

Anthony, 24, is accused of killing her daughter, Caylee, who was 2 when she disappeared in June 2008. Caylee's body was found that December in a vacant lot near the Orlando, Florida, home where she lived with her grandparents.

Casey Anthony's trial is scheduled to begin on May 9, 2011.

The defense maintains that prosecutors had originally said they would not seek death in the Anthony case but reversed that position in March 2009 when they learned that Anthony had $205,000 for her defense.

The bulk of the money came from ABC News for the licensing of photos and videos, Baez testified during a previous hearing.

"The court has the authority to bar the death penalty where the prosecution exercises its discretion in bad faith, for impermissible motives and in order to prevent the defendant from exercising her constitutional rights," the defense argued in court papers.

Judge Perry denied the motion, saying that judges are prohibited under Florida law from interfering with the state's decision to seek death. Although one exception includes circumstances in which bad faith can be documented, Perry said Anthony's defense had not proven bad faith.

The defense also argued that prosecutors sought the death penalty against Anthony because she is a woman, and that focusing on Anthony's lifestyle before she was arrested is gender bias.

Defense witness Elizabeth Rapaport, a University of New Mexico law professor and author, testified that the lifestyles of white middle-class mothers charged with killing their children receive much more media attention than those of defendants in other cases.

Under questioning by Anthony attorney Andrea Lyon, a nationally know death penalty expert, Rapaport said a mother perceived as "deviant" by a jury has a more difficult time defending herself.

Anthony teared up when Lyon noted in court that despite her client's "party girl" reputation in the media, most of the witnesses have acknowledged that "Caylee was happy and healthy."

"Do you have any evidence that there is gender bias in this case?" prosecutor Jeff Ashton asked Rapaport in cross-examination. The witness responded that she didn't know much about this case and had only read a few press reports.

The defense argued that Anthony is facing more serious charges and harsher punishment than a man in the same position would receive.

Responding to Ashton's questions, Rapaport said that men who kill their children usually are acting in a rage.

Women, Ashton argued, tend to premeditate a child's killing and have underlying psychological issues. Cases in which women kill without evidence of psychological disturbance are rare, he added.

"In my 30 years" as a prosecutor, Ashton said, "this is the first time we have had the evidence for the jury to determine if death is the appropriate penalty."

http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/05/11/florida.casey.anthony.death/index.html

On WOFL, legal analyst Judge Andrew Napolitano said the state will have to explain more of its game plan because of one Perry ruling on a defense motion. “The government’s theory, thus far, seems to be that this was an accident gone horribly, horribly wrong,” Napolitano said. “That’s not a basis for the death penalty. The death penalty requires serious premeditation, plotting, planning and killing, almost execution style in a horrific and horrendous way. So the government’s going to have to lay out something more than she used chloroform to put the baby to sleep so she could go out and party.”

I thought the prosecution's theory WAS that Casey premeditated Caylee's demise and chloroformed her to disable her while she taped her up to suffocate her to death.

I am with you, Lottie. I think the State is making a very strong premeditated cold blooded murder, not an accident gone awry. In fact, if they were going the accident way, why charge her the way they have anyway? Why not a negligent homicide type of thing? No, I have to disagree with Judge Neopolitan..... They are going full steam ahead with premedicated AND cold blooded. kh

Whatever method Casey used to kill Caylee, it was a planned cold, brutal, horrific and horrendous act. It should be acknowledged that Caylee was "gone too soon" because of her own mother. Expecting sympathy and leniency for Casey is appalling.

The defense must be coaching Casey on how to behave in front of the cameras, and play on her parent's emotions in an effort to "humanize" her. Wonder if this was a desperate idea, or if it had been in the works, waiting for a poignant moment. When is she going to acknowledge her father, now that she has assured Cindy that she loves her?

Napolitano probably isn't following the case and only heard Lyon mention in the hearing 5/11 that stuff about the state not knowing the cause of death and not knowing if they were going with premeditated or accidental. SHE said that, not the prosecution!

When she said that it made me wonder if SHE'D been following the case!

OR did she slip up and expose the defense's future agenda? I do think before this is over they are going to announce that Casey 'JUST' told them the 'truth'...that it was an accident that snowballed out of control. Probably the only reason they haven't used that one yet is because they have to first know ALL the prosecution knows so they can make up a good fail-safe accident story.

~~~~

That crap with Casey mouthing I love you to Cindy is so bogus! She's trying to weaken Cindy by drawing out Cindy's maternal instincts and gain her confidence so Cindy lets her guard down after which Cindy will be thrust under a speeding bus!

Here's something else Lyon harped on that made no sense.

She said the prosecution put the dp back on the table after they got new evidence and she didn't have a clue what that new evidence was.

Where has she been? The new evidence was obviously Caylee's remains being found AND with duct tape adhered to her nose and mouth openings!

I'd be more concerned about the first time the dp was put on the table when they had nothing really except the trunk evidence of a dead Caylee via one hair with a death band and a mere suggestion that chloroform may have been involved.

What a coincidence, though, that they dp was taken off the table just days before Caylee's remains were found. Kind of makes me wonder if Kronk went back to that spot after hearing the dp was off the table.

ETA: I'm thinking the defense might be confusing themselves by not keeping good records while knowing more about what really happened than they are saying...and when Lyon exclaimed the prosecution had no new evidence from which to put the dp back on the table, she wasn't thinking about Caylee's remains being found being new because it was not new to the defense team who may have known where Caylee was already.

AJ- I Agree. I wouldn't be surprised that the defense is going to hold off as long as they can with who/what killed Caylee - then when all other avenues are exhausted, and they can't find anyone else to blame - they will bring out the "It was an accident, Casey panicked, and tried to make it look like kidnapping when she applied duct tape" tale.

Cindy, it was noticed, has reached out to present a tragic religious figure, leaning forward, eyes closed, and clutching "Rosary Beads". The Rosary Beads must mean that she has given up on her Protestant religion and is "trying out" the Catholic religion to see if that God is more powerful and will answer her prayers. She is so disgusting, and still a media whore.