Will Casey Anthony Cop a Plea?

Update #3!

Tuesday, January 19

This just in from the Orlando Sentinel

It's official – the fraud case against Casey Anthony will not start on Monday but a status hearing is scheduled.

Court officials announced the change this morning.

Orange Circuit Court Judge Stan Strickland will address two motions at the 1:30 p.m. hearing. It's unclear yet which motions he will hear.

Stay tuned for further updates.

Update #2!

Monday, February 18

WFTV has provided updated information.

This week's status hearing for Casey Anthony’s murder trial has been delayed until Monday January 25, the day her check fraud trial is scheduled to start.

The defense had asked for a change of venue for that trial and there are reports that, since no hearings have been held on that issue, the defense also wants the check fraud trial to be put off.

Since court is closed today, these reports can't be based on any official announcements. To find out what is really going on, we'll have to wait to hear what Judge Strickland says. Check back tomorrow. Hopefully, we'll have the official word on what is going on.


Update #1!

Monday, February 18

The Orlando Sentinel is reporting that the fraud case will not be heard next week.

There's a slew of motions that haven't been addressed by the court, such as whether the defense can get a change of venue due to the media coverage. And, the defense has not interviewed the victim, Amy Huizenga, under oath yet.

Prosecutors and Anthony's defense team will appear at a pre-trial hearing Thursday to address some of these issues.

Other sources are indicating that the hearing on Thursday will not take place.

Stop by for any further updates.



It's been a quiet holiday season on the Casey Anthony front.

The only bits of "news" out there include Andrea Lyon's appearance on the Today Show and an audio clip of her on the Steve Malzberg radio program on WOR710 out of New York. (The radio program is rather raucous and you have to listen through the first segment to get to Lyon's part.) In these segments, she compares Casey Anthony to a victim of the Salem Witch Trials. Then, she goes on to tout her new book.

Then, George Anthony went to Fox 35 to read his letter about "Living Under a Microscope" and what his life has been like since his daughter was arrested and later charged with the murder of his granddaughter, Caylee Marie.

The final bit of "news" was that a "JD" had sent a letter to Judge Stan Strickland in late December which fully exonerates Casey Anthony!

What is real news in the case is the upcoming hearing on Thursday, January 21 for the fraud trial.

A while back, I was talking with Sprocket about the hearing. I opined that Casey might cop a plea at the hearing rather than letting it go on to trial on January 25. Sprocket did a little poll on the matter, and most people thought that Casey would never take a plea. I would think, however, that her defense team is pushing her to take a plea for a number of reasons.

First of all, Judge Strickland made a statement at the December 16 hearing, after listening to Jose Baez argue his motion to dismiss many of the fraud charges. He said that:

This case is going to get resolved either by trial or plea before the capital case and, if and when it gets resolved, she is going to be treated the same way by me (as) anybody else would.

Strickland also mentioned that charges that were brought by the State are not unusual and that they could possibly be merged into a higher sentence, depending on if and when somebody takes a plea. He indicated that while Casey Anthony is presumed innocent at this point and she could possibly end up with concurrent sentences if found guilty or if she took a plea.

So, at this point, the defense has lost the battle to postpone the fraud trial until after the murder trial. That being said, it would be in Casey's best interest to get the best deal possible through a plea deal. I can't imagine that the defense would want Casey to appear in a televised trial before a jury prior to the murder case.

As was seen at the last hearing, Casey is not ready for prime time as a defendant. She has difficulty behaving in a "neutral" way and lets her anger show. I can only imagine how many people would love to analyze her body language while listening to her former friend as she testifies against her.

I would also imagine that the defense would have a difficult time putting up an affirmative defense. In her statements to police and to her family, her "motive" or "mitigating factor" was that she would "lie, cheat, and steal" in order to find her child. That is something the defense would not want to say, nor would they want anyone else to testify to what she said.

As can be seen in the picture, Casey was rather brazen in her use of Amy Huizenga's checks. On July 15, 2008, she presented herself to a branch office of the Bank of America to clean out the last of Amy's savings. There are also videos of her cashing bogus checks at Target. In a video visitation with her parents in August, 2008, she tells her mother to apologize to Amy for the theft. Finally, Jose Baez sent a check for the stolen amount to the Bank of America. This evidence makes for an extremely strong case.

If Casey doesn't take a plea, the hearing will be another round of motions.

The defense is asking that various pieces of information not come out in a trial. These are the motions:

MOTION IN LIMINE TO EXCLUDE EVIDENCE OF ALLEGED PRIOR BAD ACTS

In the motion, the defense points out that in Officer Wilson's "alleged affidavit" Amy Huizenga "found out that Miss Anthony was a "liar". "Additionally, Miss Huizenga states testimony referring to Miss Anthony's alleged drug activity."

One curious paragraph in the motion explains that "The only purpose of evidence of these, and potentially other, alleged prior bad acts of Miss Anthony is to attempt to show that Ms. Anthony had the propensity to not properly supervise its students." Go figure what that could be!

DEFENDANT'S MOTION IN LIMINE TO PRECLUDE THE INTRODUCTION OF ANY EVIDENCE RELATING TO MISS ANTHONY'S MURDER CASE

This is a motion one would expect in this trial. The nagging problem about this is that, as I mentioned earlier, Casey's defense to this has been, since day 1, was that she needed money to fund her search for her kidnapped daughter. This defense simply can't be used at all. In their own motion, the defense clearly states that:

Any evidence mentioning Miss Anthony's child Caylee Anthony, the homicide charges and other charges she faces regarding her daughter, accusations of child neglect, abuse, or any other such evidence relating to Miss Anthony's pending homicide case is irrelevant.

Clearly, Casey has no defense. It would be better to take a plea deal.

The remainder of the motions deal with change of venue and jury selection. Judge Strickland mentioned on December 16 that he would meet with the attorneys concerning jury selection. At this point, we will have to wait for the hearing to see what has been negotiated between the parties.

Here are the links to all the motions concerning these issues.

Motion For Venue Change (Document is 124 pages and is slow to load)
Motion For Jury Questionnaire
Motion For Sequestered Voir Dire
Sample Juror Questionnaire

At this point, the fraud trial is scheduled for Monday, January 25.

I'd love to hear if you think Casey Anthony will be convinced to plead guilty to the charges in this case!