Tears and More Tears

Lee Anthony’s tearful testimony was the high point of Friday’s activities in the Casey Anthony trial. Or was it the low point? Hard to tell one from the other anymore.

It seems that Lee, Casey’s brother and Cindy’s son, must have inherited the tears for fears gene. We’ve seen Casey turn on the water works sitting at the defense table. We’ve seen Cindy turn them on when testifying, both for the prosecution and the defense. And now, we see a big, bearded grown man break down crying on the witness stand.

Why? Because he wasn’t invited to his sister’s baby shower.

This Turkey would cringe at the thought of attending one of those. Crying would definitely not enter the picture. Rejoicing with a beer and silent tears of joy would be more like it.

Lee broke down again when talking about not being present for the birth of little Caylee, with the rest of his family. He said that Cindy was ashamed of the out of wedlock birth.

Under cross examination, when asked why he wasn’t similarly emotional when depositions were taken in advance of the trial, he stated that things were different back then. The span of time between the depositions and the trial has found Lee suddenly turning into a whining cry baby about not being invited to a baby shower and Cindy amazingly able to recall details that she had previously forgotten. All of this under oath.

Protecting a sister or a child from death by lethal injection might well be the motive for these desperation ploys by the Anthony family, while the defense team no doubt views them as building sympathy from the jury. Jeff Ashton’s harsh attempts to impeach Lee Anthony, and to a lesser extent, Linda Burdick’s cross examination of Cindy Anthony could have caused a sentimental swing by the jury in favor of the defense. Maybe, perhaps. We cannot get into the minds of the jurors.

Regardless of the motive for the sudden change of tune by both Cindy and Lee, the legal implications for each of them could include charges of perjury if they lied under oath at either the deposition or the trial (or both). However, under the “this family has been through quite enough” rule of getting District 9 State Attorney Lawson Lamar re-elected, charges might never be brought.

As this Turkey has mentioned, the long string of forensic expert witnesses for the defense led me to wonder whether Jose Baez and company had abandoned the defense theory originally presented by Baez in his opening arguments. Clearly, I wasn’t the only one wondering what the defense was trying to prove with today’s testimony, inasmuch as Judge Perry had to ask Baez at least twice to enunciate his defense game plan. Perry characterized it as constantly changing. One certainly has to wonder whether Baez’s inclusion of all those far fetched allegations in his opening was not another blunder borne of Baez’s inexperience or ineptitude. Now, he has finally begun to try to tie the case together by casting doubt on the prosecution’s case — as well as advancing his own theory of an accidental drowning. However, one big area of the defense’s case remains to be explored via witnesses: the notion that George Anthony sexually abused his daughter over a period of many years. Will George fall on his sword, too, by testifying for the defense? Or will the jury have to accept Baez’s account of the incestuous relationship?

Another issue that will require significant attention is the 31 day period that elapsed before Caylee was reported missing and the subsequent song and dance about Zanny the Nanny, kidnapping, and other such folly. The 31 day lapse is no doubt etched indelibly in jurors’ minds. It would seem that the only reason to delay that long would be to cover up a crime. An accident doesn’t require a cover-up. Just how the Zenaida Gonzalez-Hernandez kidnapping of Caylee fits into this picture is even more difficult to conceive if indeed the child drowned accidentally. This alone makes it unlikely that Casey Anthony will be called as a witness. She might be a great liar by her own admission, but she’ll need the proverbial sky hook to get her through this potential cross examination.

District 9 Chief Circuit Judge Belvin Perry had asked the lawyers to give him a time estimate for completion of their cases. Baez responded that he could wrap up the defense’s case by Wednesday or Thursday. That, he said, meant Thursday. The prosecution will have rebuttal witnesses, which Mr. Ashton estimated would require the remainder of Thursday and Friday. The humorous part involved the closing arguments. When asked for a time estimate, Baez began muttering something about the unfairness of the prosecution essentially having four lawyers doing four closings while he was expected to provide his summation in the time it took for one prosecution lawyer to do his. The judge told him to give his estimate independent of what the prosecution was doing. “Knock yourself out. Just give me an estimate.” Baez replied that his peroration could well require half a day. Judge Perry responded that that was OK if he wanted to put the jury to sleep. What came out of this discussion is a hyper-optimistic target of Saturday for handing the case to the jury. As there are several charges for the jury to consider, Perry’s instructions to the jury will be lengthy. He estimated 45 minutes or so for them. Adding all the time estimates in this paragraph, this Turkey feels that Tuesday, July 5 is more likely than Saturday, July 2.

Today, Saturday, June 25, will be a full session, which the judge estimates will conclude around 3 PM.