Pajiba

I honestly had no idea that this case or these people existed until last weekend when I went to a neighborhood get together and learned that every single woman in my immediate neighborhood is glued to the TV over this. I still don't get it. I'm not judging; I just don't get the fascination with it. As you mentioned, these things tend to happen every few years.

I think that you make a lot of excellent points, but this still must be said ...

Speak for yourself. I haven't touched anything having to do with that whole situation with a ten foot pole, and I think that "news" network ought to die in a fire. Didn't pay attention to OJ, either.

But then, I watch very little television, reality or not. So maybe I'm the weird one, eh? :)

I've heard it was happening, but don't know who or what or when or why. I don't care. (And yes, I know it's de rigeur to state such nonchalance at this trial or anything else that catches the zeitgeist, but I'm honest).

As to your question, yes. Yes, we ARE bad people. We are brutal and horrifying with one another. This is Rubbernecking on the Highway TV, only we get to enjoy every horrific second in comfort -- with our personal shame at being entertained by such displays well and truly hidden.

It's no coincidence that today of all days is when the top story in England is of the News of the World tapping the cell phone of a missing, murdered 13-year old in order to get more juicy bits to run with. Nevermind that they tampered with evidence, deleted messages and led family/friends to believe she might still be alive. The media blames the audience (us) and we blame the media and, in so doing, we absolve one another of our crimes.

How can she possibly be declared not guilty? What happened in that 30 days, and how is that not glaring evidence of wrongdoing?

People are enthralled in this type of stuff because it's amazing how much the American justice system can mess up an obvious hole-in-one. This is OJ all over again.

I wasn't entertained. I was disgusted. I followed the case because it was brought to national attention. I read the articles and watched selective testimony--Dr. G, the grieving expert--to shape my own opinion.

The prosecution laid out a very clear case but couldn't prove the murder method. The defense decided to shuck and jive for a week, do some magic tricks, and Billy Flynn this girl out of lesser charges that actually fit the crime. It was the Chewbacca defense and the jury, sick of sitting in that courthouse, fell for it. Unbelievable, except how it's totally not because we already knew at least one juror was an idiot. You know, the one who talked to the media immediately after the Judge said "don't talk to the media?"

Courtney, I got back from a trip to Orlando just last week and gave nary a thought to the circus taking place (i.e. this trial) but then I made the mistake of tuning in to CNN and I was a goner. I've been glued to the tv wanting to know how this would turn out and I just can't wrap my mind around the "Not Guilty" verdict because of those 30 days, the partying and acting like she didn't have a care in the world. My interest was more tied to the fact that an innocent died very possibly at the hands of her own mother and it's just so sad and unnatural and I wondered if justice would be served. I had no horse in this race but the verdict left me with a sinking feeling. Regardless, I pray that that poor child is resting in peace.

I'm confused as to why people care about Casey Anthony...

Thank you for validating my choice to not bother with most TV!

@camytaru: People don't care so much for Casey as much as for Caylee, at least that's the case as far as my personal interest in all this.

No care evar. Countless people, millions of food & wild animals die, horrifically, every single goddamn day. And news flash, our legal & justice systems are broken. World is a vampire.

This isn’t new, obviously.

No, it's not. Not even remotely new. The public has be fascniated and completely capitivated by trials since well before TV ever existed. Here is a brief list of so-called "Trials Of the Century" from way back when:

Harry K. Thaw murder trial (1906)
Sacco and Vanzetti murder trial (1920–1927)
Leopold and Loeb murder trial (1924)
Scopes Trial (1925)
Gloria Vanderbilt custody trial (1934)
Lindbergh trial (1935)

Reality TV is not the sole blame of the Anthony fixation. We’ve been warped by legal dramedies, too.

Neither are to blame with the Anthony fixation. It's just human nature. Not everything is a result of pop culture. Somethings just sort of are.

Are We Bad People?

Perhaps, but, as a collective, humanity is better today then it ever has been in the past. People doing horrible shit to other people and enjoying watching it has been going on since caveman times. But ideas the like racial equality, gender equality and animals rights are all quite new and continue to be enhanced and refined.

I think it's missing the point to say that our justice system is broken just because you disagree with a jury verdict. Would everyone being found guilty make you happy? You trust the police and DA that much?

I can picture Nancy Grace right now. Sitting at a table, muttering to herself, and slamming her fist down every few minutes and yelling BULLSHIT at the top of her lungs.
My day is complete.

People don't "care" about Casey Anthony, I don't think. I think people in general (not just Americans, either, as someone above stated) are fascinated/disgusted by people who can hurt their own offspring, especially a mother. I think most people believe she's guilty, regardless of today's verdict. It's one of those cases that plays to the most basic emotions-how can a mother not protect her child? How can a mother hurt her own child? It's no different than a lot of the other cases of mothers murdering their own children...except that she got away with it.
I can't say I'm surprised...I've been discussing it with friends and figured it was 50/50...we heard a lot of media reports that the jury wasn't necessarily privy to. All they had to go on was the evidence presented by the prosecution in the courtroom, which, I'm sorry to say, wasn't much.

If I'd heard of it before I'd forgotten and suddenly it was on People the last couple of weeks. "The hell is THIS about?"

So, yeah, I don't care.

I second the sentiments found above. I am aware of these kind of cases because it's kind of hard to avoid them and I might even form some sort of opinion and have an emotional response to it, but I don't follow them like they are some sort of reality show. I am always aware that these are actual people.

I'm not the type to watch reality TV, though. I think the last time I actively followed a reality TV show was The Real World: Chicago. I guess its rather than titillate and entertain me, watching the seamier, fucked up side of humanity makes me sad and depressed.

Television, to say nothing of entertainment, has no place in the courtroom. I was summoned to jury duty on June 2nd, the dress code specified "clothing appropriate to the somber nature of the occassion" (emphasis mine). The same should apply to the manner in which the proceedings are reported.

I noticed people were WAY more into it than I was. NOw that the verdict has been publicized people are angry at the jury and that pisses me off. The jurors have been sequestered and have given up weeks of their lives including no being able to be with their families during the holiday. The jurors are given VERY specific directions regarding how how to process the evidence information. The burden of proof is on the prosecutor and from what I heard the evidence was circumstantial at best. I have served on a first degree murder trial in Killadelphia no less. It was 10 years ago and the pictures and details STILL haunt me.The people on my juror all knew the guy was guilty but based upon the evidence it was NOT beyond a reasonable doubt enough to convict him for first degree murder based on the instructions the judge gave us. I am positive the jurors did not decide lightly and without much thought. You are instructed to only consider the evidence and information presented during the trial not your preconceived notions.

I'm apparently living under a rock because I'd heard nothing of this until this morning when Facebook blew up over the verdict. I had to look her up. I wish I hadn't. I'd have been better off not knowing that sick monster existed.

Next season of "Dexter"?

Well I ended up seeing a lot more of this shit than I ever would want to. I work for the Department of the Army. Ever since 9-11 caught us with our pants down, its pretty much an unofficial policy to have a TV somewhere in pretty much every building or office with CNN on. I was on active duty at the time in the navy and let me tell you, we in the military were just as out of the loop as everyone else. That event basically taught everyone that a) the media was much better at getting information out through the rest of the government than any internal system, and b) they usually know what is going on before than the people that should when it comes to major, rapid events.

That said, I work with a bunch of people that turn the TV onto FOX News rather than CNN or my preference, a fucking test pattern. Every fucking time this case was mentioned, the secretaries would turn the damn thing up, forcing everyone in the office to hear this crap, and of course their own wonderful legal perspectives.

We only give a shit about this case because the mom is moderately attractive and white. If she was overweight, a minority, or a man, this would not have been covered at all. Thousands of kids die each year in similar situations and we don't give a shit.

Its all really just fucking pointless in the grand scheme of things.

12 people heard the evidence, they made a decision, the system works. Other people get killed EVERY. FUCKING. DAY, but when they're not cute white children people don't give a flying fuck. I'm pretty sure some other white kid will vanish/perish, soon enough so folks can overreact AAAALL over again.

Move on.

Nope, you are wrong. If it was a black/dark skinned child nobody, except their immediate family, would give a rat's ass.

These are facts.

In a nutshell: I've heard virtually nothing about this, but then I haven't cared to (and I don't live in Florida). I vaguely remember when the girl went missing and there was an exhaustive search, and "cadaver-sniffing dogs pointed to the mom's car". That's about it.

That said, a few weeks ago, around when the trial began, my co-workers and I were supposed to have a conference call/computers being connected session with a client of ours in Florida. We tried to get it set up where the computers were connected (so we would all be viewing the same computer screen while also on the phone). This, of course, requires some bandwidth on the Inter-tubies. Well, we kept not being able to set up the computer part, and not being able to set it up, and the problem was definitely on their end... A couple of days later, talking to the client, they said that SO MANY PEOPLE in their office were surreptitiously watching the live, streaming coverage of the trial that they bogged down the servers.

Those of us not in Florida went, "W..T..F...?"

I once sat on a jury in a capital case. Kidnapping. Attempted Murder. Gangs. Crack. Rape. Sequestered. The whole nine yards. It was the most horrible experience of my life, and I've been shot. It sent me into a funk that lasted weeks and lingers still today. When the trial was over and I got home I felt like I had escaped from Hell.

Every person who took the stand, including the victims and the cops, was a scumbag. They all were blatant and obvious liars. The prosecutor was inept, and really had no case at all. The judge was sleepy. It was a tour of the underbelly.

The only nugget of hope I could take from the whole thing was that even the mildly-racist right-wingers on the jury did their duty and acquitted a guy we knew was a scumbag, because the prosecutor hadn't proven a single thing and barely knew what he was trying to prove. He even contradicted his own case over and over. Reasonable doubt? It was all doubt all the time.

We did our job, even though it was painful. For doing our duty we got held in a room and chewed-out by the prosecutor, to the point that three women and one man cried.

My point is, I can not for the life of me understand why people watch stuff like this for entertainment. We must be wired very differently. I'm not saying I'm better. I just don't get it.

Gotta confess, I watched, but I see no loathsome mark on society. Gotta agree with Lainey on a number of counts, including that the mother was a cockroach and that Slim's just a bit too clever. Different because she was a white mom? Nope. Different because Caylee was an adorable little child? Maybe.

What drew me in the most, though, was the availability of a story this absurd and the easy assumption that so many pieces fitting together could only end in the system working as it should.

It didn't. And that, to me, is loathsome.

... uh ... actually I wasn't making it more than it is either.

A woman got away with killing her own kid. That's fucked up, just like it's fucked up every other time it's ever happened.

Just got home from Fam Refunion in Texas ("You kill 'em, we chill'em!"), and I can tell that I have arrived at an opportune moment. After reading Courtney's article, I was deeply ashamed to discover that this trial/fiasco had been going on for THREE YEARS??!! Are you KIDDING ME? I had NO IDEA! I just found out about it a few months ago, via the CNN app for iPad. This "woman/defendant," called the "Tot Mom," which is all I know about her, is a star! Even worse, I despise Nancy Grace for making her a star, (and I REALLY HATE Nancy's hick accent; believe you me, spent four days in Texas and Not ONE of my relatives twangs anything LIKE Nancy!) I just have to wonder WHO IS propelling Tot Mom to stardom and WHY?

I leave the country ---oops, state--- for a few days and THIS is what I return home to.

Jeez. WFT. What is this pathetic world coming to? I ask ya?

I was watching "Chicago" the other night when it hit me:

Cayce Anthony is just this year's Roxie Hart, and we are just as ridiculous as a society as the background characters were in the show, waiting outside the courtroom for the verdict with bated breath, desperate to be tantalized. I blame "Unsolved Mysteries."

Anthony will be a distant memory in 6 months time when she's replaced by some batshit crazy tea party mom who bakes her kid in an oven in the name of Jesus and lower taxes. Mark my words.

Unless, of course, she does the world a favor and accidentally overdoses. Or gets caught having an abortion. At which point Nancy Grace will simultaneously spontaneously orgasm and spontaneously combust.

And that is one witch I would pay to watch burn.

I hate to agree with Geraldo, but the prosecution should never have gone for the death penalty. It tied the jury's hands too tightly, and in this day and age it's impossible to seat a jury of anyone's "peers". In this case, the "beyond a reasonable doubt" bar was set too high and you can't convict on "I think so". Or at least you shouldn't.

I didn't follow this as closely as I had the OJ trial. I was working for a local FOX affiliate news department during that trial and though most of my colleagues were shocked at the verdict, I wasn't. There were too many asked and unanswered questions. There were too many doors opened and never inspected.
For example:
The blood found in OJ's car had preservative in it. EDTA. IT does NOT occur naturally in any human being, therefore it was planted by someone, presumably someone with access to his blood samples.
Much was made of the glove that "didn't fit". Much was also made of OJ cutting his finger "in the commission of the act". How do you cut a finger and not a glove?
Much was made of a witness who heard voices that night. Then it was poo-pooed as if a witness meant nothing. There was a lot more, but I don't want to belabor the point. The real point is that evidence is often presented and misrepresented and then made paramount or ignored entirely. The glove being a major point. "If it doesn't fit, you must acquit". It's bullshit, but it worked.

Something worked here as well. I'm not so shocked about the verdict as I am about the fact that she is getting away scot-free for essentially covering up her daughter's death for 31 days. It's a felony to move a body, much less hide the fact that there was a death.
If she used the story about her father abusing her as a defense for whatever she did, doesn't that mean she's admitting she did "something"? Something she's now not getting prosecuted for?
If she made up the story of the babysitter, isn't that somehow proof that she covered up something? If the grandmother said that she left a message saying she hadn't seen her granddaughter and then said she smelled death in the car, how is that thread left hanging?

Again, I'm not shocked at the verdict really (well, yeah I am), but the fact that she is now only guilty of perjury (and lying about what? Doesn't that mean she lied about the murder?) and can't be tried again under the double-jeopardy business. Overall it's par for the course for Florida and show-trials.

I do reject the idea that the media is to blame. The media only play what people want to see. If people didn't want to see it, it wouldn't be aired. The only blame the media can be held to is the fact that it's impossible to seat a jury that doesn't know what's going on and therefore must seat a jury of death and blind morons. Which is exactly what defense attorneys want anyway.

I know of a woman that has a section in a forum that's dedicated to stories like this and she grazes the internet all day to "report" back with snippets and links. This story and the girl that went missing in the Bahamas particularly appealed to her. She seems to feel she's helping with her continuous "investigation" into the matter. Maybe that's part of the wide appeal of these stories, people feel invested somehow even though they've got absolutely no connection and can't make an impact on the results even if they did.

Fuck all of you playing the race card on this. No shit that bad things happen to black people every day that don't get reported on. FYI, bad things happen to white people every day too that don't make it on CNN. This was a crazy story involving crazy people that seemed like the plot to an episode of CSI. Did CNN exploit the ever loving shit out of the story? Absolutely, but that's because there was something to exploit. What makes a better headline, "Mom kills child, covers it up for 31 days, acts like nothing happened, and makes up fake people to blame for it" or "Man shoots wife, arrested 20 minutes later"? The story was tailor made for TV, regardless of skintone. Put the race card back in the deck for when it's warranted.

Nancy Grace needs to retire now. Having nothing else to talk about.

If all the restaurants in the world suddenly started selling only hamburgers and french fries, would it be the fault of the patrons of said restaurants for only eating hamburgers and french fries and pretending to like it?

My point being: How is it the fault of white America, or any America, that one or two kinda-watched TV channels (court tv, msnbc, cnn: whoever continued the narrative) found a story that they liked and continued to push it for three years?

The only reason this is a big deal is because Nancy Grace and a few other cable news reporters decided it to be. You can't blame the public for being interested in the only thing that the media allows them to be interested in.

Second, I think the primary reason that white news anchors continue to thread the white person on trial narrative is because if someone like Nancy Grace were to pick some hispanic or black person who possibly murdered their own daughter ala Ms. Anthony, and then drilled the point home about it for three years, quite a few people in the PC/racial crowd would call her a racist for demonizing a minority.

I mean, don't you all think that part of the reason that white people are so interested in the trial of another white person is due to the fact that they can cuss and holler and scream for blood as loud and as long as they want without looking like racists? It's the safe bet. No toes to step on, other than those whose toes are overlooked.

I didn't watch one single moment of the trial, nor do I much care about the result, so please don't include me in the "We" of the title.

Just because some people - I assume they're mostly women, because it seems to be mostly women who are riveted by the personal lives of people they don't know, have never met and never will meet - wasted hours of their lives watching this crap doesn't mean we all do it.

I don't care any more about the missing/murdered white people than I do the missing/murdered non-white people. Which is to say, a non-white child dead under suspicious circumstances should be just as "newsworthy" as this child, whatever the circumstances or ethnicity of the people involved. But in the U.S., that child is not. And that IS a fact. White people don't care as much, apparently, about dead black kids or dead Hispanic kids.

I can't remember the last time a large portion of white America was supposedly riveted by the story of a black child who was neglected to death (what I assume happened in the Anthony case) by a parent. I guess those cases get pleaded out quietly without a big show trial that Nancy Grace can yap about in her troll-like way.

Anyway, so now people who want to get away with doing something that results in the death of their child know what to do: don't report it to the cops, make up a bunch of shit, hope they don't find the body until it's so decomposed a cause of death can't be established, then get lawyers willing to cast suspicion on everyone but you (the parent who's responsible for the child).

Hopefully this neglectful mother will never have another moment of peace for the rest of her miserable life. Hopefully, a conscience (if she possesses one) will do what the justice system couldn't.

And yeah, the prosecution fucked up.

The really frightening thing is, they do it all the time. But most of the time, it works. Only those trials don't get on TV (because they don't involve attractive white women), and innocent people get convicted. And some have been executed.

I know everyone is a bit on edge about the who "race card" aspect of this conversation. I would like to bring up a prime example occurring in my neck of the woods.

A four year old was shot after a fireworks celebration in our downtown. Right now the local radio stations and newspapers are up in arms about the shooting...as they should. The child, thankfully recovering fine from his leg wound, was not the target but an unfortunate victim of a stray bullet.

Here is the thing...this occurred in down town Baltimore. We are at a 20 year low for homicides and we still lead the nation in homicides for large cities...by insane numbers. Kids are especially at risk in the city because most of the housing has no AC, so once school is out, basically entire neighborhoods shift to an informal night schedule to beat the heat. When there is nothing to do all day and its 90+ degrees, all you can do is sleep. I can't pull out official numbers but I honestly believe that a young child is killed or wounded in similar situations at least each month in my city. Most will never make the paper. So why is this one situation so great, that it is completely taken over the local airwaves and media? Why are people demanding that something be done?

The child and his parents are white suburbanites visiting the city.

Its really not that simple of black and white of course. If for any reason you aren't valued by society, you are going to get treated like a second class citizen. Poor, disabled, gay, homeless, minority, criminal record...whatever it is will heavily affect how you are treated. Its very hard to watch something like this case on TV for all these years and wonder what the fuck our priorities are.

I would also add that the trend to include non-whites, while maybe not noticed by non-whites as much, is in full force. Nearly every show and movie has such a racially diverse cast it is borderline pandering. I saw Larry Crowne with the parents yesterday (innocuous and cute, not much else) and the cast was a veritable Benneton ad. Yes, the leads were both white, but every other cast member fit neatly into each of the five food groups with the notable exception of Asians.

'm I really the only one which realizes it unfathomable that this specific lady got off? Casey will be now within this OJ category, however wish karma catches way quicker than it really is hooking the man.