Archives for 2011

Judge Belvin Perry has his hands full trying to keep the Casey Anthony murder trial moving along on an even keel. The two lead counsels for the two sides keep flinging spitballs at each other when the teacher has his back turned. Judge Perry is nobody’s fool and, like any good teacher, has eyes in the back of his head and lots and lots of patience. His patience is wearing thin, though.

Too much spitball flinging is bound to get someone detention. It might even get both flinger and flingee detention, just to prove a point, before it escalates to rubber bands and paper clips.

On Friday, Perry warned lead defense counsel Jose Baez that he could not pick and choose court orders he felt like following, and that he would consider contempt proceedings at the conclusion of the Anthony trial. In Perry’s opinion, Baez had violated disclosure rules by not disclosing information that would be presented by Dr. William Rodriguez, an forensic anthropologist who was testifying on Friday when he was interrupted by objections when he gave an opinion that was not covered by his deposition. The prosecution asked for him to be deposed and to receive the deposition timely before Rodriguez would resume testimony on Monday.

Now, on Monday, with the jury waiting in their cramped jury room, Jeff Ashton, lead prosecutor, asked to speak on a procedural matter, that being the late delivery of Rodriguez’s deposition, not him giving sufficient preparation time. He further stated that he came into the knowledge that another expert witness, Richard Eikelenboom, would be testifying for the defense, but Ashton had not yet received any information. Baez argued essentially that he needed to conduct his defense the way he was doing it, which did not go over big with Judge Perry.

“I want you two to turn around and look at that clock on the back wall of the courtroom,” said Perry, preparing to teach the children. “What time is it, Mr. Ashton?”

“Nine twenty-five,” replied Aston.

“And Mr. Baez, what time is it?”

“It looks like it is nine twenty-six to me,” replied Baez.

“You see,” admonished the exasperated judge, “you two can’t even agree on what time it is!”

Perry then launched into a patient but insistent diatribe. He addressed the friction between the two attorneys, which he said was a matter for the Florida Bar to take up. Then, he proceeded to rule on the matters at hand, giving the prosecution the time it needed to read the expert witnesses’ depositions before they would testify. In the process, Perry once again warned Baez that repeated violations of the same court order would make him think strongly of initiating contempt proceedings at the close of the trial. The judge did not want this crap getting in the way of conducting a fair and expeditious trial for Ms. Anthony. Meanwhile, testimony from both Rodriguez and Eikelenboom would be delayed until Tuesday.

The judge was also unhappy about the amount of time spent on procedural matters. Here it was 9:45 and the jury had been sitting in a cramped room waiting for an hour. He told the lawyers that they would be working a full day on Saturday, and that he would consider starting at 8:30 instead of 9:00 every day. He also noted that Wednesday would be a half day, which was his fault.

With that, he brought the jury back in, noted that everyone was present, and ordered the trial to proceed.

He announced that Dr. Rodriguez’s testimony would be delayed.

“Will the defense please call your next witness.”

At the defense table, there was much paper shuffling, head scratching, muttering, and gesturing. Baez spoke.

“Dr. Eikelenboom was to be our next witness.”

With smoke coming out of his ears, Judge Perry recessed the court until 10:25 and told the boys to come to the principal’s office. No one knows what went on in there. ???? ??? People were tweeting about possible plea deals and any other thing they could think of that would gain them the validation they so sorely craved from their anonymous on-line pseudo-buddies. ???? Ten twenty-five came and went. Finally, the judge returned at 10:45.

“This court will be in recess until tomorrow morning, 9:00 AM.”

This whole thing couldn’t have sat well with Perry, who is trying to keep the trial running smoothly and proceeding with dispatch. Counsels’ shenanigans had cost the trial an entire day.

Was anyone other than Perry concerned about the defendant? It seemed that both counsels had gone deep into egocentric territory. This Turkey thinks that Ms. Anthony is getting fed up with Baez and his games. When Cheney Mason entered the courtroom, she nodded and smiled; when Baez came in, she gave him a straight-faced sidelong glance. Ms. Anthony hired Baez after receiving a recommendation from another prisoner. She stuck with him through it all, even though he showed signs of unorthodox behavior very early in the game, enough so that her family tried to convince her to dump Baez.

Only Ms. Anthony knows the truth, and she ain’t talking. In this country, she is innocent until proven guilty. Judge Perry is trying his damnedest to give her a fair trial.

As I was watching Twitter, I noted that many of the tweetheads were feeling sorry for the people attending the trial, as they would have had to get up like, really, really early in the morning and then they might not even get a seat, and now they have to go through it all over again, like, fer sure. Well, I’m here to tell you that those who think that way have their heads firmly inserted into their rectums.

Nobody held a gun to those spectators’ heads when they decided to take a chance on getting to see this, the 18th “trial of the century” so far. They called in sick at work, ditched school, or just plain got up off their lazy asses to be entertained by what they felt would be a unique moment in jurisprudence. Too bad, folks. Trials are unpredictable and mostly dull. I don’t feel sorry for you folks in the slightest. Spare me. You don’t have any “rights.”

However, I do feel sorry for the jury. They’re sequestered, meaning no outside contact at all, they’re far away from friends and family, and this trial is getting behind schedule. They have no liberty, no freedom. They cannot even discuss the trial among themselves, and they surely cannot watch or listen to news broadcasts or read newspapers. Wouldn’t you be tearing your hair out in such circumstances?

And, yes, I feel bad for Casey Anthony. If she is properly convicted, I will cease to feel sorry for her.

The circus is back in town on Tuesday morning at 9:00 AM, with Rodriguez and Eikelenboom scheduled to testify as expert witnesses for the defense.

People talk about a mistrial, but this Turkey does not believe that Judge Perry will pull that trigger. Under some circumstances — and I’ll repeat that I am not a lawyer, so this will be vague — a granted mistrial motion will result in acquittal of the defendant, with jeopardy established. In such a case, Ms. Anthony would walk and could not be re-tried. That would suck even more than the other mistrial scenario, in which the whole trial is re-started. In either case, there is every reason why Perry would want to avert a mistrial. So, unless things become lots worse with Baez, don’t be looking for a mistrial.

Those who were blowing wind about a plea deal while the lawyers with locked away with Judge Perry will be disappointed, too. ??? ??? ???? Baez is too naive and inexperienced to admit that he could lose this case. He acts like he’s God’s gift to jurisprudence, as if he is infallible. Why would he want a plea deal? He’s going to win, anyway. That having been said, I’m thinking that a deal might be the best way out of this mess for all concerned. Say aggravated manslaughter, and an appropriate sentence, maybe, perhaps.

Nevertheless, trials like this have a life of their own with lots of little twists and turns. No surprises would be a big surprise for this Turkey!

Judge Perry decided to make Saturday a half-day session for the latest “Trial of the Century”. It was anything but Soporific Saturday, as the both prosecution and defense tried Perry’s patience enough to threaten one side with contempt proceedings at the conclusion of the trial. ?????? ?????? More fireworks occurred during the questioning of the two expert witnesses who took the stand today for the defense, providing a more entertaining than usual session for this trial addict.

The first witness to testify was forensic anthropologist Dr. William Rodriguez, who is with the U.S. Department of Defense Armed Forces Medical Examiner’s Office. It appeared as if the defense was poised to score some points with Dr. Rodriguez until a question came up about the duct tape found on Caylee Anthony’s remains, a question pivotal to discrediting the prosecution’s theory that the duct tape was the cause of the toddler’s death. Rodriguez testified that he cannot tell exactly where the duct tape was applied to the head due to the decomposition of the body subsequent to that time. That answer immediately raised an objection from the prosecution, as this opinion had not been previously disclosed by the defense.

Judge Perry had set deadlines for disclosures by both sides to the other, deadlines that had long passed. Rodriguez stated that he had given his opinion to lead defense counsel Jose Baez in February. The visibly perturbed judge made some strong statements about both sides engaging in gamesmanship, but this failure to make a disclosure by Baez was in direct disobedience of a court order. He told Baez that he cannot choose which court orders to observe and which to ignore, and even though the disclosure would have been past the deadline, it was essential that if the associated testimony were to be heard by the jury, the prosecution should have been given the information well in advance. Thus, with the jury absent, Perry ordered the witness to step down to be deposed later Saturday by the prosecution and continue his testimony on Monday, while admonishing Baez that he would consider whether to initiate contempt proceedings at the conclusion of the trial. Pretty powerful stuff.

“It appears to me that this was quite intentional,” Perry noted. ???? ?????? “This was not some inadvertent slip. The question is whether Ms. Anthony should be punished because of this.”

Baez pouted throughout — as one analyst stated “like a sulking schoolboy being scolded by a teacher.” His naivete and inexperience have been apparent throughout this trial, as this Turkey has frequently mentioned. ????????? ??? ????????? At this point, though, his shenanigans have entered new territory. This being a death penalty case, a defendant’s life is hinging on a competent defense; she is getting anything but. Baez wanted to make a name for himself. He is sure as hell doing that!

This day should have been a big win for the defense. It would turn out to fall far short of that, possibly scoring big points for the prosecution, particularly during the cross-examination of the defense’s second expert witness, Dr. Werner Spitz, a world renowned forensic pathologist with tens of thousands of autopsies to his credit who had given testimony in many high-profile cases.

Cheney Mason took over the questioning of Spitz as Baez sat down to pout some more over his threatened contempt citation.  Later, Baez would undoubtedly attend the prosecution’s deposition of Rodriguez, where he would be able to hone his pouting technique even more.

After going through the white haired, elderly, peripatetic Dr. Spitz’s lengthy list of credentials, accomplishments, and honors, Mason questioned Spitz about the second autopsy, which Spitz had conducted at the funeral home where the remains were transferred after the official autopsy by Orange-Osceola Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Jan Garavaglia. Spitz’s request to attend and participate in the original autopsy had been denied. He seemed to be torqued about it, to the extent that he called Dr. G’s work “shoddy” because she did not saw the skull to look inside. He declared her decision a “failure.” At his unofficial autopsy, Dr. Spitz opened the skull in order to determine in which position the body had been resting.

The duct tape question arose once again, but this time there would be a surprise answer that even Artificially Sweetened, who thinks this whole trial is a bore and says “OMG!” every time I turn it on, gasped when she heard it. Spitz concluded that the duct tape was placed on the body post-mortem, after decomposition.

“I think the duct tape was a later event, not an early event, after decomposition,” he said.

Whoa! Inasmuch as the prosecution had theorized that duct tape had been the murder weapon, this could blow its entire case to bits. Once again, it appeared that Baez and company held the upper hand. It wouldn’t last long.

Prosecutor Jeff Ashton, who had blown Friday’s blow fly expert off the stand with his cross-examination, was poised to get under Spitz’s skin.

Ashton first established that Spitz was attracted to high-profile cases, with the implication that he was what one local TV analyst would later call “a media whore.” Spitz glibly responded that for him, every case was a high-profile case. Then, Ashton got down to some specifics.

“Did you work on the Phil Spector murder case?”

“Yes.”

“Did you work on the O. J. Simpson murder case?”

“Yes.”

“Did you work on the Menendez Brothers murder case?”

“No.”

“Oh, you didn’t get that one?” Ashton commented in a stage whisper loud enough to be heard throughout the courtroom.

Ashton asked Spitz to cite a protocol that specifies that the decedent’s skull must be opened to properly complete an autopsy. Spitz could not do so. “I don’t know where that is published,” he said at one point. “I’ve been out of the mainstream of administrative forensic pathology for some time now.” Another point for Ashton, who would move on to Spitz’s penchant for notoriety and media whoring.

Spitz couldn’t recollect what he had discussed during media interviews about the Anthony case even though he had appeared on TV discussing it as recently as last week. He was asked about several other interviews where he had discussed the case, including the Today Show, but he continued to deny any knowledge of the specifics of such interviews.

Spitz appeared annoyed that his credibility was being brought into question. Thus softened, Ashton went in for the kill.

The duct tape question was posed to Spitz, who stuck to his guns that the tape was applied to the skull long after the death of the child. Responding to another question, he agreed that the tape would have had to be applied with the jaw bone held in its anatomically correct position, which would have been next to impossible for one perpetrator to have done on the site. When asked why the tape was not adhering to the skull when it was discovered, Spitz responded, “Water intervention.” Ashton asked why the hair was stuck to the tape if someone applied it to the skull after decomposition. Spitz danced an arabesque worthy of Bill Clinton as his perjuring finest, “I don’t know how the term ‘stuck to tape’ is applicable here.” Were we about to hear that it depended on what the definition of “is” is?

Upon looking at the photos taken of the remains in the woods, Ashton asked Spitz why the hair had fallen off in a different location that Spitz’s analysis of the corpse’s positioning suggested it would. Spitz sank to a new low here, suggesting that someone had moved the hair.

Although Artificially Sweetened disagrees, I think that the prosecution hit a home run with its cross-examination. In this Turkey’s opinion, AS felt sympathetic toward the beleaguered elderly gentleman being peppered with probing question after question by Ashton. While I believe it is true that some members of the jury could feel similarly sympathetic toward Spitz and resentful of Ashton’s heavy handedness, it became quite obvious that Spitz was paid by the defense to provide testimony that would corroborate the defense’s case. This is what Ashton wanted the jury to see. Having discredited Spitz, the important issue of the duct tape remains up in the air.

Saturday was a major win for the prosecution. Not only did it nullify a major witness for the defense, but it was able to throw the entire defense off balance with the overhanging threat of a contempt citation by Judge Perry. Not bad for half a day’s work!