Casey Anthony Case Study

Evie Dunagan
Mr. Potoka
American Law & Justice
23 November 2014
Problems in the System A Florida jury found Casey Anthony not guilty of first-degree murder in the death of her 2-year-old daughter, Caylee Marie. As so often happens in high profile cases, the jury was wrong. Casey clearly murdered her daughter. Her mom, Cindy, reported that Caylee was missing on July 15, 2008. Casey’s cover story was unbelievably ridiculous. When Casey’s mom, Cindy, confronted Casey at Casey’s boyfriend’s apartment, Casey actually claimed that a random baby sitter nobody had ever met had taken Caylee away over a month beforehand.
Cindy called the cops, informing them, “I found my daughter’s car today. And it smells like there’s been a dead body in the car.”
It was pure conjecture, a sociopathic response to being caught red-handed. And Casey Anthony is a sociopath: outwardly charming, pathologically lying, indecently self-centered, lacking in shame or guilt, promiscuous, exploitative and irresponsible, and willing to hurt anyone and everyone in order to get her
Because the jury system, as currently run, is stupid. Yes, jury trial is guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution (although only with regard to federal cases). It was originally considered a hallmark of civilized criminal justice because citizens did not want to be subjected to government inquisitions, with the court stacked against them. Juries were supposed to be a bulwark against governmental encroachment (Rivolta). Nowadays, juries have become a hallmark of our heavily bureaucratized system. Those who have day jobs are eager to avoid serving on juries, mainly because the convoluted rules of procedure and evidence have turned summary trials into week-long events. By and large, only the least offensive – and not coincidentally, the dumbest – tend to be selected for juries. As the aphorism goes, the problem with juries is that they are generally composed of the 12 people too stupid to get out of jury duty (Document E).
The phrase “show trial” now means something different – it means a trial that is a show. That’s precisely what O.J. and Casey Anthony were about. The provision of the Constitution that requires a public trial is now used to ensure that trials become media circuses. Should we embrace the European inquisitorial system, in which judges ask the questions and come up with the decisions? Should we hire professional