Casey Anthony Trial: Day 27

Some of Casey Anthony’s relatives taking the stand in her trial today.

FOX News Radio’s Eben Brown has the latest from Orlando, FL:

…Twenty five year old Casey Anthony faces the death penalty, if convicted.

Here is a  summary of the Casey Anthony Trial: Day 27 from FOX Producer Kathleen Reuschle who was in the courtroom for the proceedings:

Defense attorney Jose Baez zeroed in on his “theory of defense” today and began focusing witness testimony on the possibility Caylee drowned along with the Anthony family’s propensity to cover up an accidental death and in particular, George’s links to the duct tape found with the toddler’s skull.

Baez re-called Cindy Anthony to the stand and showed jurors a series of consecutive photos depicting how Caylee typically got into the pool assisted by her grandmother. Wearing a florescent yellow life vest little Caylee is seen climbing the steps of the ladder, sitting on the platform on the top, and then eager to splash in the water as Cindy helps her in. Jurors also saw photos of how the ladder looked when it was in use, and when it was detached. Baez finished the sequence showing a photo of Caylee a bit older standing at the Anthony sliding glass door, able to reach the latch.

Cindy testified as Caylee grew she was able to climb the ladder by herself and would go swimming 3-4 times a week, and swam every day the week Cindy took vacation. She said Caylee would be anxious to get in the pool, but they told her someone always had to be with her. “We knew she could go up and down, but we told her she had to be with one of us and told her why, she could get hurt,” Cindy said.

Cindy then recounted for jurors she noticed the ladder had been left in the pool and their side gate was wide open when she came home from work on June 16, 2008. She stated she called George at work to ask him about it and even told her coworkers about the incident. The following month, when Caylee was reporting missing, Cindy testified she told the lead detective in the case what she remembered about the ladder.

In cross-examination prosecutor Linda Drane Burdick attacked the defense theory head on and asked, “Did your daughter tell you there was an accident involving the pool?”  ”No Ma’am” Cindy replied.  ”In fact she continued to tell you that the child was kidnapped by a babysitter?” “That’s correct,” she said.

Baez also spent considerable time asking Cindy about the striped shorts that were recovered from the crime scene in an attempt to show someone who didn’t regularly dress the toddler may have put her in the outfit after she was already dead.  Cindy stated Caylee had outgrown the shorts, she hadn’t seen them in awhile, and they weren’t her favorite. This followed testimony from yesterday when Baez asked Crime Scene Investigator Jennifer Welch whether socks or shoes had been recovered from the remains site in the woods, and she said they had not been – raising the same question – was Caylee fully dressed when she died?

Baez then called Lee Anthony to the stand who provided powerful testimony on how his mother Cindy hid Casey’s pregnancy. He stated she “wasn’t thrilled Casey was having a baby out of wedlock,” denied it and told him to “let it go” and didn’t acknowledge it until right before Casey gave birth. He was so upset that they felt he wasn’t important enough to clue him that he refused to go to the hospital when Caylee was born. Heaves and sobs of raw emotion poured from both Lee and his sister as he recounted the painful memory. The moment was key for Baez to back up the claims he made in his opening statements, “they hid this beautiful child in life, you bet they would hid her in death.”

He then re-called Cindy Anthony to the stand to elicit testimony from her that she didn’t have a baby shower for Casey until after Caylee was born.

Next, the Defense team was hoping to admit testimony from Corporal Eric Edwards from the Orange County Sheriff’s office to show police suspected the Anthonys may be involved in a cover-up and went so far as to approach a member of Kid Finder’s Network to ask her to wear a wire or bug her house. But the judge ruled it was inadmissible because it didn’t prove or disprove a material fact in the case and didn’t go to the theory of defense. This was primarily because the employee declined to wear a wire and no incriminating audio ever materialized.

Baez then called to the stand Kid Finder’s employee, Linda Ginelli. Ginelli told jurors George Anthony had duct tape at their command centers where they distributed “Missing Caylee” fliers. She said he used it to tape down their table cloths so it wouldn’t blow away and also to post the fliers.

Finally lead detective Yuri Melich took the stand and Baez asked him if he ever brought Mr. Anthony in for an interview after it had been brought to his attention he had been using the duct tape that had been found on Caylee’s skull. Melich revealed George was the one who alerted him to the smell in the Casey’s car and had approached him to speak privately at one point. He also stated he only pulled the cell phone records for Casey and the man who found Caylee’s remains, Roy Kronk – but neglected to run a report on either Cindy or George’s cellphone history from the days in question. During the investigation he had blown off a tip to search in the woods off Suburban Drive, he said, because he believed cadaver dogs had already been to the area. But in fact the dogs had searched beyond a dead end sign and the tip was for the area closer to Hopespring Drive, the Anthony’s street. Melich admitted he arrested Casey first, then looked for evidence in her car, “I was concerned that she may hurt herself… based on another case that was in the media at the time,” he said.