I was one of the few who supported this in the "If you were on the jury" thread. (No, that's not an "I told you so"...plz continue reading).
I think Nancy Grace is an abomination and that she, and other media reports that followed, demonized KC to a HUGE extent. To be fair, she gave them plenty of material to do it with. If I was ever tried for a crime - any crime - just due to my surfing habits and morbid interests you're going to find a LOT of weird things in my cache. A LOT.
My mother passed away on June 7th. We were very close. I reacted very badly to it, in ways I did not expect.. I partied. I put myself into some compromising positions at a bar. I entered two new relationships within days of each other. I drank a lot at times. I finally realized what I was doing last week and it took a LOT out of me to re-focus my grief into "more appropriate" things. And I didn't kill my mother. I was doing anything and everything to "feel better" and to focus on the sensation of being alive and being in the moment. And nowhere I went, no one I saw, etc were reminders of my mom. I couldn't take it.
Until that happened, I couldn't "get" the partying of Casey at all. I thought that sort of reaction as grief was, if anything, forced denial. Now, I do wonder.
I/we may never know exactly what happened to Caylee. But I think the prosecution over-reached based on a lot of inflammatory stuff that didn't actually have to do with Caylee's *death* (the partying pics, etc). There were so many vocal people who outright HATED KC and wanted her to "hang" for this that I think they believed they could get the conviction.
In the end, they just didn't prove the charges. I do wonder if in FL if there is a charge for "negligent homicide" or similar. I believe the jury couldn't quite find for "aggravated", but have wondered why something more akin to negligent homicide wasn't pursued as I believe that case could have been more easily proven.
One of my professors (psych) mentioned recently that Casey's behavior was similar to what one would experience during a manic phase following a traumatic encounter.
Some symptoms of mania are: (note: I just pulled this list off the web)
* Extreme irritability & distractibility
* Excessive "high" or euphoric feelings
* Sustained periods of unusual, even bizarre, behavior with significant risk-taking
* Increased energy, activity, rapid talking & thinking, agitation
* Decreased sleep
* Unrealistic belief in one's own abilities
* Poor judgment
* Increased sex drive
* Substance abuse
* Provocative or obnoxious behavior
* Denial of problem
In reality, patients in a manic stage often engage in irrational over-spending sprees or sexual liaisons, maybe gambling away their life's savings, etc. There is normally a great display of "grandiosity".
If you look at Casey's behavior many MANY of her actions can be explained using just that list and knowledge of manic behaviors. Of course, I have no idea if this is true or not. I don't know if she has ever been diagnosed as bi-polar, but it would not surprise me.
Either way - whether Casey killed Caylee, if it was an accident, or if Casey knows who did - this mania would easily explain her actions. It make much more sense to me than Casey being a wild party girl happy to be rid of the little burden.
By the way - I totally agree about Nancy Grace. I stopped watching her during the Natalee Holloway craziness. She is an evil, vile, horrid woman. It's really a shame, because her program could provide such a service to society, but instead she just shrieks whatever her own gut feeling is, ad nauseum. It's hard to believe that she used to be a prosecutor. That woman has nothing but a hell-bent fury and hatred, with zero ability to think critically.