Huntington Contacted on Dec. 11/Will TH Ever Testify Again **Merged**

[cv1964]

Hate to be snarky, but one of the choices should have been "If he is testifying to pigs in blankets".. Only because we know that will be his next experiment. and I say that with the utmost respect and seriousness.. He seems like a very serious guy and I think he actually felt bad that he didn't conduct the experiment in the "true to life" format.. I see him as someone who doesnt' like to be tripped up but didn't expect that question.

 

[Sleuth5]

I am unsure. I think when his ego recovers (and he loses his defensive and immature hubris about always being right) he may attempt it again. I see enough academic arrogance to air his newly won credentials in public at some point in the future. But all good experts know when to bow to superior facts without acting as if their superior credentials will somehow carry them through. Particularly when that someone basically languished for several years before bothering to finish and write a report.

I found the depo he gave in 2010 hilarious from that standpoint he was told from the get-go there was no money to pay him yet. That was in December 2008. Hadn't JB already gotten the ABC blood money yet? He couldn't have blown through that already. I'll bet the good Dr. asks a few more questions first before he jumps on a plane and shows up at a crime scene that hasn't even been processed yet. Wow. Naive just doesn't cover it.

:goodpost: Well said, Cecy! Spot-on on the issue of hubris -- but he is very young, and certainly quite promising as well, so we'll hear more from him.

 

[ami]

Like everyone else I think Ashton clearly rocked that one and it's cool that the jury seems to really respect the Prosecution. It's so amazing to see how professional the State is in comparison to the defense... like night and day.

I'm glad Huntington was taken apart. He'll be humiliated tonight but will probably look back on this as a good learning experience. Will he testify again? I think so, but with more humility (and honesty) than he showed today. He's got a lot of maturing to do.

 

[Sleuth5]

BTW Dr. Huntington, here is a hint for the next time you are called to testify on behalf of an ethically questionable defense team looking to spend somebody elses money. You are young thin pale and a bug guy. This in and of itself makes you more than a tad weird to the general population such as is found in juries. Joyfully and passionately telling them about your glorious expertise in all things decomposition because of all your experience working in the morgue as a 16 year old goes beyind weird and well into CREEPY territory. Very creepy territory. Classic horror movie "Igor" territory. This is probably not the best approach to take.

:floorlaugh:

 

[MissJames]

BTW Dr. Huntington, here is a hint for the next time you are called to testify on behalf of an ethically questionable defense team looking to spend somebody elses money. You are young thin pale and a bug guy. This in and of itself makes you more than a tad weird to the general population such as is found in juries. Joyfully and passionately telling them about your glorious expertise in all things decomposition because of all your experience working in the morgue as a 16 year old goes beyind weird and well into CREEPY territory. Very creepy territory. Classic horror movie "Igor" territory. This is probably not the best approach to take.

I'm still pondering on his "Flies are good mommas" story. He really does love the little buggers.

 

[BG4pip]

I don't feel sorry for him one bit, and I don't think he was so innocent...during Cross, it was clear he was purposely being evasive or not answering truthfully when he knew it would help the state. I just watched the whole mess about the amount of days and temperature outside affecting decomposition, and it took JA about 15 minutes to get this guy to finally stop trying to run in circles and finally just agree that JA was right. He said way too many: "Based on that assumption", "I find it unlikely- even though that was never studied", "It's possible, given the assumption"...blah blah blah... I suffered second hand embarrassment for this guy.

Not to mention that ridiculous pig experiment where after that entire testimony he says if he had to do it again he would do the experiment in Florida (not Nebraska), In June (not September) and wrap the pig in a blanket, 2 garbage bags and a laundry bag (and not just keep it bare). WHAT THE HELL? SERIOUSLY? All that testimony just to end up saying that the experiment had NOTHING to do with the case at hand??

I join everyone in criticizing JB. He is way over his head. I fault him, not for his lack of ability, but for his lack of integrity in taking on a death penalty case he is ill equipped to handle. And I have no kind words for Huntington. If I understood what he was trying to say, he agrees with the prosecution expert, that death occurred elsewhere, and the already decomposing body was brought to the place where it ultimately was discovered a few days after death occurred. The point of disagreement was as to whether the body was ever in the trunk of the car. Haskins said yes, Huntington said no. But I also understood Huntington to say the trunk had the odor of decomposition when he inspected it, two years after all of the contents of the trunk had been removed. I cannot reconcile that admission with his conclusion.

That being said, I think this is an unfair criticism. He plainly said the experiment he did with the pigs was performed after he had been retained, but it was done for purpose of general research, and not as an experiment to bolster his testimony in this case.

 

[vlpate]

Referencing Dr Huntington's testimony regarding decomposition stains, there were no "comparable" decomposition stains in the trunk, and tests done by the State say they found none... only one hair of "questionable origin".

Huntington was not able to speak specifically about the stain in the trunk of Casey’s car, since he did not examine it directly....so how are you referencing Huntington's testimony?

 

[cv1964]

Huntington was there for the money ultimately and to make a name for himself as an expert witness. He barely kept his integrity intact but did give it an honest effort.

The SA did an excellent job on cross and taught him a lot. Hopefully he learned from it and will put his new found knowledge to good use.

The SA did such a great job I had to stop it and wait to show my husband.. "this is where the writers of all those tv shows you watch get their ideas".. it was brilliant and beautiful to watch..

Go team Caylee!

 

[Horace Finklestein]

Huntington was there for the money ultimately and to make a name for himself as an expert witness. He barely kept his integrity intact but did give it an honest effort.

The SA did an excellent job on cross and taught him a lot. Hopefully he learned from it and will put his new found knowledge to good use.

The SA did such a great job I had to stop it and wait to show my husband.. "this is where the writers of all those tv shows you watch get their ideas".. it was brilliant and beautiful to watch..

Go team Caylee!

Yes, like not stretching the truth to free child murderers.

 

[celticthyme]

Well he will probably try to be an expert witness again, but hopefully he has learned some valuable lessons today.
As so many have mentioned stay within his area of expertise, have some familiarity with the basics of the case, and decide if you want to be ethical or sell out to the highest bidder. Keep the answers succinct, simple and coherent.

Scientists can disagree, but giving an answer to the truth as you know it, within your area of knowledge and expertise, regardless of who it helps, will not fail you as a person or a witness.

 

[cyberborg]

I felt that TH lost credibility as the testimony progressed. He tried to appear as an expert and experienced in too many areas and volunteered his opinion rather than sticking to what he really knew. That diluted his effectiveness. He asserted a lot of things, showed his bias towards aiding the Defense at all costs and, even when he agreed with JA he wanted to proffer broader possibilities and was forced to concede the point. The mental sparring rather than appearing to be neutral clearly demonstrated his immaturity and lack of experience in testimony. The student has a LOT to learn from his master.

 

[cyberborg]

BTW. I loved it when JA pulled the physical evidence to debunk the wild assertions about tobacco in various cans and the food, salami. Way to make stuff up and get shot down.

 

[PaperDoll]

I find this witness very BORING, he isn't interesting at all. I love the way JA is handling him, however :fence:

 

[miss plum]

I could be totally wrong here but I thought Dr. Haskell testified for the State that he believed Caylee's body (forgive me Caylee for speaking of you like this) was not in the trunk for the first, blowfly-attracting part of decomposition, but was in there for the second coffin fly-attracting phase by which time the blowflies would not be interested, and that he therefore was not surprised by the low population of maggots and the single blowfly leg found in the trash bag, which makes a lot of Dr Huntington's testimony not a useful counter at all to the State's case.

 

[Mohabi]

BBM

I completely agree with most of your statement,except the BBM.
This guy was not looking out for any of the other experts out there. IMO he was trying to throw them under the bus. I suspect sour grapes over something.

I can completely agree with YOUR statement. In addition to what you said (sour grapes), this Dr. Huntington guy was about himself only. He tried to shove his pride in his accomplishments down everybody's throat. That's what it felt like to me.

 

[miss plum]

Sorry if this is too O/T but his voice and manner of speaking reminded me a lot of one of the characters from 'Boardwalk Empire', the one whose face is half missing from a war injury so he wears a painted tin mask. I was mainly listening to the audio and not watching, and over and over his voice reminded me of him. It was quite unnerving.

 

[Bluegrass]

I didn't read the whole thread because its long so excuse me if I reiterate anything already said. I want to go back and read more on this bug guy and the testimony.But his tetimony of looking at a photo of a stain in the trunk and making a judgement is bogus and should be thrown out.
But my thought on this bug evidence is that ICA wrapped Caylee up tightly as soon as she found she was dead (or killed her ? This I don't buy.) She wrapped her as much as she could because why would she leave her body exposed in the trunk to look at?
That is why that pig decomposing evidence is useless. It should have been thrown out.
Baby Caylee was wrapped in blanket and bags and this not only contained the juices but prevented many bugs from getting in.
My theory is that she often put Caylee in the trunk to sleep while she partied and that night she went on a date and used chloroform, she may have used it before to get her to sleep. She duct tapes her mouth so if she wakes up she can't be heard crying. After she found her dead that fateful night she eventually put more duct tape on her face so she would not have to look at her face.
Drugging babies and toddlers to sleep is not anything new. It used to be quite commonplace and even prescribed by doctors...whiskey, paragoric, benadryl, etc.
The chloroform research was to find out how much she could use safely on the baby.
But ICA panicked after Caylee died and made the situation much worse for herself.
Someone told her then that she might as well, since it has gone so far, to hide the remains as long as possible to obscure any evidence. Someone probably helped her do this and also to clean the car.
The person who rescued her from this was likely the most logical person that always rescues her and enables her to live her party life-style. As well as someone who may know a little something about evidence in homicides.
GA looks terrified. CA looks distraught and wornout. ICA looks like she's on antidepressants.
I know this isn't a popular theory but it fits ICAs personality profile.

 

[LolaMoon08]

IMO, it seems likely the majority of the flies escaped when the trunk was opened at the tow yard, the trash bag was removed and left overnight in a dumpster. When George and Cindy drove the car home, they opened the windows, trunk, skylight, etc. to air it out...

THAT is why i think a lot of flies were not still there. As far as the stain, she was triple-bagged with two garbage bags and an additional bag with a vinyl liner. :twocents:

July 15th, 2008 was not the only time that trunk was opened during the 31 days.

Casey could have opened the trunk on June 19th, 2008 when she borrowed the shovel from her neighbor. Which is what I believe happened. She opened the trunk after backing into the garage and carried Caylee out into the backyard and tried to bury her. Now, either she left the trunk open (doubtful) while it was in the garage... or she shut it. If she shut it, she would again have to open the trunk in order to put Caylee back into the trunk.

On June 24th, 2008... we know for a fact that the trunk was opened because this is the day of the gas can incident. Now... you know that Casey was hiding a heck of a lot more than those gas cans from George. Whether Caylee was still in the trunk or not... Casey did not want him anywhere near the trunk of that car.

Now... depending on what day Casey finally decided to dump Caylee into the woods off Suburban Drive... she would have had to open the trunk again.

Who knows how many times Casey opened that trunk or attempted to clean it. I am hoping that Dr. Haskell is called back on that stand to give us his opinion on how hard it would be to get the bugs out of that car? Casey obviously didn't do a good enough job or there would have been none left.

I believe that TH's little experiment was not even worth listening to. Anyone who can honestly compare a Nebraska September to a Florida June is just... unusual.

Second of all... He left the pigs in the trunk for 11 days!! That is 6-9 days longer than Caylee was even in the trunk of her mothers car. So the timeframe isn't even correct. He was trying to bolster the experiment and the amount of bugs by leaving those pigs in the trunk a lot longer than Caylee was even in the trunk.

Also, those pigs were not wrapped in anything. At least he could have done was attempt to use one trash bag! He had the relevent information to do a serious experiment that would have given his opinion more weight, but he refused? I think he knows full well that the blanket, bags, and laundry bag would have made a difference.

I am really interested to hear Dr. Haskell's opinion on how hard it would have been for Casey to get rid of the bugs... she had at the most, 10 days with that car before she left it at Amscot.

All in all... I think Jeff did an amazing job today. TH came across as really misleading... especially with the "tabacky spit" and the "dried up bologna." If we can not trust what he says about these issues... how can we trust him about the stain?

 

[LolaMoon08]

I'm still pondering on his "Flies are good mommas" story. He really does love the little buggers.

Ironic isn't it? An insect shows more caring and compassion for its' offspring than Casey Anthony E.V.E.R. did for Caylee! I think I am going to stop having to kill all these bugs down here in Florida. I'd hate to take these good momma's away from their babies. Well, with the exception of spiders and palmetto bugs. They can all die!

 

[STEADFAST]

Huntington was not able to speak specifically about the stain in the trunk of Casey’s car, since he did not examine it directly....so how are you referencing Huntington's testimony?

He did specifically and with ridiculous certainty say that the stain in Casey's trunk was not decomposition, based on a photograph.

When shown a photo of a stain from the car, Huntington said it did not resemble the stain of human decomposition.http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/...anthony-trial-day-21-20110617,0,3817111.story

He based his opinion on photos, something he said was common practice in his specialty. . . .
Huntington said the stain he saw in photographs of the trunk liner of Casey's car was not consistent with decomposition fluid stains.
. . . "There is nothing I can see that would indicate a decomposing body was in the trunk." http://www.torontosun.com/2011/06/17/casey-anthony-defense-expert-didnt-detect-decomposition