Prior to opening statements, after reading as many documents, interviews, depositions, and looking at whatever photos available, all via the Sunshine Law, that I could find, I was leaning very strongly towards this whole case being the product of a tragic accident.
In the beginning, I felt the same way.
Fairly early on, the SA offered KC a plea deal. She refused the deal because she would not admit to something she did not do. I believe at that time, she told the SA that Caylee had drowned (speculation on my part). Not long after KC refused the plea deal, LL was up for re-election, and for the first time in 20 years, he had an opponent. A few weeks before the election, the SA reattached the DP to this case. Was the DP a political move? I don't know. When Caylee was found in area A, the ME's office sent capable people out to deal with the situation. Dr. G was called in to take over the examination. Was this a political move? I don't know. I do know that KC is probably the most hated woman in Florida, and reinstating the DP did not hurt LL's popularity in the least.
I find no merit in this scenario at all but, to each their own. The DP was on the table, taken off in anticipation of a plea, then put back on the table after refusal of such, as I remember it.
In August of 2008, we had the RK sightings, and the deputy RC dereliction of duty. RK changed his story every time he was interviewed or gave a deposition. Deputy RC was released for dereliction of duty. In addition, RK was looked into by the defense, and they found he was not a boy scout. The judge however ruled, that RK could not be used as a SODDI. There remain many more questions than answers surrounding the whole RK situation.
Agree with this with one exception. LE failed to investigate properly at the Suburban Dr. site early on.
We also have the bad check situation, and the judge allowed this to be dealt with prior to the murder trial. Some say this was to give the SA more ammunition to impeach KC should she decide to testify at her murder trial. Add to that, the initial proceedings of the civil suit brought forth by M&M for Zenaida Gonzales. M&M wanted to depose KC and ask her questions that the state could use against her in the murder trial. KC did say that this was not THE ZFG. Eventually, the civil suit was pushed past the murder trial. This case is filled with oddities and firsts.
Agree, but consider all these facets of the case were caused by the same pack of lies.......from KC. Each facet had to be dealt with and one at a time.
We had too, the JJ tape, that LDB had sealed. Very interesting stuff going on in this trial. Yes, the SA was not doing anything illegal, but what they were doing was obviously trying to gain every advantage they could to win the case, which is fine, but when the lawyer games begin, and both sides are playing for the win, neither side should be criticized for doing everything they can legally do to win.
Lost me on that one.
The situation with TES, and what happened at the lawyers office with the TES records. Again, nothing illegal, but taking every advantage to make things as difficult as possible for the DT. There was also the discovery disks the state provided to the defense that could not be read on a standard computer without the proper specialized software the state used. Not illegal, of course, but more gameplaying.
Here's where I feel your opinion on that is lacking in understanding from the searchers point of view. The TES records were confidential information. When each volunteer signs up to search, it is with the reassurance that your personal information will remain confidential. The DT (especially now in hindsight) had no reason to be trying to get those records. These were innocent people earnestly trying to help find a little 2 yr. old girl. Now that we know the DT and KC knew Caylee was dead early on, what was that all about? It was to create a ruse, IMO and for what? People will be far more hesitant to volunteer now in such cases for fear their names may end up in the legal documents affiliate with a high profile case. It was unfounded and unnecessary.
The media took this story from the get go, and morphed it into the trial of the century (so far). KC was made infamous by HLN and other media. Many have jumped on this golden ticket. The media fanned the flames for 3 years. The reporting was sometimes less than ethical, but this was forgiven because KC was hated. The syringe in the bottle loaded with chloroform was the all time low in reporting. The smoking gun had been found, and KC was toast. The retractions from various news outlets were few and far between once it was discovered that the chloroform this syringe was loaded with, had a lower level of chloroform than common tapwater. Everything the media reported came out slanted in favor of the state. Anything the slightest bit exculpatory was either ignored totally or downplayed as insignificant.
The doc releases. Interesting stuff via the Sunshine Law. This is where I became certain the SA did not have a solid case. Nearly every shred of evidence released was questionable. The chloroform search (win her over with chloroform), the cadaver dogs alerting in the A's backyard one day, next day no alert and no reasonable explanation as to why they did not alert second day, chloroform lvl in the trunk (qualative not quantitive), lack of fly casings in trunk, lack of decomp fluids in trunk, lack of DNA in the trunk, white trash bag sitting in a dumpster for 18 hours plus contaminated the evidence in the white trash bag, the single hair with apparent decomp (research showed that generally speaking the apparent decomp does not appear for upward of 90 days after death), butyric acid found in multiple food products as well as vomit, the fantasy stain in the trunk that I cannot see (yes, I have seen the stain photo from the thread on this site), the single fly leg that was used by Dr. Haskell to build his theory that was also found in the contaminated white trash bag. The smell of death, some smelled it some didn't, and the maggots found in the contaminated white trash bag were eating something that maggots considered food. The disappearing heart shaped sticker residue. Area A, RK's testimony of manipulating the skull, combined with Tropical storm Faye, makes ALL evidence found in area A speculation, what scientist can possibly figure out what was moved by animals, RK or a tropical storm, yes, they can make educated guesses, but an educated guess is still a guess and this is speculation. The mandible found under the skull in an anatomically correct position, first time ME had seen the madible still in place, ever(another first), even after RK's manipulation and Faye's potential manipulation. The smell of death allegedly escaped from the trunk and entered the seating area in the car, yet, the chloroform did not follow the same escape route used by the odor of death to find its way into the seating area of the car. The flies in the dt witnesses experiment found their way into the seating area of the car, and one would think that scientifically if a fly can find its way into the seating area, that something like chloroform would have no trouble finding its way in. The substance like adipocere (adipocere normally takes weeks to form), was found on paper towells in the contaminated white trash bag, yet was never tested further to prove that the substance was adipocere. Dr. Haskell and Dr. Vass said the decompositional event that occured in the trunk could have originated from a decompositional event not human origin. The Frye hearings, and the air sample allowed in, another first. The hair with apparent decomp allowed in, yet another first. I had questions about everything in this paragraph, and I hoped that at trial, the SA could and would answer all my questions.
At trial, my hopes that the SA would answer my questions were shattered when the states forensic witnesses were cross examined by the DT. Instead of solidifying the 3 years of evidence we had seen, the DT methodically poked holes in nearly every piece of evidence. The SA did not introduce anything new that we hadn't seen before except, the awful photoshop simulation, and the erronous cacheback report of 84 times. The trial did not change my previous opinion that this whole situation was a tragic accident, the trial solidified my opinion. The states circumstantial case was weak at best. When one uses potentially contaminated evidence that was found in the white trash bag, and one bolsters that evidence with a scientist that says there was an adipocere like substance in the bag, and bolsters it more, by having CA claim it smelled like there was a dead body in the trunk of the car, only to impeach her testimony in rebuttal about the chloroform searches. One bolsters it even more by having another scientist base his reports on a single fly leg found in that same potentially contaminated white trash bag. When one omits providing information to the jurors like the lack of fly casings in the trunk, not further testing the substance like adipocere to confirm it was adipocere, not finding any DNA in the trunk stain, not finding any decompositional fluids in the trunk stain, one's case becomes weakened. When the strength of one's case is inappropriate behavior of the mother, and the mother's lies to police, all occurring after the fact, one's case is weak. When one places the mother in handcuffs and puts her in the cage, only to be released minutes later because LE wasn't concerned about the illegal credit card purchases at that time, instead of mirandizing KC at the time of placing her in cuffs, one is not strenthening one's case. When the states witnesses speculated where the duct tape placement was, if Caylee had been in the bags, what the bone dispersement meant, what the chloroform levels in the trunk meant (without ever finding anything that confirmed the use of chloroform), one's case has holes in it. One can not use the chloroform level in the trunk to bolster the evidence that there was a dead body in the trunk, when the chloroform level found was qualative not quantative. In other words, if one is building a foundation of bricks, and the chloroform brick has a hole in it, you can not use that as a foundation that the chloroform search was made as part of a premeditated murder. One can't speculate that the duct tape was wrapped around the skull and use that as a foundation to make a photo shop simulation to convince a jury that the tape was wrapped around the skull. (well, actually they can and did, but neither the jurors nor myself bought into that piece of evidence). At the end of the prosecutions CIC, I believed that the defense did not need to put on a defense because at that point I felt the state had failed to prove anything BARD except the lying to police. I did hope that the state would solidify their CIC during the rebuttal stage. The only thing they accomplished in the rebuttal stage, was impeaching CA, which almost seemed counterproductive to their CIC.
That's your prerogative but, doesn't make it so. Far more believe it's credible evidence, including myself. Doesn't make either one of us wrong, just seeing it from a different perspective.
So, in a nutshell, my opinion is that the verdict arrived at by the jurors is correct. If one disagrees with my opinion that is just fine. I am not trying to convince anyone to change their opinion. What am I doing in the spirit of debate over whether the verdict was right or wrong, is show an alternative but equally plausible explanation to as much of the evidence as possible.
If one thinks BARD that the duct tape was wrapped around Caylee's skull holding the mandible in place, I can understand why one would think that way, I would simply disagree with it based on the evidence presented. Why, because the evidence presented was that animals, RK, and Faye manipulated the remains found in area A, and ALL statements made by the ME's were speculative (again educated guesses but guesses nonetheless). Since I do not believe the duct tape was wrapped around Caylee's skull holding the mandible in place, because to me it defies logic that duct tape would hold the mandible in place after decomposition, animal activity, RK activity, and a tropical storm, am I automatically wrong because I disagree with the majority? My opinions are based entirely on how I interpreted the evidence presented.
IMO, this is the ONLY piece of evidence that was intact in spite of all those conditions you mentioned and IMO is undisputable. Because it was that mandible in place accompanied with the adjacent duct tape, still attached to the hair says to me that it went on there for a reason. It didn't float there, it didn't fly there, it was placed and there is no other feasible explanation the mandible was still attached other than it stands to reason, the tape attached to hair and soft tissue, soft tissue decomposes but the tape and hair remain that was attached to skull, the skull attached to mandible. Mandible still attached to skull. Why? This never happens. All medical experts agreed on that. That tape was the smoking gun IMO and that's what the PT should have hammered home.
Honestly, after 2 and 1/2 years of debating on this site, I was, much like CM, surprised that the jury found her not guilty on the first 3 counts. I think the verdict was correct, but after 3 years of the media telling how open and shut this case was, it surprised me nonetheless. It was surprising because 12 random people basically reached similar conclusions to what I had prior to the start of the trial, based on the evidence shown via the Sunshine Law. They reached the verdict in a different way than I did, because they did not have all the information I had. I did have all the information they had, and using only the information they had, I would have come to the same conclusion they did, the same way they did. It is pretty amazing to me, that 12 random people on a jury, unanimously agree with a few of the pro verdict posters on this site. As HHSS would say the irony is rich, that out of hundreds of potential jurors, the 12 picked to serve on the jury unanimously reached a verdict of not guilty on the first 3 counts. What are the odds of that happening, unless, the state simply did not prove the first 3 counts BARD?
What are the odds of that happening? Very low. With the knowledge they did not understand certain aspects, they asked no questions, they did not take their own notes into deliberations, etc., IMO their fulfillment of doing a "good" job wasn't there. There are more qualified members on this forum, but fortunately for KC, this is what she got.
As always, my entire post is my opinion only.
Ditto.
