Today begins the trial and opening statements for the Casey Anthony murder trial- what is reportedly expected to get more attention than the O.J. Simpson trial.
According to Judge Belvin Perry, the amount of attention the O.J. Simpson trial drew in 1994 might be surpassed by this eight-week long trial.
Anthony is accused of murdering her two-year-old daughter Caylee Marie in 2008 and if found guilty, Anthony could face the death penalty.
Richard Hornsby, an attorney who has blogged about the case, gave his opinion about the trial to ABC News Radio. “It comes down to how the defense is going to define a win. If their goal is to have her completely exonerated, she would have to take the stand,” Hornsby told ABC News Radio.
A lot of the possible outcome comes down to whether or not Anthony takes the stand or not. “If their goal is a lesser manslaughter charge, I think it would be detrimental for her to testify because once she testifies and if the jury disbelieves her…she’s testifying herself into the death penalty,” Hornsby said.
The charges Anthony is facing consist of first-degree murder, aggravated manslaughter of a child, aggravated child abuse and providing false information to law enforcement. After testing Anthony’s car, forensic experts said Anthony’s 1998 Pontiac Sunfire trunk tested positive for chloroform and decomposition.
“So much emanates from the car,” Jean Casarez, an attorney and legal correspondent for In Session on truTV told ABC News Radio. “Casey Anthony had possession and control of that car. She’s the one that drove it. She’s the one that ran it out of gas…From chloroform to the hair that had signs of decomposition, according to the prosecution, to the smell from the trunk of the car, to the doll in that car that Caylee Anthony loved.”
Anthony’s young daughter, Caylee Anthony, was missing for a month before her grandmother Cindy Anthony called 911 in the summer of 2008 to report her disappearance. In the call, she was alarmed about her daughter’s car.
“I can’t find my granddaughter. There’s something wrong. I found my daughter’s car today and it smelled like there’s been a dead body in the damn car,” Cindy Anthony said in the July 2008 call to police.
