Did Casey Anthony get away with MURDER of her 2 Yr old daughter [Video and Pics]

ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) — Prosecutors proved Casey Anthony was a liar, but convinced the jury of little else. The government failed to establish how 2-year-old Caylee Anthony died and they couldn't find her mother's DNA on the duct tape they said was used to suffocate her. There was conflicting testimony on whether the putrid smell inside the family's car was a decomposing body or simply trash, and it was never quite clear why chloroform was so important.

The lack of evidence and the doubt raised by the defense — that Caylee accidentally drowned in the family's pool — was enough to win an acquittal. After a trial of a month and a half, the jury took less than 11 hours to find Anthony not guilty of first-degree murder, aggravated manslaughter and aggravated child abuse.

 
Ultimately, though, the burden of proof wasn't on Baez.

 
"I don't think it was Baez' great lawyering that won the case," said Richard Rosenbaum, a Fort Lauderdale criminal defense attorney who closely followed the trial but wasn't involved in the case. "I think it goes back to the prosecution and the weaknesses in their case."

Kendall Coffey, a former U.S. attorney for Miami and now a defense attorney, said Baez had to offer an alternative to the prosecution's theory of how Caylee was killed, though he was less impressed with the molestation accusations.

"The biggest questions were the 'how' and the 'why,'" Coffey said. "Even the state acknowledged they weren't exactly sure of how Caylee was killed. That was a candid acknowledgement, but Baez seized on that."

 
"This case has brought on new challenges for all of us. Challenges in the criminal justice system, challenges in the media, and I think we should all take this as an opportunity to learn and to realize that you cannot convict someone until they have had their day in court," he said.

Yale Galanter, who has represented O.J. Simpson in a number of cases since 2000, said he was not surprised by the verdict.

"The issue is there was absolutely no evidence linking her to the death. None," said the Miami lawyer. "So what the defense did was brilliant, they brought up the drowning, they brought up the sexual molestation, and it really got the jury to focus away from the bad behavior of the mom."

ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) — Prosecutors proved Casey Anthony was a liar, but convinced the jury of little else. The government failed to establish how 2-year-old Caylee Anthony died and they couldn't find her mother's DNA on the duct tape they said was used to suffocate her. There was conflicting testimony on whether the putrid smell inside the family's car was a decomposing body or simply trash, and it was never quite clear why chloroform was so important.

The lack of evidence and the doubt raised by the defense — that Caylee accidentally drowned in the family's pool — was enough to win an acquittal. After a trial of a month and a half, the jury took less than 11 hours to find Anthony not guilty of first-degree murder, aggravated manslaughter and aggravated child abuse.

 
Ultimately, though, the burden of proof wasn't on Baez.

 
"I don't think it was Baez' great lawyering that won the case," said Richard Rosenbaum, a Fort Lauderdale criminal defense attorney who closely followed the trial but wasn't involved in the case. "I think it goes back to the prosecution and the weaknesses in their case."

Kendall Coffey, a former U.S. attorney for Miami and now a defense attorney, said Baez had to offer an alternative to the prosecution's theory of how Caylee was killed, though he was less impressed with the molestation accusations.

"The biggest questions were the 'how' and the 'why,'" Coffey said. "Even the state acknowledged they weren't exactly sure of how Caylee was killed. That was a candid acknowledgement, but Baez seized on that."

 
"This case has brought on new challenges for all of us. Challenges in the criminal justice system, challenges in the media, and I think we should all take this as an opportunity to learn and to realize that you cannot convict someone until they have had their day in court," he said.

Yale Galanter, who has represented O.J. Simpson in a number of cases since 2000, said he was not surprised by the verdict.

"The issue is there was absolutely no evidence linking her to the death. None," said the Miami lawyer. "So what the defense did was brilliant, they brought up the drowning, they brought up the sexual molestation, and it really got the jury to focus away from the bad behavior of the mom."

George Anthony