A judge yesterday denied the Anthony defense team motion to remove the death penalty in the state’s case against their client, Casey Anthony.
Circuit Judge Stan Strickland on Friday, December 18th, denied Casey Anthony defense team’s motion to remove the death penalty procedures which they argued, unsuccessfully, was impermissible and constituted bad faith by the state.
Several weeks ago, Anthony’s defense team had filed a motion indicating that the prosecution was bringing a death penalty case against their client in bad faith and that Casey’s constitutional rights are being violated as a result.
But, Judge Strickland thought differently.
In his ruling Strickland wrote that “while the quantum of evidence sufficient to seek the death penalty will virtually always be an issue, that matter is generally best left for the jury”. The Judge therefore denied the defense team’s motion to take the death penalty off the table.
With Strickland’s ruling it means that, should Casey Anthony be found guilty by a jury of murdering her two-year-old daughter, she could be put to death.
Casey Anthony sits in the Orange County Jail in Florida awaiting her first degree murder trial in the death of her daughter Caylee.
The trial is expected to commence in the summer of 2010.
Earlier in the week, Strickland had denied the defense motion to drop nine of 13 counts of the check fraud charges against Casey Anthony, in a separate case. So, even before Casey’s murder trial gets underway, she would face trail on all 13 counts for check fraud on January 25th 2010.
Anthony is accused of stealing checks from her former friend Amy Huzienga, and cashing them.
