Casey's Attorney: "I'm Scared For My Client”Posted: 1:10 pm EST January 7, 2010Updated: 6:51 pm EST January 7, 2010
Comment On This Story ››ORLANDO, Fla. -- Casey Anthony’s death penalty attorney, who is an expert on death penalty cases, admitted on national television that she doubts a jury will clear Casey of her daughter's murder. Anthony's defense attorney went on a morning show again Thursday morning, talking about how the amount of publicity will prevent Casey from getting a fair trial.
“I'm scared for my client. I'm afraid that the fact that she's been pilloried in the press. I would liken this Meredith, to the Salem witch trials,” Lyon told Meredith Viera on the Today Show.
BILL SHEAFFER: Talks About Defense TeamVIDEO REPORT: Attorney Goes On National TVSLIDESHOW: Casey With Caylee Defense attorney Andrea Lyon says she will keep trying to get the death penalty off the table, but she stumbled over her words when she said Casey didn't kill her daughter Caylee Anthony.
“It does put a lot of pressure on a defendant to plea bargain even when they didn't, when they didn't do it. She didn't kill her kid,” Lyon said.
WFTV legal analyst Bill Sheaffer
(interview) says the evidence is what it is and that people have a right not to believe that Casey had good reason for not reporting her daughter missing for 30 days and to also not to believe her inconsistent story about leaving Caylee with a nanny who's never been identified.
"Quit whining and get to the defense of this case. The evidence is, the facts are what the facts are. If that is tried before a jury in Orlando, Tampa, New York City, or Timbuktu, the jurors are going to form their opinion based upon their view of that evidence," Sheaffer said.
Lyon has tried more than 130 homicide cases, defended more than 30 potential capital cases and taken 19 people through the penalty phase and, so far, she's won them all. However, Thursday, Lyon admitted she's not optimistic about her client’s chances.
"There’s always a presumption of guilt and the intense media scrutiny here, as far as I can see, has made it virtually impossible to get a fair trial and we’re rolling an even bigger stone up a bigger hill than you normally are," Lyon said.
Lyon seemed also to be doing damage control after Eyewitness News exposed her comments that female prosecutors are manly and that jurors on death penalty cases are killers, as she tries to sell her new book.
Andrea Lyon repeated the defense's mantra that the public won't find out until the trial why Casey is innocent, but, Sheaffer says, if they really had something convincing that could spring Casey from jail they would have brought it forward by now.
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