Casey Anthony Defense Rests

Ever since late in 2008, when a municipal meter-reader found the bones of Casey Anthony’s 2-year-old daughter buried in a swamp–and in the days when Casey was being photographed all over town living it up in the midst of her daughter’s disappearance–observers have been wondering how, in the aftermath of it all, Casey could just go blithely on with her life of shopping and socializing. Not just how she could have possibly killed her daughter, if in fact she killed her daughter, but how she could have gone about her life in this way after having done so. Some think they’ve found the answer in Casey’s father.

If George Anthony really did molest his own daughter, then resulting desensitization could be the explanation, or one of them. The self-defensive suppression of feelings becomes a habit of soul that extends to all feelings, even to those associated with the death of one’s own child. On Wednesday, George Anthony had a chance to deny the charge of molestation, but he did not deny it as strongly as one might think he’d want to, saying only, “I would never do anything to harm my daughter in that way.” When the cross-examining attorney replied, “Only in that way,” George’s attorney objected and the objection was sustained. And during it all, Casey sat there at the defense table shaking her head in a gesture that all but accused her father of lying.

Failure to go the distance is a theme not just in George’s denials but in his affirmations, too. His putative mistress also took the stand Wednesday and claimed she had an “intimate” affair with George, conducted in her home. George said he did indeed visit her home, on more than one occasion, but he denied the intimacy. She claims that George acknowledged the killing, and that he did so by calling it “an accident that snowballed out of control.”

This all comes at the end of a week culminating with the defense resting without their client taking the stand. Casey keeping quiet is the strategy they’ve employed, and the strategy is undoubtedly a shrewd one. There’s a lot about this trial that’s worth keeping quiet about, but among those with conflicting motives at cross-purposes, it’s all somehow being spoken.