Casey Anthony: Get ready for extensive coverage of her jail release - Hal

Casey Anthony: Get ready for extensive coverage of her jail release
posted by halboedeker on July, 14 2011 7:01 PM

Local stations have been warning they will provide heavy coverage Sunday of Casey Anthony’s release from jail.

How heavy? WKMG-Channel 6 will offer an Anthony special late Saturday. The CBS affiliate will start with its regular 11 p.m. news, then go into at least 90 minutes devoted to Anthony. ”We’ll stay on as long as we think it’s necessary,” WKMG General Manager Skip Valet said.

Lauren Rowe and Gaard Swanson will anchor the coverage.

Anthony could be released any time on Sunday. WKMG also will be on from 5 to 9 a.m. Sunday. Valet said WKMG will interrupt its regular schedule when the release happens. Anthony was acquitted last week of first-degree murder in the death of her daughter, Caylee.

I’ll share other stations’ plans when I learn them.

An emergency hearing in the Zenaida Gonzalez defamation suit against Anthony is scheduled for 8 a.m. Friday. Anthony will not attend, WESH-Channel 2’s Bob Kealing reported.

“She says she’s too exhausted to handle a deposition in a civil lawsuit,” WFTV-Channel 9 anchor Martie Salt said. WFTV’s Kathi Belich reported, “Casey Anthony’s civil lawyer wants to buy her time. He does not want the judge to force her to face a deposition in the Zenaida Gonzalez defamation lawsuit while she’s still in jail.”

The deposition was scheduled for Tuesday, but Gonzalez’s attorneys are concerned that Anthony will disappear after leaving jail, Belich added.

Anthony’s attorney has described that concern as “grandstanding” and an attempt to create a “media spectacle and frenzy,” WESH’s Kealing reported.

WFTV-Channel 9 legal analyst Bill Sheaffer predicted that Casey’s deposition would “make George and Cindy’s deposition look like a walk in the park.” Anthony’s parents had a highly contentious session with Gonzalez’s attorneys.

WOFL-Channel 35’s Shannon Butler explored a petition to get federal authorities to retry Anthony. Defense attorney Diana Tennis said, “I think a lot of people are getting very creative in their thinking about what we can do to ‘correct’ this verdict.” She said a federal indictment is highly unlikely, because killing your child in Florida wouldn’t break a federal law.

Butler concluded, “Let’s be honest, the FBI isn’t going anywhere near this.”

WOFL’s Holly Bristow looked at emails sent to defense attorney Cheney Mason and concluded that just a third of what she read were negative. One critic told Mason that he’s “the most vile vermin there is.” But a disabled veteran also sent Anthony a check for $100.

WFTV noted that Anthony’s jail account jumped to $476 after her release date was announced.

WFTV anchor Bob Opsahl said the station had learned that local bail bondsman may be paid to protect her “because she may spend a few days trying to open communications with her parents and her brother.”

WFTV also relayed the comments of Dr. Harry Krop, who said he found no mental illness in Anthony earlier this week. But he said that Anthony doesn’t appreciate how negative the public views her.

http://blogs.orlandosentinel.com/entertainment_tv_tvblog/2011/07/casey-anthony-get-ready-for-extensive-coverage-of-her-jail-release.html