Casey Anthony To Be a Free Woman as Probation Ends - ABC News

Casey Anthony To Be a Free Woman as Probation Ends

By CHRISTINA NG (@ChristinaNg27)
Aug. 21, 2012



Casey Anthony's one-year probation sentence for check fraud ends this week, giving her the freedom to go wherever she pleases.

"As of Friday, Aug. 24 at 12 a.m., nobody will be able to tell her where to be," Anthony's attorney Charles Greene told ABCNews.com.

"She's complied with all the terms of her probation and she's looking forward to having her freedom to move forward because, even though she's been out of jail for the last year, she's essentially still been in prison by the requirement that she remains in one location," Greene said.

Anthony, 26, was acquitted last summer of killing her 2-year-old daughter Caylee Anthony.

After Anthony's acquittal, Florida Judge Belvin Perry ordered her to serve one year of probation for a 2010 check fraud conviction. Prior to her first degree murder trial, Anthony pleaded guilty to stealing checks from her best friend Amy Huizenga during the time that Caylee was missing.

Since then, Anthony has been serving her probation from an undisclosed Florida location. She has resurfaced a few times over the past year via a leaked video diary and a telephone conversation with Piers Morgan, but has otherwise succeeded in disappearing from the public eye.

Anthony has been unemployed for the past year, according to her monthly probation reports, so it is unclear where any money she might use comes from. She has not published a book or sold her story in any known capacity.

Greene hopes that one day she will tell her own story.

"There's things she wants to say, but they need to be on her time, her terms, her conditions," he said. "I hope that one day she says more."

Her attorney still fears for the safety of Anthony, once considered the most hated woman in America after a Florida jury said the prosecution failed to prove that she killed her daughter. During the months that Caylee was missing, Anthony was depicted as a party girl in bars and getting a tattoo that proclaimed "Bella Vita."

"People ranging from the media to people with lawsuits against her to people with just a fantastic obsession with her search for her on a daily basis," Greene said. "People have a fascination with her life that, for some people, borders on psychotic."

Greene said that he constantly receives phone calls and message from people who both love and hate Anthony obsessively.

"Getting off probation and having the ability to move around will increase her freedom to concentrate on other things, including moving forward and figuring out what happens next as well as what happened in the past," he said. "She's looking forward to being out from probation and having the freedom to handle things in her life and move forward, but her plans are confidential."

Greene would not comment on whether Anthony has considered leaving the country or on the status of her troubled relationship with her parents.

"This is not a celebration," he said. "We're not making this a celebratory time in her life. There's a lot of sadness and pain and regret that she has to deal with."

Anthony's former defense attorney Jose Baez told ABC News on Monday that Anthony served her probation in Florida and that she was currently in Florida. He did not know if Anthony planned to remain in Florida after her probation ends.

But Anthony's legal woes are not over yet.

Zenaida Fernandez-Gonzalez is suing Anthony for using her name when she told Orlando police that her 2-year-old daughter Caylee was stolen by a babysitter and gave police her name. Anthony stuck to that lie for three years before her lawyer told the court at the opening of her murder trial that the babysitter never existed and that Caylee accidentally drowned in the family pool.

Fernandez-Gonzalez sued Anthony for defamation, saying that she lost her job and home as a result of the accusations. The trial for the civil suit is scheduled to take place in January 2013.

Matt Morgan, one of the attorneys for Fernandez-Gonzalez, said that the end of Anthony's probation does not affect the defamation case in any way.

"We have at this point already obtained service on Casey Anthony and therefore she will have to attend the trial," Morgan told ABCNews.com. "If she were to leave the state and go outside of the jurisdiction, come January she'd have to return and face Zenaida Gonzalez in the courtroom."

Anthony has checked in with probation officers every month for the past year and her monthly reports have been public. Anthony's reports have consistently said that she is unemployed, has not been taking any classes and has not been drinking alcohol or taking drugs.

"It'd be hard to imagine that, at least in the very near future, she could ever have what many of us would consider a normal life," Greene said.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/casey-anthony-free-woman-probation-ends/story?id=17041400#.UDO8nqMvB3U