Mommy's Little Girl

by Diane Fanning

  “I don’t want to wait another minute. Let alone . . .”

  Casey cut her off. “I don’t want to wait another minute. I want her to be found whether I’m still stuck in here or not. I don’t care.”

  “I think once she’s found, then you can tell everyone what you know and you’ll be released. Don’t you think?”

  “Potentially. I don’t know. Yuri has it set in his mind that I’ve done something.”

  “Well, he thinks you guys did something to Caylee,” Cindy said.

  When her dad got on the line and told her that he missed her, wanted to take her pain away and wished he could’ve been a better dad and a better granddad, Casey’s tears flowed.

  “You’ve been a great dad and the best grandfather. Don’t for a second think otherwise. You and Mom have been the best grandparents. Caylee is so lucky to have both of you. I can’t even put into words how glad I am that she’s had both of you, and that she still has both of you,” she said in a strained voice.

  Her mother returned to the phone and said, “We never really got a full description of Zanny. We know she’s got brown curly hair.”

  “It’s long—about shoulder length—she wears it straight.” Casey described Zanny. “It’s curly, but she also wears it straight, that’s what I’m telling you, it’s called a straightener, remember? She’s the one that gave me my straightener.” She elaborated on the baby-sitter whom everyone involved with Casey had yet to meet. Zanny, she said, was 5'6” or 5'7”, 140 pounds, brown eyes and no tattoos that she’d seen, even when Zanny was in a bathing suit. She added that her mother’s name was Gloria, her stepdad, who’d legally adopted her, was Victor, and her older sister was Samantha, a student at the University of Central Florida. She gave the names of Zanny’s roommates, Raquel Farrell and Jennifer Rosa, and provided employment history for both of them.

  When Casey complained that detectives had never created a composite drawing and never shown her a photograph of the Zenaida who lived in Kissimmee, Cindy said, “They told us you couldn’t pick her out in a line-up.”

  “They’re full of shit.”

  George asked Casey if she would be willing to talk to the FBI or anyone in law enforcement. She assured her father that she would talk to anyone they sent to her. She did say, though, that she would not be comfortable talking to Detective Melich or Sergeant Allen, but would be willing to talk to Appie Wells. She said she didn’t care if she talked to him one-on-one or if the attorney were present.

  As they wrapped up the conversation, Cindy asked, “What’s your gut telling you right now?”

  “My gut is telling me that she’s okay.”

  “And your gut’s telling you that she’s close or she’s hiding?”

  “She’s not far. I know in my heart she’s not far. I can feel it.”

  CHAPTER 35

  Over the weekend, Lee emailed Melich the detailed description of Zanny and other details from the conversations he and his parents had had with Casey at the jail. Law enforcement, however, was convinced that Zenaida did not exist.

  George and Cindy prepared for the second Caylee vigil on Sunday, July 27. They planned to hold one every Sunday night until Caylee came home. That afternoon, Richard Grund called George, leaving a message that offered help, and asked one question: Why aren’t you doing what ex-cops do?

  George must have understood the meaning of that question, that a former law enforcement officer would first focus his suspicions on the person closest to the missing person—his daughter Casey. According to Richard, George called back right away and said, “Here’s my answer to your question as to why I’m not doing what you think I should be doing: because my wife doesn’t want me to.”

  Despite the rain that day, more than two hundred people filled the front yard of the Anthony home. A minister delivered a short sermon. Everyone joined hands as he led the group in prayer. “Casey has gotten deceived and we are standing here to ask God to break that bondage off of her.”

  Cindy led the group in a chant of “Bring Caylee home!” Outside of the prayer, no one spoke about Casey or her situation in jail. They were encouraged by the news that an anonymous corporation had put up a $225,000 reward for the safe return of Caylee.

  Rozzie Franco of Fox News approached Cindy at the end of the service to discuss Detective Yuri Melich. “We asked him about a grid pattern from your home, and why they hadn’t done that and why they’re not searching actively. What do you think? What are your thoughts on that?”

  “I don’t know,” Cindy said. “I mean, they had receipts that could have traced my daughter’s last actions for the last month. They didn’t want them. They didn’t even want to go through any of her personal things. It’s too late now, guys. I’ve already put her stuff away. So you know, I let it sit out in the bedroom for the last week, and no one’s wanted to come through any of the stuff that we took from the apartment . . .

  “And I’m frustrated. I just want one of them from the sheriff’s department to call me and give me some respect, give my husband some respect, give us a little update. They were so good about coming here every day for the first three days, because they knew we were giving them everything they wanted, and I’ve given them everything they wanted. I open my home to them. I let them search my backyard without question. I let them take my computers without question . . .

  “I feel like I am the one who’s being punished for trying to look for my granddaughter. And I can’t keep doing this day after day. I’ve been grabbed by the media. My son gets chased down on his way to see his sister this morning. . . . My son is a tough person, but he called me this morning, he said, ‘Mom, this is first time I felt like my life was in danger.’ ”

  Cindy concluded the interview with some venting about the media: “. . . This has to stop. Quit harassing her friends, her friends trying to speak to the authorities. They won’t return their phone calls. But they don’t need to be on the media. They’ve already said Casey is a great mom, that she’s always taken good care of Caylee; she’s always been worried about Caylee, that she’s been around cigarette smoke or whatever. This Zenaida person I’ve known about for the last three years. Do they think that she’s been plotting to murder her child for three years now? Come on. Give me a break!”

  Lee sat down for an interview with Orange County Detectives Eric Edwards and Michael Erickson that day. He provided the investigators with a handwritten list of receipts containing twenty-two dated entries in chronological order. “I want to make sure that we’re on the same page—that these receipts were very organized . . . I saw them that night,” Lee said, referring to July 15, “when they were being taken out of the bag.” He added that he’d created the list when he visited the attorney on July 28.

  “It would have been very nice to have those receipts,” Detective Edwards said. “The attorney currently has them?”

  “Yes, he does.”

  “And you can’t remember when you took them and gave them to the attorney, but it was some time . . .”

  “I want to say it had to be this . . . past Monday. Not yesterday, the week prior. It had to be around that time.”

  “Like the twenty-first?” Edwards asked.

  “Yeah. Within a day or two, one way or the other. And we had offered it up . . . first to the officers on that—at this point, we’re early morning into the sixteenth—we offered it to them at that time. We offered it to them again on the evening of the sixteenth and again on the evening of the seventeenth. I was present for every time when that was offered to them,” Lee avowed.

  The detectives moved on to questions about Casey’s relationships with the men in her life. Lee said, “Ricardo and Casey had been seeing each other from February until the month . . . of April on kind of a full-time basis. They decided to break it off, see what they can do as friends. But they were still having, you know, a relationship . . . kind of on a semi-serious level up until Casey started hanging out with Tony—and actually even through the initial part of hanging out
with Tony. So, it was in that time that she kind of transitioned . . . from Ricardo to Tony.”

  “She kind of seems like she may swing from boyfriend to boyfriend to keep a comfort?”

  “Sure. Absolutely,” Lee said.

  “Is that . . . how you look back at her past and . . .”

  “Absolutely. That’s very accurate. But also to make sure that we’re clear on this, Casey—unbeknownst to Jesse’s and my parents—Casey and Jesse still maintained a semi-regular relationship, and always have over the past few years. This includes, from what I’ve been able to find out, at least into May when she started to see Tony.”

  Lee laughed. “She’s always maintained to my mother and father that Jesse is the one pursuing her, and she’s trying to get him out of . . . her life, while Jesse maintains that same thing to his parents. When, truth be told, even through phone records, you can see they equally reach out and facilitate the relationship between themselves. No one person is chasing the other more than the other.”

  Edwards wanted to clear up a piece of confusing information with Lee: “Now we go to the eighth [of June]. I have highlighted that in red because your Mom originally thought, in her frantic state, that she hadn’t seen Caylee from the eighth on. But now that changes. We know that to be the fifteenth. And that’s just over stress. There’s no finger-pointing going on there.”

  “Right.” Lee nodded.

  “It’s just that she recalled originally that’s the first time. You believe, though, that may have influenced your sister picking the ninth as . . .”

  “A hundred percent,” Lee interjected.

  “. . . when the abduction occurs?” Edwards finished.

  “Absolutely.”

  “Okay, which is a red flag as far as what her thought process may have been—in my mind, anyway. We cruise on through—we get to the fifteenth. You know from talking to Mom that they went and visited Granddad in Mount Dora?”

  “Um hum.” Lee nodded.

  “When they came back, you believe from talking to Mom, that your sister, Casey, was at the house and actually [uploaded] the video and the pictures onto MySpace?”

  “Yes.”

  “Or onto the home computer?”

  “And MySpace, yes.”

  “And MySpace? Okay. And that being the forensics stuff that we know of, the last time any digital recording or any photographs were taken or existed of your niece . . .”

  “Exactly.”

  “. . . Was on the fifteenth?” Edwards continued.

  “Yes,” Lee affirmed.

  Judge Strickland’s decision to permit audio and video recordings to be admitted into the record earlier that day was on Lee’s mind when he talked to his sister on the telephone. “Here’s an FYI for you, so you can conduct yourself accordingly,” Lee warned. “Everything is public record, including this phone call, including the visitation video, all that stuff is going to end up being released at some point.”

  “I know it is,” Casey said.

  “I had no knowledge of that whatsoever,” Lee complained.

  “They told me about that yesterday.”

  “They told me after we did that. There are obviously things I may have asked in a different way.”

  “Yeah, absolutely.”

  “I don’t want you, you know, to feel for any reason we are not on your side about anything, because we are, about everything. We are completely behind you . . .”

  “I know.”

  “. . . and being completely behind you, our entire focus, our entire days—every second of every day is consumed by what we can do to find Caylee.”

  “Of course,” Casey acknowledged.

  He then asked her if she had anything she could tell him that would help them find Caylee, but Casey said that nothing came to her mind.

  “Do you think Caylee is okay, right now?” Lee asked.

  “My gut feeling, as Mom asked me yesterday, and as the psychologist asked me this morning, that I met with through the court: In my gut, she’s still okay. And it still feels like she’s close to home.”

  CHAPTER 36

  On July 29, Cindy and George came to the jail again to visit their daughter. They sat in the hard, uncomfortable chairs staring at an empty screen, waiting for their daughter’s arrival on the other end. Finally, personnel informed them that Casey had been taken to court. They joined her there, and then came back for a visit the next day.

  After exchanging greetings and news, Casey sighed, sniffled and wiped her eyes. “I’m being as strong as I can—considering the situation. It’s hard—it’s just very hard.”

  “I know. I know,” Cindy commiserated.

  “I just wanna go home,” Casey sobbed. “Every day I wake up, I’m just hoping and praying I get to go home. I just want to be with you guys. I just wanna help find her, because I feel a little hopeless, I feel a little helpless here.”

  Cindy reassured her that everyone was being supportive and sending love her way. When the conversation turned to Caylee, Cindy said, “I want her home so that we can celebrate her third birthday as a family again.”

  “Every day I can feel it, Mom. I know I’m going to be home with you guys. I know she’s going to be home with us. Everyone just has to keep that faith, because mine’s growing stronger every day.”

  George offered his reassurance, too, and apologized for not being a better dad and grandpa. Casey rebuffed that, saying, “Dad, I can’t say this to you enough: You’ve done everything you possibly can, and you’re the best father and by far, the best grandfather I ever met . . . I mean that with all my heart. Don’t think otherwise for a minute.”

  When Cindy returned to the phone, her voice was stretched thin and high from the stress and tears. “I want you both home so bad, Casey. I’m trying to stay so strong for you.”

  “You’re doing such a great job, Mom. I want you to know that . . .”

  “I’m trying so hard, but it’s getting harder every day . . . She’s not going to hurt Caylee, is she, Casey? She’s not going to hurt Caylee?”

  “I told you, in my gut, I know she is okay. I can feel it, Mom; I know she’s still okay. We’re going to get our little girl back, and she’s going to be just as she was.”

  “Don’t ever let anybody outside the family . . .” Cindy began.

  “No. Trust me. I’ve said the same thing. I’m going to be the crazy, over-protective mom at that point, but I don’t care. I think it’s well deserved.”

  “You’ve always been a protective mommy.”

  “Well, like I said, ‘the crazy . . . ,’ ” Casey said with a chuckle. “I won’t let her out of my sight. So, I’ll do whatever I have to. We’ll figure it all out when it comes to it. I mean, I’ve been thinking about jobs and schedules and what I can do . . .”

  “You won’t have to work. You won’t have to work. We’ll figure everything out.”

  Casey said, “I’m kind of glad I haven’t been crying every day—inside, of course, yeah, but I’m keeping my wits about me and staying as strong as I possibly can. This is the strongest I’ve ever been. Because even when I want to break down, I’ve been able to calm myself quickly, without doing much of that. It’s hard, considering where I am, considering the situation, but I just keep thinking about you guys, ‘cause that’s the thing that makes me feel okay about not crying, and not being so emotionally distraught I can’t even think straight.”

  “I know,” her mother said. “It’s the same way with me. I mean, I could curl up in a ball and be so absorbed with her not being there, which is—There are moments I’m like that—but I know that’s not going to bring her home.”

  “I know it.”

  “Someone has to be her little voice out there.”

  “Exactly. But you aren’t a ‘little voice’ by any means,” Casey said with a laugh.

  “Well, you know me . . .”

  “Exactly. And it’s funny. I’m going to say this, and you’re going to laugh—I think it’s hilarious. Everyone says that—
you guys have always said I’m the loudest in the family, then it’s you, then it’s Lee and then Dad, because Dad is quiet and reserved, we know that. But I’ve been told by many sources that it is your son that’s the loud one,” Casey grinned. “Then it’s you. Then it’s me. So, hah!” Casey laughed.

  Cindy was not amused. She answered seriously, “That’s okay. I don’t want to be the loud one. I don’t want to be . . .”

  “Oh, you’re still the middle one. So, you’re still the moderator. We know that Dad will always process things thoroughly before having any reaction or saying anything. He’s very choosy about his words. He always has been. Which is good. ’Cause I think within our family, we need someone like that. ’Cause little Caylee is like you and I.”

  When Cindy asked Casey about the letter to the family that she’d promised Lee, Casey said that she had been too busy to write it. But later in the conversation, Casey contradicted herself when she said that she liked visitors because she had nothing to do but read and take naps. Although she’d said she wanted to talk to Ryan Pasley, she was declining any visits outside of family and her attorney. She said she’d rather see friends after she got out of jail.

  When they left the visitation, George told reporters, “You want to reach out and touch them and give them a hug and make her feel the love that we have, to know we love her daughter unconditionally. We want our granddaughter back.”

  For his part, Ryan didn’t sound as if he were beating down any walls to speak to his childhood friend, when interviewed by law enforcement that day. He said he’d thought about visiting her in the hopes he could get information from her, but decided not to go. He knew she wasn’t saying anything, because “she’s lawyered up.” He added, “I’m sure . . . her lawyer is telling her just shut up, and hopefully they won’t find anything . . . I guess that’s what I’m going to assume, because he actually called me and asked me questions.

  “I answered whatever questions he had and then he ended up asking me, ‘Do you think you’d be a good person . . . as a character witness or a reference for Caylee?’ And I said, ‘To be honest with you, from the truth that I’ve told you, I’m not going to be . . . I mean, I’m going to be a big detriment to your case.’ He’s like, ‘Yeah, you’re probably right,’ and he even hung up the phone,” Ryan chuckled.