Mommy's Little Girl (3 page)

Anthony and his roommate stared at her blankly, not knowing how to respond. Casey stomped back into the living room and shouted, “Shut up!” at her mother. Without another word, she walked outside and Cindy followed.

As they drove, Cindy continued to badger Casey for answers. Casey was not at all forthcoming. Amy squirmed in the back seat. The mother–daughter war of wills made her very uncomfortable.

Cindy continued to pepper her daughter with questions. “The car smells like shit. We were terrified. We thought something happened to you and Caylee. What happened in that car?”

Casey gave no response.

“Why did you lead Amy on about buying the house?” Cindy continued.

Amy cringed. She wanted to be left out of it.
Just take me home. Drop me off. I found Casey, my job is done.

Casey didn't answer that query either. She gazed straight ahead, outside of the car. Her face was hard and cold, with no evidence of remorse, no hint of apology.

When they pulled to the curb to drop her off, Amy suppressed a huge sigh of relief. As she stepped out of the car, Cindy said, “I'll let you know what happens. I'll let you know if Caylee's okay.”

For a while, Cindy drove around, begging and insisting that Casey take her to Caylee. Her daughter, however, resisted, claiming Caylee would be asleep and she didn't want to bother her.

Exasperated with her daughter, Cindy called her husband's cell and left a message. “Hey, George, call me as quick as you can.”

George called her back ten or fifteen minutes later, at
about 8:15, but the call was routed to voicemail. “Hey, I just wanted to let you know I'm here. What's going on? Is everything okay?” When he hadn't heard from her fifteen minutes later, he tried the home phone and got no answer there either. He called his son, Lee, who lived a couple of blocks away. “It's a long story, but Casey's in a lot of trouble. We don't know where Caylee's at. I'm worried about your mother. Get down there. Beat feet. Get to Mom.”

Casey's older brother Lee pulled up to the house five minutes after talking to his father. The coarse blackness of his facial hair gave him a nearly perpetual 5 o'clock shadow beneath the ridge of his heavy brow and dominant eyebrows. As usual he entered through the garage, where he found himself repelled by the smell. He saw the white Pontiac his sister drove—the trunk was open, the windows rolled down.

He went into the house, but no one was at home, raising his sense of alarm. He called his mother's cell. Meanwhile, Cindy had given up on getting any cooperation from her daughter and called the sheriff's department, where she was told to go home and call them back from there. To Lee she said, “I'm thirty seconds away from pulling in. I've got your sister in the car.”

“Okay,” Lee said and went outside to meet them as they pulled into the driveway. He saw the strain on their faces as they stepped out of the car. Casey snapped at her mother, “You know you won't even listen to me, so why do I even bother!” She stomped off inside.

“Mom, what's going on?” Lee asked.

“Your sister knows where Caylee is, and she won't take me to her. I'm going to call the police, and you need to talk to your sister.”

Lee left his mother in the living room and went down the hall to his sister's bedroom. He stood in the doorway while Casey sat on the side of the bed. He hoped he could
delay the call to the police by getting information from her. “Where is Caylee?”

“I know where Caylee is. She's with the nanny. She's sleeping. I don't want to take her out of what's been normal for her lately. We can get her in the morning,” Casey insisted.

Cindy stalked down the hall talking about her concern over the state of the car and complaining that Casey had lied about being out of town. “Okay,” she said. “If you weren't where you were, how do I know that Caylee is where you say she's been?”

Lee offered what he hoped was an acceptable compromise: “I will go. Tell me where I can go to see Caylee myself. I'll go for five minutes. I'll do it your way. I'll just go and just make sure that she's okay.” He then offered to take along his roommate to verify what he saw.

Cindy interrupted, “That is unacceptable. I want her here. I want her home. I don't want just to see her. I want to hold her. I want her to be here.” She walked away in frustration.

“Mom won't allow that to happen,” Casey told Lee, confirming her mother's statement.

Lee continued to try to reason with his sister. At nearly six feet tall, he towered over his younger sister. “What's going on? What's the deal? Why are you going to allow Mom to get the police involved in this?”

“I don't want to disrupt her life, because from here on out, Caylee's life will never be the same.”

“Could you take Mom and me to Caylee tomorrow?” Lee asked, seeking a compromise between his mother and sister.

“Mom has thrown it in my face many times before that I'm an unfit mother, and, you know, maybe she's right, and maybe I am.”

Lee didn't want to get distracted by side issues. He wanted to solve the problem of the moment. “Why won't you allow us to see Caylee?”

“Maybe I'm a spiteful bitch,” Casey snarled.

“Well, I don't get it. What's in it for you? Why are you letting the police get involved in this? This doesn't make any sense to me.”

“Look, maybe this should have been done a long time ago. I've stolen money from Mom. I've been a bad daughter. I've stolen money from you. I've been untrustworthy. And maybe I have been a . . . a . . . a, you know, a bad mother, daughter and sister, you know? So this should have been done a long time ago.”

Lee asked again about seeing Caylee, and Casey continued in her obstinate refusal.

At last he threw up his hands and turned to his mother. “Fine, call the cops, because I'm with you. I want her to prove it, if she won't allow us to go.”

Cindy stepped outside with the phone and punched in 9-1-1. “I have someone here who I need to be arrested in my home,” Cindy told the operator.

“They are there right now?”

“And I have a possible missing child,” Cindy said with a sob. “I have a three-year-old who has been missing for a month.”

“A three-year-old? Have you reported that?”

“I'm trying to do that now,” Cindy snapped.

“Okay, what did the person do that you need arrested?”

“My daughter.”

“For what?”

“For stealing an auto and stealing money,” Cindy explained. “I already spoke to someone who said they would patch me through to the Orlando sheriff's department and have a deputy here. I was in the car and I was going to drive her to the police station and no one is open. They said they would bring a deputy to my home when I got home to call them.”

“So, she stole your vehicle?”

“Yeah.”

“When did she do that?”

“On the thirtieth. I just got back from the impound. I'd
like to speak to an officer. Can you have someone come out to my house?”

“Okay. Okay, I've got to ask these questions so I can put them in the call, okay?”

“Okay.”

“The thirtieth of June?” the operator confirmed. “Yeah.”

“Okay, how old is your daughter?”

“Twenty-two.”

“Okay what's her name?”

“My name?”

“Her name.”

“Her name? Casey Anthony. C-A-S-E-Y.”

“And your name?”

“Cynthia Anthony.”

After getting Cindy's telephone number, the dispatcher continued. “And you said you have the vehicle back.”

“Yes. And I have the, uhm, statement.”

“Casey's there right now?”

“Yes, I got her. I finally found her after a month. She's been missing for a month. I found her, but we can't find my granddaughter.”

“Okay. How tall is Casey?”

“Five foot one-and-a-half.”

“Thin, medium or heavy build?”

“Thin.”

“What color hair?”

“Brown.”

“What color shirt is she wearing?”

“White.”

“What color pants?”

“Oh, they're shorts,” Cindy said. “But they're plaid. They're like pink and teal and light black plaid.”

“Does she have any weapons on her?”

“No.”

“Is Casey not telling you where her daughter is?”

“Correct.”

“Alright, we'll have a deputy out to you as soon as one's available.”

“Thank you,” Cindy said as she walked into the house and loudly declared, “The cops are on the way. She's going to have to prove it now.” She turned around and went back outside.

Lee walked down the hall to his sister's room. “Casey, here's what I don't get. What's in this for you? Mom, as much as she doesn't like that you're running up her credit bills and all this stuff, she's never called the police. She's never even threatened to call the police. So why would you let all these other things be the reason why you get in trouble? I don't get it. What's your motivation right now? I just don't understand. You've got to understand what's going to happen when the officer arrives. So, let's go through this right now, because I don't understand what you're going to do there.”

Casey did not respond.

Lee continued, “The officer is going to say, you know, ‘Good evening, Ms. Anthony. Where's your daughter?' That's exactly what he's going to say. And what are you going to say?”

“She's with the nanny. She's sleeping,” Casey said.

Lee continued in the role of policeman. “Great, Ms. Anthony. I'm so happy to hear that. That's going to be a relief for everybody. So hop in the car. Your mom's going to follow. Let's go get her.” A shocked expression crossed Casey's face. Lee shrugged his shoulders. “What's it going to be, Casey? What are you going to say?”

Casey slumped and burst into tears. “Lee, you want to know the truth? I haven't seen Caylee in thirty-one days.” She threw her hands over her face and repeated the sentence.

“Where have you been?” Lee whispered, afraid his mother would overhear. “When and where is the last time you've seen her?”

“She was kidnapped,” Casey sobbed.

Cindy heard the furtive conversation and knew something was up. She exploded through the doorway and demanded, “What have you done? Why are you crying? What's going on?”

Casey raised her head and turned tear-stained eyes to her mother. “I don't know where Caylee is.”

Cindy shouted, “Who took her? Who took her?”

“Uhm, the nanny did. She was kidnapped, Mom,” Casey cried.

Cindy slammed her fist on the bed. “We could have found her a month ago. Why did you wait?”

Casey's tears dried as if they'd never been shed, and her eyes turned as cold and sharp as shattered crystals. Lee ran from the room and into the kitchen to get a pad of paper and a pen. He wanted to get information from his sister so that he could search for Caylee. When he returned to the bedroom, Cindy held a telephone to her ear while she talked to her daughter. “We'll have a court order to get her. If that's how you want to play, we'll do it, and you'll never . . .”

“That's not how I want to play,” Casey objected.

“Well, then you have . . .”

Casey cut her off. “Give me one more day.”

“No, I'm not giving you another day. I've given you a month . . .”

The operator interrupted. “9-1-1, what's your emergency?”

“I called a little bit ago,” Cindy said. “The deputy sheriff's not here. I found out my granddaughter has been taken. She's been missing for a month. Her mother finally admitted she's been missing.” While she talked, Cindy walked up the hall, out of the house and into the garage.

“Okay. What's the address you're calling from?”

Ignoring her question, Cindy said, “We're talking about a three-year-old little girl. My daughter finally admitted that the baby-sitter stole her. I need to find her.”

“Your daughter admitted that the baby is where?”

“That the baby-sitter took her a month ago. That my daughter's been looking for her. I told you my daughter was missing for a month. I just found her today. But I can't find my granddaughter. She just admitted to me that she's been trying to find her herself. There's something wrong,” Cindy's voice strained with emotion. “I found my daughter's car today and it smells like there's been a dead body in the damn car.”

“Okay. What is the three-year-old's name?”

“Caylee. C-A-Y-L-E-E Anthony.”

“Caylee Anthony?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. Is she white, black or Hispanic?”

“She's white.”

“How long has she been missing for?”

“I have not seen her since the seventh of June,” Cindy wailed as she watched from the open garage door as George returned from work and pulled into the driveway.

“What is her date of birth?”

“Um. Eight . . . Eight/Nine/two thousand . . . Oh God, she's three. She's . . . Two-thousand-
five.
” Cindy turned to her husband. “George, Caylee's missing.”

“What?”

“Caylee's missing. Casey says she [the nanny] took her a month ago,” Cindy shrieked.

The dispatcher interrupted. “Okay. I need, um. I understand. Can you just calm down for me for just a minute? I need to know what's going on. Okay?”

Cindy mumbled and the operator continued, “Is your daughter there?”

“I'm on the phone with them,” Cindy told George.

“Is your daughter there?” the dispatcher repeated.

“Yes.”

“Can I speak with her? Do you mind if I speak with her? Thank you.”

Cindy talked to George as she walked into the house and down the hall to Casey's room. “I called them two hours ago, and they haven't gotten here. Casey finally admitted that [Zenaida, the nanny] took her a month ago and [Casey] has been trying to find her.”