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Nancy Grace
Facts and Evidence in the Caylee Anthony Case
Aired November 27, 2008 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Casey Anthony is a 22-year-old mother. That`s a fact. This is her beautiful 2-year-old Caylee. That`s also true, but the rest of the story is blurry, at best, false at worst.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Anthony claims she dropped her daughter off at this apartment on June 9th and when she came back the babysitter was gone.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Everything she has told them so far has led nowhere. The Anthonys admit Casey has lied to them again and again.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Caylee`s mother, Casey, abandoned her white 1998 Pontiac in the parking lot.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Tell what she knows about Caylee`s whereabouts and the little girl`s well being.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The sheriff`s deputy has testified Casey Anthony`s car did smell of decomposition and one of the dogs smelled human remains.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Her own mother locked up in jail continues to keep her secret locked up as well.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NANCY GRACE, HOST: A beautiful little 2-year-old Florida girl Caylee Anthony vanishes into thin air last seen by her mother. In a stunning twist, baby Caylee go on for an entire month before she`s even reported missing and it isn`t her mom who finally calls 911. It`s little Caylee`s grandmother.
So why didn`t mommy call police? The grandma`s 911 call ignites a desperate search. A police investigation and lie after lie by the tot mom, but still, no sign of Caylee.
Tonight, the crucial first 24 hours in the search for Caylee and the police investigation that follows.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GRACE (voice over): Amazingly, it all starts here at this local check cashing shop Amscot. Casey Anthony`s white `98 white Pontiac Sunfire left abandoned in the parking lot for days. Mom Casey calls Anthony Lazzaro, saying she`s run out of gas.
He shows up and Casey Anthony leaves the Pontiac behind saying her dad will take care of it.
ANTHONY LAZZARO, CASEY ANTHONY`S EX-BOYFRIEND: I got a call that to come pick her up that she ran out of gas. I asked her where she was and she said that she ran out of gas at that corner and that somebody helped her push her car into the Amscot. So then I went and picked her up.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No child that night before?
LAZZARO: No child with her at all. She had some groceries and some clothes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Where were the groceries from?
LAZZARO: They weren`t actually groceries from the store. It was from her house. She had some freezer pops and like some Tyson chicken or something to make for dinner that night.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: From grandma`s house?
LAZZARO: Yes, because it wasn`t in any bags. It just looked like normal plastic bags.
GRACE: June 15th, Casey Anthony`s parents George and Cindy Anthony get a letter from Johnson`s Wrecker Service. It reveals the tot mom`s car has been towed to the wrecking yard and has been sitting there for nearly two weeks.
CINDY ANTHONY, CASEY ANTHONY`S MOTHER: We received a registered letter. It was stuck on our door. I did not find that registered letter until the Sunday before Tuesday which was, what, 13th, I guess, and when we opened it up -- I mean, it just says that there was a registered letter waiting for us at the post office because, obviously, you can`t go find out on that Sunday.
So the letter was stated that was put on my door on the 11th, but I didn`t find that letter until the 13th. On the 14th, my husband had a chance to go get the registered letter. So that`s why I was talking technical because you`ve been so technical and I`m trying to be as cooperative as I can, so on the 15th is when we got the registered letter, my husband did, and when he found out it was from a towing company is when we found out about the car.
GRACE: George and Cindy Anthony head to Johnson`s wrecking yard and it`s there, the heart wrenching story of Caylee Anthony begins to unravel.
After settling the $500 towing bill, the manager leads George to his daughter`s car. When they open the driver`s side door, the car wreaks with the smell the manager tells police knocks him back. It`s the smell of human decomposition.
GEORGE ANTHONY, CASEY ANTHONY`S FATHER: The wrecker, I don`t know what the genetleman`s name, I still don`t know, I`m sure you guys know by now, but he said, whoa, does that stink. I said -- I sat in the car for a second and I opened up the passenger door because I was trying to vent that thing.
GRACE: At this point grandmother Cindy hasn`t seen her granddaughter for three weeks. She finds a scrap of paper inside Casey Anthony`s car. On it, the phone number for Anthony`s friend, Amy Huizenga. Also left behind, Caylee`s favorite baby doll. She refused to go anywhere without the doll, day or night.
Determined to find her daughter and her granddaughter, Cindy Anthony calls the friend Amy.
In the meantime Casey Anthony is driving Amy Huizenga`s car while she`s on vacation. Well, unfortunately, Huizenga left something behind, her checkbook.
Anthony caught on grainy surveillance video at a local bank and Target allegedly forging friend Amy`s check, racking up hundreds of dollars worth of lingerie, sportswear, grocery, even cases of beer. No toys, no diapers, no baby clothes, nothing, not a single thing for little Caylee.
Casey Anthony`s check scheme later lands her multiple fraud and theft charges.
CAPTAIN ANGELO NIEVES, ORANGE COUNTY SHERIFF`S DEPT.: Orange County`s Sheriff`s Office detectives return to the Anthony residence and place the defendant under arrest for violation of Florida statutes dealing with economic crimes. The defendant was placed into custody without incident and transported here to the Orange County main office for processing of her paperwork.
The defendant is under arrest currently for violation of Florida statutes dealing with (INAUDIBLE) a forged instrument, fraudulent use of personal information and petty theft. She had used some moneys and checks and an account that did not belong to her. It belonged to someone else. That was known to her and that was a violation of Florida state law.
You have the investigative process. You have to make sure that you have your information that`s collected. We have to have information back from the banking institution so there`s a number of dots that we need to point and make sure that our homework is properly done, and we`ll continue to do so.
Remember that there isn`t any investigation of this magnitude. You have allegations and additional charges that may surface and we`ll continue to investigate those as well.
GRACE: Between 2:00 and 4:00 p.m. Casey Anthony stops at the Cast-Iron Tattoo shop and makes an appointment. She then heads to the Orlando International Airport to pick up friend Amy Huizenga. Amy Huizenga back from Puerto Rico, a trip Casey wanted to make herself, but claims Caylee was the reason she couldn`t go.
After picking up her so-called friend, Huizenga drops Casey off at her current live-in`s apartment, Tony Lazzaro. Amy drives off with no idea she`s about to become involved in a major dispute between Cindy and Casey Anthony.
According to police, Huizenga received a disturbing call from Cindy Anthony desperately wanting to talk to Amy. Cindy Anthony tells Amy if she doesn`t find Casey, Casey Anthony will end up behind bars.
AMY HUIZENGA, CASEY ANTHONY`S FORMER FRIEND: The grandma called me and pretty much wondering where her daughter and granddaughter were. Briefly explained some of the situation. Offered to come pick me up from the mall.
After some deliberation I decided to pick her up on that offer. She sounded very concerned and told me that if she did not find Casey she would end up in jail. And I.
CPL. EDWARDS: Grandma said that?
HUIZENGA: Yes. I decided to trust her.
DET. RIVERA: Did you ask her why she would make a statement like that?
HUIZENGA: Well, she has told me that the car had been in impound since the 30th and they had just gotten it off. She hadn`t seen Caylee. She was pretty panicky.
GRACE: Cindy tells Huizenga about the letter from the tow company and the stench of the trunk of Casey`s car. Amy confides the tot mom told her she`d run over something, an animal, with the car.
CPL. EDWARDS: Grandma ever ask you about a smell coming from the car?
HUIZENGA: She told me about the smell in the car ride back to Tony`s place. After she had picked me from the Florida mall, that was -- she was telling me the story about, you know, the fact that she had gotten a letter from the impound saying that the car had been impounded since the 30th. They went to go pick it up. And that the car smelled like something had died. And.
CPL. EDWARDS: Grandma tells me that and at that point I`m like, oh yes, Casey told me she had run something over with her car. And then proceeds, she proceeds to tell me, she`s like, oh well, you know, we didn`t know that. But proceeds to tell me the rest of the story that the impound law because they couldn`t, did have the keys.
DET. RIVERA: Yes, but didn`t you say that that Casey blamed her dad for running something over?
HUIZENGA: Is what she told me but we now know that.
DET. RIVERA: That`s what she told you.
HUIZENGA: . nothing Casey says is true.
GRACE: But Cindy Anthony goes on to blame the smell on pizza boxes. Pizza boxes rotting left sitting in the car.
C. ANTHONY: There was a bag of pizza, for what, 12 days in the back of the car full of maggot that stunk so bad. You know how hot it`s been. That smell was terrible.
GRACE: Next the so-called babysitter Casey Anthony claims is a kidnapper.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: NANCY GRACE brought to you by.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GRACE: Cindy Anthony reveals multiple lies Casey Anthony has told. Grandfather George never had a mini stroke.
G. ANTHONY: There is no ridiculous question.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Did you have a stroke on the 13th? That you were treated at the hospital before?
G. ANTHONY: No. Curious where you got that from.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I`ll shed light on it for you. You don`t look like you`ve had a stroke last month.
G. ANTHONY: Well, put it this way. I thought I almost did because I did get -- but that was about four, three years ago just before I had my knee replacement or something like that, but.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Your daughter, it seems, has a pattern as if she`s made a date with a friend or scheduled to do something and if she needs to come up with a reason not to do it. Instead of just saying I don`t feel like going, she comes up with that you had a stroke on the 13th and she was unable to go to Jacksonville with someone because she was busy at the hospital with you. So it`s always on the extreme.
G. ANTHONY: That`s extreme, all right.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
G. ANTHONY: Because if I had a stroke I wouldn`t be sitting here talking to you guys. I mean, let`s put it this way, if I was, it would be sort of a miracle so I would have.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I still had to ask.
G. ANTHONY: Oh I know. This is getting so bizarre. This is just unbelievable.
GRACE: George and Cindy were no longer getting a divorce and Casey Anthony stole money from her parents and the grandparents.
LEE ANTHONY, CASEY ANTHONY`S BROTHER: Stolen money from mom, I`ve been a bad daughter. You know, I`ve been -- she said I`ve stolen money from you. You know, I`ve been untrustworthy. You know? And she goes, and maybe I have been a -- you know, a bad mother, a daughter and sister.
GRACE: Cindy Anthony even questions whether Casey has a job, asking Amy where does Casey work. Well, Amy says Universal Studios. Cindy also claims Casey is an unfit mother and vows she plans to seek legal custody of little Caylee.
HUIZENGA: She said that she was worried she hadn`t seen Caylee. She hadn`t talked to Caylee in over a month. Casey kept saying she`s fine. She`s with the nanny and she pretty much, you know, said that she thought Casey was an unfit mother and that if this goes on much longer that she would sue for custody of Caylee if it got to that.
DET. RIVERA: Why did she think she was an unfit mom?
HUIZENGA: The going out, the partying. She -- I don`t know if you guys have seen the picture of Casey and the American flag. That`s from a no- clothes party that we went to in May.
She pretty much showed that picture that she had printed it off from a computer in her face and said you`re at work, huh? And so that she had been watching Caylee and Casey had said she was at work. And it was the going out, the partying.
DET. RIVERA: That was the no clothes party?
HUIZENGA: Yes.
DET. RIVERA: So she was with the mom at the no clothes party?
HUIZENGA: Yes.
GRACE: Then we learned about Cindy and George Anthony, scared to open Casey`s car trunk. That was when they picked it up from the tow yard. They were both terrified Caylee was dead inside.
CPL. YURY MELICH, ORANGE COUNTY INVESTIGATOR: When I first saw you that night, when I first came to your house, there was a mention of the car. And there was a mention of what you smelled in the car. Do you remember what you told me?
G. ANTHONY: I believe that there`s something dead back there. I hate to say the word human. I hate to say that. When I first went there to pick up that vehicle I got within three feet of it. I could smell something.
You look up and you say, please don`t let this be, please don`t let this be, because I`m thinking of my daughter and my granddaughter first. I glance in the car on the passenger side, I see her seat is there. I see some other stuff around in it. As I walk around to the driver side and put the key in it, I said please don`t let this be what I think it is.
GRACE: 7:30 p.m. that night, Amy lead Cindy straight to Casey Anthony at boyfriend Tony Lazzaro`s apartment.
LAZZARO: What happened was I was just sitting there with my roommate Nathan. We were playing video games and she -- and Casey was sitting there at the couch also on the laptop, and then all of a sudden there was a knock on the door and I said come in and there was Amy just standing there with a miserable face.
And we were all -- we all looked confused and then Casey then proceeded to go outside and it was me and my roommate went back to playing video games. Then I would say about a half hour later Casey and her mother Cindy Anthony came to the -- Casey stormed in and looked like she was in tears and her mom said get your things. You`re coming with me.
And Casey said no, I`m coming back. She said, OK, but I`m coming back. And she goes, no, get all your things.
GRACE: A mother/daughter confrontation ensues outside the apartment with Cindy demanding Casey lead her to Caylee. Casey repeatedly insists Caylee`s fine and with a nanny.
Getting nowhere, Cindy Anthony forces Casey into the car. The blowup continues in the car with Grandmother Cindy confronting the tot mom about all the lies and the horrible smell in the car. Casey simply sits there refusing to talk.
HUIZENGA: Mrs. Anthony confronted Casey about a lot of those lies in the car and she pretty much sat there.
DET. RIVERA: You were in the car?
HUIZENGA: She didn`t say a word. Yes. Well, because they took me back to where I live.
CPL. EDWARDS: Did grandmother bark at Casey about the smell in the trunk of the car.
HUIZENGA: Yes.
CPL. EDWARDS: She did.
HUIZENGA: I don`t remember.
CPL. EDWARDS: What did she.
HUIZENGA: Just saying that the car smells like (EXPLETIVE DELETED). And you know, (EXPLETIVE DELETED) were terrified.
CPL. EDWARDS: (EXPLETIVE DELETED) or death? I mean did she go down the death road with her like.
HUIZENGA: I don`t, I don`t remember. It was very, very uncomfortable for me to be in the middle of that.
CPL. EDWARDS: Oh, I could only imagine.
GRACE: Finally, Cindy Anthony threatens to call police and that is when, according to Cindy, Casey confesses Caylee has been missing a month.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You called the police that night.
C. ANTHONY: Correct.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: For a reason.
C. ANTHONY: Correct.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What reason?
C. ANTHONY: Because after speaking with Casey, she -- I did not get to see Caylee. Right? I was not satisfied with her answers.
GRACE: Casey Anthony quickly blames the so-called nanny saying she kidnapped the tot. Grandmother Cindy makes two frantic 911 calls to police.
OPERATOR: 911, what`s your emergency?
C. ANTHONY: I`m calling a little bit ago. The deputy sheriff found out my granddaughter has been taken. She has been missing for a month. Her mother finally admitted that she`s been missing.
OPERATOR: OK, what is.
C. ANTHONY: Get someone here now.
OPERATOR: OK. What is the address that you`re calling from?
C. ANTHONY: We`re talking about a 3-year-old little girl. My daughter finally admitted that the babysitter stole her. I need to find her.
OPERATOR: Your daughter admitted that the baby is where?
C. ANTHONY: That the 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. I found my daughter`s car today and it smells like there`s been a dead body in the damn car.
OPERATOR: OK, what is the 3-year-old`s name?
C. ANTHONY: Caylee. C-A-Y-L-E-E Anthony.
OPERATOR: Caylee Anthony?
C. ANTHONY: Yes.
OPERATOR: How long has she been missing for?
C. ANTHONY: I have not seen her since the 7th of June.
OPERATOR: What is her date of birth?
C. ANTHONY: 8-9-2000, oh gosh, she`s 3, 2005. Caylee`s missing. Caylee`s missing. Casey says Zanny took her a month ago. She`s been missing for a month.
GRACE: That same night, 11 p.m., grandmother Cindy calls Amy Huizenga in tears to give her the heartbreaking news.
HUIZENGA: They dropped me off and then I did not hear from either of them until 11:00 when Cindy Anthony called me and told me that -- she had told me when she dropped me off, I`ll let you know what happens and, you know, if Caylee is OK and all that stuff, and called me crying at about 11:00 that night saying that, you know, Casey was gone -- or Caylee was gone and that Casey said that the nanny had ran off with her, like, a month ago.
And you know, that`s the first I heard of that story, but she called from me from her cell phone at 11:00 on the 15th.
GRACE: Meantime, Casey Anthony reaches out to numerous friends to report Caylee`s been missing over a month.
Next, more on the critical first 24 hours of the Caylee Anthony investigation.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GRACE: Cindy Anthony`s 911 calls are the beginning of a bizarre case. After the frantic calls, multiple police interrogations, written statements by family and friends, investigators head out to the Anthony home.
Detectives meet with mom Casey in private, confronting her about her version of events, even offering her a chance to change her story and tell the truth, but tough as nails, Casey Anthony refuses, reiterating the same story to cops. Her little girl was kidnapped by a babysitter Zenaida Gonzalez.
MELICH: I asked you this at the onset and before we move on tape and I`ll ask you again just to make sure we`re clear.
Is there anything about this story that you`re telling me that is untrue or is there anything that you want to change or divert from what you`ve already told me?
CASEY ANTHONY, MOTHER OF MISSING CAYLEE: No, sir.
MELICH: Did you cause injury to your child Caylee?
CASEY ANTHONY: No, sir.
MELICH: Did you hurt Caylee or leave her somewhere and you`re worried that if we find that out that people are going to look at you the wrong way?
CASEY ANTHONY: No, sir.
MELICH: You`re telling me that Zenaida took your child without your permission and hasn`t returned?
CASEY ANTHONY: She`s the last person that I`ve seen with my daughter, yes.
The horrible thing that happened is this is the honest to God`s truth, of every thing that I`ve said I do not know where she is. The last person that I saw her with is Zenaida. She`s the last person that I`ve seen my daughter with.
MELICH: And you know that that`s not true. That can`t be the truth because if that were the truth everything you would have told us would have been on the money. The addresses you would have taken us would have been on the money. Everything else would have matched.
If you had told us the truth, we wouldn`t be here at Universal Studios at a place that you`ve been fired since 2006 with you trying to explain to us, you know, that you got an office and all that stuff.
GRACE: According to Casey Anthony, between 9:00 p.m. and 1:00 a.m. June 9th she drops Caylee off with nanny Zenaida on the stairwell at Sawgrass Apartments, then heads to Universal Studios for work.
SGT. JOHN ALLEN, ORANGE COUNTY INVESTIGATOR: I want to go through this and I want you to stop me at the part that isn`t the truth, OK? You take your daughter and you drop her off on June the 9th, OK, at somebody -- at the babysitter`s house. OK? Now this is the babysitter that lives at this apartment, OK? That`s been vacant.
CASEY ANTHONY: I dropped her off at that apartment.
ALLEN: OK.
CASEY ANTHONY: At the stairs.
ALLEN: Oh you just walked her -- you dropped her off and.
CASEY ANTHONY: I walked her to the stairs. That`s where I`ve dropped her off a bunch of other times besides just that day.
ALLEN: OK. And when you dropped her off, who took her at that point?
CASEY ANTHONY: Zani did. She took her at that point.
ALLEN: So you left her in Zani`s care on June 9th. OK? So far that`s right? OK?
CASEY ANTHONY: Yes.
GRACE: When we come back, mom Casey Anthony refuses to cooperate in the search for her little girl.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MELICH: Go back to your statement, you dropped off your -- you dropped off Caylee on June 9th and -- walk me through -- you dropped her off to go to work?
CASEY ANTHONY: Uh-huh.
MELICH: OK. Get off of work and go from there.
CASEY ANTHONY: I got off of work, left Universal driving back to pick up Caylee like a normal day. And I show up to the apartment, knock on the door, nobody answers. So I called Zenaida`s cell phone and it`s out of service, says that the -- the phone is no longer in service, excuse me.
So I sit down on the steps and wait for a little bit to see if maybe it was just a fluke, if something happened. And time passed. I didn`t hear from anyone. No one showed up to the house so I went over to Jay Blanchard Park and checked a couple other places where maybe possibly they would`ve gone, a couple stores -- just regular places that I know Zenaida shops at and she`s taken Caylee before.
GRACE: Tot mom says she goes several places Zenaida frequents, a local park, stores, she even parties at nightclubs to find Zenaida and Caylee.
Instead of calling police, though, she says she starts her own investigation. We later learned that investigation includes multiple trips to nightclub Fusion, but photos show it doesn`t appear the tot mom is looking for Caylee.
Stunning and disturbing photos emerge of mom Casey partying, hanging out with friends, dancing the night away, even reportedly the life of the party at the club`s hot body contest. All just days, days after she says little Caylee`s kidnapped.
The name Zenaida Gonzalez quickly becomes the focus of the police investigation after tot mom says the babysitter`s a kidnapper. Police ask Casey to take them to known Zenaida locations, but this quickly degenerates into a big waste of time.
ALLEN: That makes sense to you? It makes sense to you that I`m trying to help the police find my daughter by giving them a bunch of bad addresses? That makes sense to you?
CASEY ANTHONY: That`s what I said, yes.
ALLEN: No, no, I`m asking you. That makes sense to you? My attempt.
CASEY ANTHONY: That part of it, no. Not at all.
ALLEN: My attempt to help him find my child, OK? What I`ve done to try to help him find my child is I`ve given him a whole bunch of addresses to go to that are bad addressed. That`s what I did to help him find my child.
That makes sense to you?
CASEY ANTHONY: I took him to the last place that I`ve seen my daughter. Besides that I took them to other places that I`ve seen.
ALLEN: OK, when you -- when you brought us here -- when you brought us here to go look in your office, that was supposed to help us how? Because everything we`re doing here is about finding your daughter, OK?
So I want you, OK, to explain to me how coming here to go to an office that you don`t have, I want you to tell me how that`s helping us find your daughter.
GRACE: Casey Anthony agreed to show cops three of Zenaida`s last known locations in hopes of making an I.D. Their first stop, 301 North Hillside Drive where the tot mom points out a second floor window on the building`s northwest corner, claiming Zenaida lived in that apartment in 2006.
But the building turns out to be a seniors` only living facility. No Zenaida.
Then they had to 2863 Conway Road, the Sawgrass Apartments, the location Anthony claims to have last seen Caylee. Again, no Zenaida.
Their final stop, a town home community Crossings at Conway. Anthony tells cops Zenaida`s mom owns a condo here and that she dropped Caylee there many times in 2006 and early 2007, but then, once again, mom Casey runs into big trouble. She can`t point cops to the specific town home claiming she can`t remember the address.
Police approached three different town homes, but all three tenants say they don`t know Zenaida or Zenaida`s mom Gloria. Again, no Zenaida.
MELICH: So you`re saying that your ex-boyfriend`s house the 9th of this month when you`re staying at your other boyfriend`s house, Tony, the rest of the month?
CASEY ANTHONY: He`d been out of town so I was staying over at another friend`s place while he was gone. I wasn`t staying in his apartment. I was staying with Amy and Ricardo and J.P. J.P. and Ricardo own the house.
MELICH: So why didn`t, why didn`t you tell us you were staying there? We drove right by the house this morning, didn`t we, when we went today? OK? And you were pointing us to an old folk`s home, which is another lie. Right? Because Zanny never lived there. Am I correct?
CASEY ANTHONY: Uh-huh.
MELICH: OK. Why were you pointing at this old folks` home and saying Zanny lived there at one point when she didn`t?
CASEY ANTHONY: Because she had gone there before. I`ve seen her there.
MELICH: She went to the old folk`s home.
CASEY ANTHONY: Yes.
MELICH: But you never dropped your kid off to her at an old folk`s home. You never went into the old folk`s home and went into an apartment with her.
CASEY ANTHONY: No.
GRACE: Getting nowhere fast, police dropped back at her parents` home. George Anthony comes out and admits to cops he believes his own daughter Casey is holding back information.
George and Cindy Anthony say they`re in fear. They`re in fear something has happened to Caylee.
Not giving up, police return to Sawgrass to question the apartment`s manager and the maintenance man. Neither knows of a Zenaida Gonzalez and when cops shows them a picture of Caylee, neither recognizes her.
Then bombshell. The manager and maintenance man reveal the apartment where Anthony claims Zenaida lives, number 210, it`s been vacant for months. Police even go inside to see with their own eyes. It`s empty.
Then a twist. The manager finds a Zenaida Gonzalez logged into a computer system. A Zenaida Gonzalez who did look at an apartment June 17th. The manager hands over Zenaida`s desk card to cops.
Detectives begin checking name after name after name in the database. Jeffrey Hopkins, the co-worker Anthony claims she told Caylee was missing. Juliette Lewis, another coworker Casey says she told Caylee was missing, and of course, the name Zenaida Gonzalez.
MELICH: Who else did you talk to about this besides Jeffrey? You said you tried to cal Zenaida`s mom. You talk to Jeffrey. Who else did you talk to?
CASEY ANTHONY: I talked to Juliette Lewis. She was one of my coworkers at Universal.
MELICH: She works -- you still work at Universal?
CASEY ANTHONY: Yes.
MELICH: What do you do at Universal?
CASEY ANTHONY: An event coordinator.
MELICH: OK. What is Juliette -- what position is she?
CASEY ANTHONY: She`s also an event coordinator. We work in the same department.
MELICH: Do you have a number for Juliette?
CASEY ANTHONY: Offhand, I can`t think of one.
MELICH: Is she in your SIM card?
CASEY ANTHONY: No, she`s not. Some of the more recent numbers. Her number just changed because she just moved back up north, she -- within the last two months has finished moving up to New York. She`s subleasing her apartment.
MELICH: So Juliette doesn`t work at Universal anymore.
CASEY ANTHONY: No, she does not.
GRACE: Not only did Casey Anthony say Zenaida was a babysitter, but also a seasonal employee at Universal.
MELICH: Where does Zenaida, does she have another job besides watching children?
CASEY ANTHONY: She has a seasonal I.D. for Universal, however, the only job that I that she`s had for the last few years, she`s been a nanny.
MELICH: So seasonal employee at Universal?
CASEY ANTHONY: Mm-hmm.
MELICH: When was the last time she worked at Universal, do you know?
CASEY ANTHONY: I have no idea.
GRACE: But further investigation reveals Casey Anthony was fired from Universal April 2006. Jeff Hopkins left April 2002, and Juliette Lewis -- she never even worked there and neither did Zenaida Gonzalez.
MELICH: How about Jeff? Jeff worked here until about two months ago?
CASEY ANTHONY: No, he hasn`t worked here for quite a while.
MELICH: Ten months? How long?
CASEY ANTHONY: It`s been at least 10 months.
MELICH: OK. He got fired since 2002. He hasn`t been an employee here since 2002. And what about the girl?
CASEY ANTHONY: Juliette?
MELICH: Yes. What about her?
CASEY ANTHONY: She left two months ago. That`s exactly what she had told me.
MELICH: Juliette Lewis never worked at Universal Studios.
GRACE: Next, more on the first 24 hours in the desperate search for Florida girl, 2-year-old Caylee Anthony.
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GRACE: Before heading over to Universal, detectives finally locate the Zenaida Gonzalez connected to Sawgrass Apartments. She`s never met Casey Anthony or little Caylee and has never even worked as a babysitter.
Armed with new information cops call Casey Anthony who continues to insist she still works as an events coordinator at Universal, even giving them a work number and the name of a supervisor, Tom Manly.
But when cops call the number it`s not valid. And there is no such person as Tom Manly at Universal. Cops discover there is a Tom Mattison, however, who says Anthony`s not an employee there and never was.
Cops go back to mom Casey and ask her office location, but she can`t give them a building number and now she says she can`t even find her work I.D.
July 16, 12:30 p.m., detectives go to the Anthony home and tot mom agrees to go with investigators to Universal. At the entrance they meet up with three employees.
Anthony tells a security officer she works there, but she`s lost her I.D. When he asks for a supervisor`s name, Casey repeats Tom Manly. Then the security officer confirms what cops already know. There`s no Tom Manly at Universal.
For once, Casey Anthony falls silent.
The cops agree to take her back to her so-called office. Casey Anthony leads the way down a hallway as if she knows exactly where she`s going, but moments later she stops in her tracks, turns around. She`s busted.
Tot mom admits it`s all a big lie, and she doesn`t work there. Police take Casey Anthony into a conference room to confront her about her lies, the whole thing, caught on tape.
ALLEN: Our purpose in coming here was to do what? Go where?
CASEY ANTHONY: I guess there wasn`t a purpose. There wasn`t a purpose whatsoever to come up here.
ALLEN: So we`re wasting time, valuable time, we ought to be spending looking for your daughter.
CASEY ANTHONY: I`m trying to think of places.
ALLEN: No, I.
CASEY ANTHONY: . where I know she`s been.
ALLEN: You`re not answering my question. Do you want us to help.
CASEY ANTHONY: Yes.
ALLEN: . find your daughter?
CASEY ANTHONY: I do want you to help.
ALLEN: Well, then you need to help me -- a good starting point would be to answer the questions, OK? If I say you were here because and then you just ignore that, like as if I never asked it, and go off in some other direction, does that answer the question?
CASEY ANTHONY: No.
ALLEN: OK. All right. Let`s go through this again. We`re here because? We got here how? To do what?
CASEY ANTHONY: Because I lied. Because I brought you up here. And honestly, I was reaching for.
ALLEN: No, stop right there. I want you to tell me how lying to us is going to help us find your daughter.
CASEY ANTHONY: It`s not going to.
GRACE: Tot mom confesses lying about her job at Universal. One of the locations she claims Zenaida Gonzalez lives and admits she should have called police the day Caylee went missing, but she still insists last seeing Caylee June 9 Sawgrass Apartments.
During the entire interrogation Anthony doesn`t shed a single tear. She never shows emotion over her missing girl, even laughing at times.
MELICH: Everything you told us is a lie. You`re looking at me in the eyes, you`re looking at -- everything you told us is a lie. Every single thing. And you can`t.
CASEY ANTHONY: No, it isn`t.
MELICH: Yes. And you can`t keep sitting here telling us the same thing and getting constantly over and over and over again we`re disproving everything that you`re telling us. You`re telling us that you`ve lied us to, you`re telling us you`re giving us misinformation, everything you`re telling us. OK? This needs to end.
CASEY ANTHONY: The truthful thing is I have not seen my daughter. The last time that I saw her was on the 9th of June.
MELICH: And what happened to Caylee?
CASEY ANTHONY: I don`t know.
MELICH: Sure you do. You need to listen.
CASEY ANTHONY: I don`t know.
MELICH: Something happened to Caylee. We`re not going to discuss where the last time you saw her. I`m guessing something bad happened to her some time ago and you haven`t seen her. So that part is true if you`re saying you haven`t seen her because she`s somewhere else right now.
CASEY ANTHONY: She`s with someone else.
GRACE: Leaving no stone unturned, cops pull up every single Zenaida Gonzalez in the system. Casey Anthony can`t identify a single one and she doesn`t recognize the Gonzalez from Sawgrass Apartments.
NIEVES: We know that there are Zenaida Gonzalez`s out there. The Zenaida Gonzalez that have talked to us by Casey is not existent to this point. What we need to do is receive information from Casey and nothing but the truth. We need that information.
GRACE: Again at headquarters, detectives give Anthony a last chance to come clean, to tell the truth, but the tot mom digs in and sticks to her story.
July 16th, 4:33 p.m. police place tot mom Casey Anthony under arrest for child neglect and, of course, lying to investigators. Cops continue passing along any new information about the investigation to mom Casey behind bars.
Each time Casey Anthony insists she does not know where Caylee, still laughing at times. The same day grandfather George turns over Anthony`s laptop computer to police. Forensic investigators discover photos on of Caylee with her great-grandfather, photos taken June 15, proving Caylee`s alive after June 9.
That`s the day tot mom claims to have last seen Caylee. George also tells police he sees Casey Anthony and granddaughter Caylee leaving the home the morning of June 16.
G. ANTHONY: The 16th is when I actually saw Casey and Caylee together. They were both leaving with backpacks and my daughter said she was going to work and she was taking Caylee to the nanny, to the babysitter.
And I know it was 10 minute to 1:00 because I was watching this food channel thing that I watch between noon and 1:00. So I`m positive. That I know for a dog gone fact.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So she actually told you on the 16th, I plan on staying at Zanny`s a late event.
G. ANTHONY: Yes. Most definitely.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mom starts calling -- apparently mom says that she had some form of a big deal going on at work, a convention. So they were staying at the Hard Rock Hotel.
G. ANTHONY: That`s what she told us.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
G. ANTHONY: I mean, that`s what my wife reiterated to me.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You didn`t have a conversation -- just your wife.
G. ANTHONY: Right.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. And then there was -- they had to move that to Busch Gardens, Tampa area?
G. ANTHONY: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And that`s where Zanny got in her car accident?
G. ANTHONY: Supposedly Zanny got in this car accident. Casey was following at some distance behind her and Zanny got involved in this accident.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hospitalized at Tampa General.
G. ANTHONY: That`s what we`re told.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And treated for a concussion.
G. ANTHONY: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Then the next day the ER nurse discovered a large laceration behind the ear and had to treat that.
G. ANTHONY: And kept her, I guess, an extra day or something, yes. If I remember correctly, yes.
GRACE: Throughout one all of the lies, one thing is consistent, Casey Anthony`s version of events doesn`t add up. The more she tells police, the more holes appear in her story.
In her written statement Anthony claims July 15, 12 p.m. she gets a call from her missing girl. The first time she`s heard Caylee`s voice in four weeks. This alleged call comes in on the same date grandmother Cindy reports Caylee missing.
DEP. APPLING WELLS, ORANGE COUNTY SHERIFF`S OFFICE: Do you remember the phone call you were telling us about? Is that true?
CASEY ANTHONY: Yes.
WELLS: Did you actually talk? What day was it that you talked to her?
CASEY ANTHONY: Yesterday.
WELLS: You remember what time of day?
CASEY ANTHONY: Around noon. It was from a private number.
WELLS: OK. What did she tell you? What did your daughter say to you?
CASEY ANTHONY: She said hi, mommy.
WELLS: And that`s it?
CASEY ANTHONY: And she started telling me a story talking to me about her shoes and books.
WELLS: It`s important that you tell me, I mean, maybe there was something in what she said that can help us figure out where she is. What did she say?
CASEY ANTHONY: I tried to ask her where she was and she just kept talking about the book that she`s been reading. We have videos of her reading the story and she`s telling me the story. And she`s telling me the story.
ALLEN: So she seemed happy and.
CASEY ANTHONY: Fine.
ALLEN: Seemed fine, seemed happy.
CASEY ANTHONY: She seemed perfectly fine. There was nothing in the background.
ALLEN: Telling you about a book. No sign of any type of stress at all?
CASEY ANTHONY: Not at all.
ALLEN: Great. That`s wonderful. Let me ask you a question. Your daughter hasn`t seen you in over a month, and she`s not.
CASEY ANTHONY: She was excited. She was excited to talk to me. But at the same time it`s crazy that she didn`t get upset when she talked me, which.
ALLEN: Yes.
CASEY ANTHONY: . had it been my mom, I know it would have been totally different.
ALLEN: Is that another thing, is that another thing that makes sense to you?
CASEY ANTHONY: She never gets upset when she talks to me, whether I haven`t seen her for an entire day or if I had to work late at night. I didn`t see her almost an entire day until the next morning.
GRACE: But cell phone records prove otherwise, revealing not a single call that could have come from little Caylee.
Remember Anthony says she dropped Caylee off with Zenaida Gonzalez on the stairwell there at Sawgrass Apartments June 9th? Police go so far as to check apartment surveillance video. No Casey Anthony. No little Caylee. No Zenaida Gonzalez.
When we come back, tot mom Casey Anthony`s web of lies.
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MELICH: We even pulled surveillance video from an apartment complex and they have to keep this by law for several days, OK? And we`re not seeing you over there. We`re not seeing you there at all that day.
You think that we`re stupid and we`re not going to.
CASEY ANTHONY: I know you`re not stupid.
MELICH: . do all this stuff? OK. We`re not seeing you there. So now if -- you`re not there and you`re not being seen there and somebody`s already saying that you`re not there, everything else you`ve told us is a lie.
GRACE: Then, another twist. Anthony also says Caylee was kidnapped by the babysitter Zenaida At Jay Blanchard Park. This is a whole new story. Mom Casey`s new story is that Zenaida, Zenaida`s older sister Samantha, and Samantha`s three children, also at Jay Blanchard Park.
After they snatch little Caylee, Casey claims the group leaves a so-called script for Anthony to tell cops over a period of 30 days. Zenaida, her sister, and the three young children allegedly take off in a silver Ford with Caylee.
Anthony never mentioned this Jay Blanchard Park story in her written statement or during the police interrogation caught on tape. Still insisting little Caylee kidnapped from Sawgrass Apartment.
Coincidentally Jay Blanchard Park is the same location Casey Anthony claims she lost her Black Jack cell phone. But cell phone ping records reportedly place the young mom near the same park June 17th, just one day after Caylee`s last seen alive.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GRACE: It is universally accepted that the first 48 hours are critical when a child goes missing, every minute, every second counts, so why would a mom who claims her daughter`s kidnapped not call police? Or at least alert friends and family?
It doesn`t make sense. And the more Casey refuses to cooperate, the more suspicions grow.
Tonight, still the question. Where is Caylee?
Thank you for being with us, inviting us into your homes for this special NANCY GRACE INVESTIGATES, the first 24 hours of the Caylee Anthony investigation.
I`ll see you tomorrow night, 8 o`clock sharp Eastern, and until then, good night, friend.
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