The Casey Anthony prosecution team was led by Assistant State Attorney Linda Drane Burdick, with Jeff Ashton and Frank George serving as co-prosecutors. All three came from the State Attorney’s Office for the Ninth Judicial Circuit of Florida, which covers Orange and Osceola counties. They tried the case from May 24 to July 5, 2011, on charges of first-degree murder, aggravated manslaughter, and aggravated child abuse in the 2008 death of two-year-old Caylee Anthony. The jury acquitted on all major charges.
Linda Drane Burdick, Lead Prosecutor
Burdick was the face of the state’s case. She delivered the opening statement and the closing argument, and she framed the prosecution’s theory of the death for the jury. Before the trial, she had built years of experience in the State Attorney’s Office prosecuting homicides and sex crimes, along with roughly eight years in managerial roles inside the office.
The Anthony case consumed more than three years of her career, from the early investigation through the verdict. When Jeff Ashton won election as State Attorney for the Ninth Circuit in 2012, he appointed Burdick as his Chief Assistant State Attorney.
Jeff Ashton, Forensic Evidence
Ashton handled the scientific side of the case. He was responsible for presenting the physical evidence the state believed tied Casey Anthony to Caylee’s death: the chloroform findings, the computer search history pulled from the Anthony home, and the forensic analysis of the trunk of Casey’s Pontiac Sunfire. He questioned many of the 23 expert witnesses the prosecution called and worked to translate complex forensic testimony for the jury.1FRONTLINE | PBS. Casey Anthony Trial Lawyers Speak Out About the Cases Controversial Forensics
After the acquittal, Ashton publicly acknowledged a significant gap in the state’s evidence. A computer search for “foolproof suffocation” had been conducted on the day Caylee was last seen alive, but sheriff’s office investigators overlooked it during the original forensic examination of the family computer, and it never reached the jury. Ashton called it “a shame” that the search wasn’t available at trial, saying it would have seriously undermined the defense’s claim that Caylee’s death was an accident.
Ashton retired from the State Attorney’s Office after the trial, then ran for the top job and won in 2012, defeating his former boss Lawson Lamar. He served as State Attorney until 2016 and was elected a Ninth Circuit judge in 2018.
Frank George, Third Chair
George was the third prosecutor at the trial table. His role drew less public attention than Burdick’s or Ashton’s, but he participated in jury selection and presented specific evidence during the proceedings. In interviews in the years after the verdict, both George and Ashton spoke publicly about the case and about the challenges of trying a homicide without a clear cause of death.
Lawson Lamar, the Elected State Attorney
Lawson Lamar was the elected State Attorney at the time and held overall authority over the office. He did not personally try the case, but his office made the early decisions about how to charge Anthony and whether to seek the death penalty. After the acquittal, Lamar publicly discussed evidence his team believed could have strengthened the prosecution, including the missed “foolproof suffocation” search.
Key Expert Witnesses the Team Put on the Stand
The prosecution called 23 expert witnesses, an unusually large number that reflected the circumstantial nature of the case. A few carried particular weight.
Dr. Arpad Vass
Dr. Arpad Vass, a forensic anthropologist from Oak Ridge National Laboratory with roughly two decades studying human decomposition, testified about air samples taken from the trunk of Casey Anthony’s car. He had developed a technique for detecting human decomposition through chemical analysis of air samples, and the Anthony trial marked the first time this type of odor analysis testimony was admitted in a U.S. courtroom. Vass described the odor of decomposition in the trunk sample as “overwhelmingly strong” and testified that chloroform was present in “shockingly high” amounts on a carpet sample from the trunk.
Dr. Jan Garavaglia
Dr. Jan Garavaglia, the Orange County Chief Medical Examiner known publicly as “Dr. G,” testified that Caylee’s death was a homicide. She could not pinpoint the exact cause of death, and that limitation became one of the prosecution’s central problems, because it left room for the defense to argue the evidence was consistent with an accidental drowning.
FBI Laboratory Analysts
Several analysts from the FBI laboratory in Quantico, Virginia, testified for the state. Heather Seubert, a DNA analyst, testified about biological testing on items from Casey’s car, her clothing, and materials found with Caylee’s remains, and reported no blood, semen, or other bodily fluids on those items. Elizabeth Fontaine, a fingerprint analyst, testified that she saw the outline of a heart-shaped sticker on a piece of duct tape recovered from Caylee’s skull. Another FBI analyst, Lorie Gottesman, contradicted that finding, testifying that she observed no heart-shaped residue when examining the same tape under specialized lighting.
Investigators Behind the Prosecution
The Orange County Sheriff’s Office handled the primary crime scene investigation, with current and former crime scene investigators testifying about evidence recovered from the wooded area where Caylee’s remains were found. FBI Special Agent Nick Savage was the lead federal agent on the case and coordinated the bureau’s work on out-of-state leads as the search for Caylee expanded nationally.2State Attorney’s Office. About Inside the State Attorney’s Office, legal assistants and paralegals managed the case files, conducted legal research, and prepared documents, handling a volume of material that went well beyond a typical homicide prosecution.