George Anthony Left 5-Page Suicide Note, Sent Suicidal Texts to Family

 

By Lee Ferran
January 23, 2009

George Anthony, grandfather of slain toddler Caylee Anthony, may have taken his own life today had authorities not located him as quickly as they did, Anthony family lawyer Brad Conway said in a news conference today.

Police found Anthony despondent and possibly under the influence of medication and alcohol early this morning in a Datyona Beach, Fla., hotel, Conway said.

Police also discovered a five-page suicide note in the hotel that Anthony had apparently penned.

In a somber 911 call, Conway reported Anthony missing Thursday night and said Anthony "has taken several bottles of medication from the house as well as some pictures." One of the pictures was of little Caylee.

Anthony's daughter, 22-year-old Casey Anthony, was charged with Caylee's murder in October before the toddler's decomposed body was found less than a mile from the Anthony family home in December.

George Anthony was taken into police custody early this morning and transported to Halifax Medical Center for evaluation under a Florida law called the Baker Act, which allows authorities to hold people without their consent for up to 72 hours pending a psychiatric evaluation.

The strain of having his granddaughter murdered and his daughter accused of that murder "pushed [Anthony] to the brink of what might have been another tragedy," Conway said at the news conference.

Click here to hear the 911 call.

Police were able to track Anthony's location through his cell phone, which he used to send a text messages to his family saying he did not "want to live anymore," Daytona Beach Police Department spokesman Jimmie Flynt told ABC News.

Investigators would not comment on the contents of the letter, but Flynt told ABC News it did not raise speculation that George Anthony was in any way involved in Caylee's murder.

Halifax spokeswoman Salina Wang told ABC News that Anthony is in stable condition.

While Conway said Anthony was recovering from his ordeal, he emphasized what a strain the past six months since Caylee went missing has put on the man.

"He's not OK. He's been through something that's affected his life, his wife's life, his daughter's life and his granddaughter is gone."

'Just Need to Get Away'

Anthony was reported missing by his family around 11:00 p.m. Thursday after he failed to show up for a scheduled meeting earlier that day.

Daytona Police Chief Mike Chitwood said Anthony was low-key and "melancholy" when they spoke to Anthony at the motel.

"[Anthony] basically said to us, 'You know, I just need to get away. I need to think things through.' That's why he was there," Chitwood told WFTV.

Police then invoked the Baker Act and took him to the hospital.

Anthony "went willingly" and fully cooperated with police and was not handcuffed on the way to the hospital, Orange County Sheriff's Department spokesman Carlos Padilla said.

"He was not arrested. He has not committed a crime," Padilla told ABC News.

According to Padilla, George Anthony's most recent actions have had no bearing on his status in the investigation into Caylee's murder and does not draw suspicion that he was somehow involved.

"The pressures and everything may have gotten to him," Padilla said. "My heart goes out to him."

Caylee Anthony Details Released This Week

Since Caylee's disappearance in June, George Anthony and his wife Cindy Anthony have steadfastly maintained Casey's innocence and called her a "victim" in the case.

George's disappearance came just days after gruesome details emerged concerning the discovery of Caylee's body.

Adhesive residue from a heart-shaped sticker was found on the duct tape that covered Caylee Anthony's mouth when her body was found in December, according to an affidavit released Wednesday by the Orange County, Fla., state attorney's office.

The sticker appeared to have been "intentionally" placed on the duct tape, according to the affidavit, written by Det. Yuri Melich.

While the sheet from which the sticker came from was not found at the scene, according to the affidavit, investigators did locate a small heart-shaped sticker similar in size to the residue found on the duct tape in the area where the body was found.

Also found at the scene was a small shirt, size "3T," a small pair of white shorts with vertical stripes, size 24 months, and a "Winnie the Pooh" blanket.

Melich wrote that when authorities arrived at the scene it looked as though the remains had been put in a cloth laundry bag prior to being placed inside a plastic bag.

The remains were found Dec. 11, 2008, less than a quarter mile from the home Caylee shared with her mother and grandparents, by utility worker Roy Kronk.

The discovery of the child's body brought closure to a mystery that had dragged on for nearly five months after Casey Anthony, Caylee's mother, told police on July 15 that her daughter had disappeared a month earlier.

The day after she reported the child missing, Casey Anthony was arrested on charges including child neglect. During a bond hearing July 22, authorities named Anthony a "person of interest" in Caylee's disappearance and said they were treating the case as a potential homicide after discovering "evidence of decomposition" in the trunk of a car that Casey Anthony had driven.

On Oct. 14, with Caylee's body still missing, Casey Anthony was officially charged with first degree murder.

By the time Kronk found the child's remains less than half a mile from the Anthony home Dec. 11, the massive search effort had attracted thousands of volunteers. Authorities including the FBI had tracked down hundreds of leads both in the United States and abroad.

Eight days later, authorities confirmed through DNA testing that the remains belonged to the missing toddler.

FoxNews.com
June 29, 2011

The father of Casey Anthony, who is accused of killing her 2-year-old daughter, testified Wednesday that he wrote a suicide note saying he had unanswered questions about what happened to his granddaughter, a revelation that undermines defense claims that the toddler drowned accidentally and he helped cover it up.

Anthony, 25, is accused of killing her toddler daughter, Caylee, in 2008. She has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder and could face the death penalty if convicted of that charge.

Prosecutors say Anthony suffocated her daughter by placing duct tape over her nose and mouth, while defense attorneys claim Caylee accidentally drowned in the family's swimming pool. The defense team also contends that Anthony and her father, George, covered up the accident -- a theory George Anthony has denied. The child's remains were found in December 2008 -- almost six months after she was reported missing -- and no cause of death has been determined.

On Wednesday, defense attorney Jose Baez asked George Anthony about his Jan. 22, 2009, suicide attempt. Later, prosecutor Jeff Ashton asked Anthony if he had bought a gun five months before that and Baez objected.

With the jury out of the room, George Anthony said he planned to use the gun to try to get his daughter's friends to tell him what happened to Caylee.

Anthony testified that he wrote in his suicide note about "unanswered questions" and that he chose to kill himself because "I needed at that time to go be with Caylee because I knew I failed her."

Ashton argued that the statements were valid for the jury to hear because they rebutted the drowning theory and implied that George Anthony didn't know what really happened to Caylee. Ashton also said the suicide note did not include any reference to George Anthony molesting Casey Anthony when she was a child, as Baez claimed in his opening statement.

Judge Belvin Perry agreed the jury could hear about the gun purchase and the suicide note.

"It looks to me like someone opened the door and someone is trying to walk through it," he said.

When the jury came back, George Anthony got emotional as he recounted the months before his suicide attempt, in which he drove to Daytona Beach and tried to overdose on prescription medication.

"I tried to take my own life," he told Baez. "That’s not an 'alleged.' That happened.”

Anthony also said he never got the opportunity to confront his daughter's friends because law enforcement confiscated the gun the day after he bought it in August 2008. Casey was out on bond and staying in his home, and firearms are prohibited in a place where a person on bond is living.

The defense attorneys have continued their strategy of painting the Anthony family as dysfunctional.

Baez questioned George Anthony earlier about accusations from the defense team that he sexually molested Casey Anthony as a child.

"I would never do anything like that to my daughter," Anthony said, which prompted Baez to ask, "You would never admit to it would you?"

Casey Anthony appeared to be shaking her head in what appeared to be a "no" motion during that part of her father's testimony.

George Anthony also testified that he was "100 percent sure" he smelled human decomposition coming from his daughter's car.

"I could smell it 3 feet away on the passenger side. When I opened up that car door, yeah, it smelled like decomposition … human decomposition," Anthony told the jury, adding that he was able identify the odor of human decay after years of working in law enforcement.

The defense also called another witness to the stand Wednesday -- the estranged son of Roy Kronk, the Orlando County meter reader who found Caylee's remains.

Kronk's son, Brandon Sparks, said his father told him about the discovery weeks before police told the public the body was found -- a revelation that could support the defense's claim that Kronk moved or hid Caylee's remains in an attempt to profit from an award.

“I asked him why he waited so long” to report finding the body, Sparks said. “He didn’t have an answer.”