Ooooh that smell
Can’t you smell that smell
Ooooh that smell
The smell of death surrounds you
- Lynyrd Skynyrd from “That Smell”
On June 27, 2008, Casey Anthony contacted her close friend, Amy Huizenga, about a peculiar odor emanating from her car. The message was clear, and it was confirmed during Amy’s deposition taken on February 14 of this year. Jose Baez asked her about it starting on page 32:
Q: Okay. Now, she sent you a text message in reference to the smell of the car; is that correct?
A: Yes.
Q: Okay. And that was on what date, do you recall?
A: I think it’s in here somewhere. I don’t know what day it was.
Q: I can help you if you want to look towards the date for your statement to confirm it.
A. That would be great.
Q: Okay. The 27th. June 27th.
As the interview progressed…
A: Okay. Yeah, the 27th is when she confirmed - - like, when she said it was. But there were definitely a day or two that she had been like, dude, my car smells and I don’t know what it is. Just, like, one of those - - I mean, I think everyone’s had the time you’re like what is that smell. I don’t understand. And she just said it smelled, like, you know, something had died in her car and she had no clue what it is. And I think it was - - she - - it was coming from the engine areaish is what she had said. And then when she - - you know, finally, it was - - she was letting me know she had found it was and that was a squirrel that she figured her dad had run over when he was driving the car.
Q: Let me ask you this - -
A: Yes.
Q: - - do you have any other text messages about the smell or was it just that one text message?
A: I don’t know. You have the text messages.
What’s so important about this exchange is the fact that Casey acknowledged the odor of death in her car, as confirmed by a text message written and sent by her. She also told Amy that the smell had been in the car for at least one day, perhaps two. Was this the start of attempting to pass the blame on to her father?
Q: Okay. Do you know if you spoke about it before the 27th or after the 27th?
A: Before, because the 27th was when she said what it was and there was at least a day, if not two days, that she told me about the smell.
We have now established that Casey freely admitted that the smell of death did, in fact, exist in her vehicle. This leaves us with two possible choices: Casey knew exactly what it was and she was working on an excuse to cover it up, or she had no idea what caused the foul odor.
Let’s fast forward a bit to Amy’s conversation with Cindy, after Cindy picked her up at the Florida Mall. Remember, Cindy called 911 that night and uttered those now famous words, “I found my daughter’s car today and it smells like there’s been a dead body in the damn car.”
Within a week, she changed her tune. “It smelled like something had died in the car. I smelled it. I thought something had died in the car. I didn’t know what it was. It could have been a squirrel. It could have been anything. But when we opened the trunk and we saw the maggots in the trunk with all the pizza and stuff, it was a rancid smell.” (See: http://www.wftv.com/news/16981004/detail.html)
She also told FOX News, “Do me a favor, put a little piece of pizza or any piece of garbage in your car today and leave it shut up for 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 days in this heat and then come back to me in 19 days and tell me what it smells like.” (See: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,389642,00.html)
What she did was a complete spin. It meant that the smell of death was not really death at all, it was pizza and other garbage found in the trunk that reeked so badly. She told the 911 dispatcher about the smell of death for one reason only: to quickly bring law enforcement to the house. She didn’t really mean what she said. Excuse me. Never mind. Except for one major issue. It wasn’t only the dispatcher she told that to.
Starting from page 52 of the deposition, where Amy dropped Casey off at Anthony Lazzaro’s apartment in Winter Park…
Q: Okay. And then where did you go?
A: I went to the Florida Mall with JP [Chatt] in his car because he wanted to go pick up the new iPhone that had come out while we were gone. And the Florida Mall is fun to walk around in so I tagged along.
Q: Tell me about the conversation when Cindy calls you. What happened - -
A: She called me and asked me - - you know, obviously stated who she was and then asked me if I had seen Casey or Caylee. I was, like, well, I just saw Casey like an hour and a half ago, but I haven’t seen Casey - - or Caylee in a while. And so she proceeded to tell me that, like, she needed to find her, that she was going to be in really big trouble. I believe she mentioned jail for some reason. I don’t recll what the reasoning was why she was going to be going to jail, but just seemed very important that she find her and that she hadn’t seen her in a long time. So that the car - - her car had been impounded for two weeks and that she just really needed to find Casey.
Q: Did she say anything about the smell in the car?
A: I don’t think she said anything about the smell of the car on the phone conversation. She said - - she did later in the car, but not, I don’t believe, over the phone.
AHA! I received an e-mail yesterday afternoon. A very nice person, who shall remain anonymous, wrote this to me:
I read the deposition of Amy. In it, Cindy states to her that the car smelled like a dead body had been in it. She says the same thing on the 911 call later. Then much later she says that she would have said anything to get the police there ASAP. I think saying that to Amy BEFORE the Police might come back to really haunt her.
She makes a very valid point. Continuing with Amy’s depostion:
Q: Okay. So then [Cindy] picks you up at the Florida mall?
A: Yes.
Q: You got in the car and then what’s the conversation like as you’re going to Tony’s house?
A: Well, first it was a, it’s nice to finally meet you because I had yet to meet her at that point. And she told me - - like actually then told me then the whole story of the car impound, that was when she told me about the smell.
Q: What did she say in describing the smell?
A: She said that it smelled - - it was the most horrible smell that she had ever smelled and that they were terrified that it was either Casey or Caylee in the car - - in the trunk until they got it open. But that was - - that her fear and she was barely controlling, like, emotion in saying that. Like, it was - - you could see that that was still something [t]hat she remembered being upset about that that thought was in her mind.
Q: Did she say she smelled the car or did she say George smelled the car?
A: Both of them. I believe they were boh there.
Q: Okay. So she’s telling you this on the way to Tony’s house?
A: Yes.
If it wasn’t the odor of death, what prompted George and Cindy to immediately think of Casey and Caylee’s well-being? Here are two snippets quoting George and Cindy’s own words from a transcript of the HLN program, Nancy Grace, dated November 17, 2008:
GEORGE ANTHONY: You guys don’t know! The person who was in the back of my granddaughter’s (SIC) car is not my granddaughter!
CINDY ANTHONY, GRANDMOTHER OF MISSING TODDLER: My husband is a deputy sheriff. Years ago, he was a homicide investigator, as well. And the first thing he thought was human decomposition. I’m a nurse. I thought human decomposition.
It’s interesting, to say the least. Ooooh that smell!
Reference: Huizenga Depo 2_11
Sunday, June 12, 2011 at 9:19PM 
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