Casey Anthony’s Apology: Fake?

A reader requested that I review Casey Anthony’s apology to her friend, Amy Huizenga, in the case of check fraud. Anonymous asks on my “Feedback” request page:

http://www.wftv.com/video/22335848/index.html She has super-twitchy microexpressions particularly compared to her blank face a few minutes earlier during her plea form responses http://www.wftv.com/video/22335740/index.html at 1:58 to 3:11 and during the prosecution’s descriptions of her crimes at 4:32 to 4:58 (where I swear I see smiling microexpressions while the prosecutor is talking about Casey‘s purchases at Target.)

Thanks for your request! Here are my thoughts: Read more

When I watch Casey in the second video link, where the judge talks to Casey and asks her questions about her plea deal (at the time marker’s specified above), I see no micro expressions. I do not see any positive emotions either. I do, however, see that Casey is swallowing frequently, which is an indication she is likely uncomfortable or nervous.

In the first video link, when I watch Casey as she apologizes to the court (and her friend), I believe that Casey is truly sincere. Her breakdown is genuine and real. It is not fake. I do not see any micro expressions, but what I suspect you are seeing are the normal stress movements of the face as Casey Anthony is trying to hold herself back from crying.

Micro expressions are flashes of hidden emotion that occur in 1/25th of a second. They are fast and fleeting.

What is fascinating to me, and it is very common, is that once people see someone in a negative light, they are unable to accept or see that a person with a negative history can still do genuine and positive things. I suspect this is due to an emotional bias. Emotional biases are a huge blinder to seeing the truth for every one of us. It’s one of the biggest pitfalls to being accurate at deception detection…

Thanks, anonymous, for sharing your thoughts with us.

Clarification (2-6-2010): While Casey’s crying episode was real and genuine, what we don’t know was “what she was crying about”. It may have been feelings of sorrow for her friend. It may have been tears for herself, but the emotions were genuine. That’s all I can ever say 🙂 I’m not a mind reader 🙂