Casey Anthony Should Not Have Served Probation

Florida judge deciding whether Casey Anthony should serve probation for check fraud has ended a hearing without a ruling.

Judge Belvin Perry described the case Friday as a "mess" before saying he needs more time to research whether Anthony should return to Orlando to report to a probation office.

"If anything could go wrong, it went wrong here," Perry explained in court.

Perry was asked by Anthony's attorney's to overturn another judge's order requiring her to return to Florida and serve probation.

The Florida mother disappeared from the public eye after she was acquitted last month in the death of her 2-year-old daughter, Caylee.

Judge Stan Strickland sentenced Anthony in January 2010 to probation after she pleaded guilty to using checks stolen from a friend.

The hearing dealt with Judge Stan Strickland's order requiring Anthony to return to Orlando, Fla., and serve a year's probation. Strickland presided over a check fraud case involving Anthony in 2010. Anthony pleaded guilty to stealing checks from friend Amy Huizenga during the time Caylee was missing.

Strickland, who has publicly questioned Anthony's murder acquittal, filed an order on Monday saying that his sentencing instructions were not properly implemented. In his oral sentencing, Strickland ordered Anthony to serve 412 days in jail and probation when she was released from jail. An error was made on the written sentencing which allowed Anthony to serve her probation while in jail awaiting her murder trial.

Perry made clear that he felt Anthony should not have been allowed to serve a probation while in jail. "The judge's oral pronouncement was not followed," he said at one point. Later he appeared to scoff at the arrangement, saying "if you can call it probation in jail.

The defense contends that Anthony has already served her probation and that Strickland no longer has any jurisdiction over Anthony. Strickland recused himself from the case earlier this week.

"For the previous judge to enter an amended order well after the completion of her probation isn't simply clearing up an error," said defense attorney Lisabeth Fryer. "He [Judge Strickland] issued an order to be acted upon by the Department of Corrections so she would begin a second term of probation for the same crime."

Defense attorney Jose Baez called Susan Finnegan, the Florida Department of Corrections' senior supervisor, to testify by phone that Anthony had successfully completed her probation. Finnegan said that Anthony's probation was terminated on Jan. 24.

Finnegan also spoke about the difficulties that her probation officers might encounter if Anthony is sentenced to probation again.

"All the public attention on the case would be a unique challenge," Finnegan said.

The prosecution argued that they did not know that Anthony had erroneously served her probation while in jail until this week.

They argue that the function of probation is to help convicted criminals reenter their communities, something that could be hard to do while sitting in confinement in a jail cell.

"The state believes that it's certainly bad public policy to allow someone to serve probation while in custody," prosecutor Frank George said. "This supervision was supervision in name only. Ms. Anthony was required to do nothing…her only obligation was not to attack anybody or try to escape.