Death still possibility for Caylee's mom

ORLANDO, Fla., May 11 (UPI) -- The judge in Casey Anthony's Florida murder trial Tuesday denied Anthony's motion to remove the possibility of the death penalty, court records showed.

Orange County Chief Judge Belvin Perry Jr. denied the defense team's motion to remove the death sentence based on gender bias, the Orlando Sentinel reported.

Anthony is charged with first-degree murder in the death of Caylee Marie, her daughter. Anthony was indicted by a grand jury in October 2008, three months before Caylee's remains were discovered near the family home.

"Societal biases against women provide the state with a way of deflecting attention away from the insufficiency of the evidence in Miss Anthony's case," the defense said, adding that the state often does not seek the death penalty against men accused of killing children.

White middle-class mothers get more intensive media coverage compared with defendants in other cases. The media often concentrates on other issues, such as a woman's clothing or whether she has a tattoo or goes to see male strippers, none of which has anything to do with the criminal case, said Elizabeth Rapaport, a University of New Mexico law professor who testified about her research on gender and the death penalty.

Those issues, Rapaport said, are "not legally relevant to guilt."

When questioned by Assistant State Attorney Jeff Ashton if she has any evidence that the prosecutors in this case were gender biased, Rapaport said she did not. Ashton said the decision to seek the death penalty was based on the evidence, not gender discrimination.

The trial is scheduled for May 2011.