Continuation Part 10: Amanda Knox/Raffaele Sollecito

[lonepinealex]

Why does either alternative matter? If the police/prosecutor violated the rights of the suspects - the eventual defendants - under Italian law or ECHR case law. doesn't that official misconduct constitute a violation that must be accounted for - by, for example, disallowing the false evidence such as false, coerced statements from all trials, criminal or civil?

Part of the question being posed is: When was the official misconduct planned? (That is, when did the framing begin?) And perhaps there is no single answer to that, since one cannot see inside the mind of Mignini. But on the first day the body was discovered, there were intentional failures by the police to measure/record the victim's body temperature and to effectively document the broken window and scattered glass for forensic analysis. These failures both establish intent to commit official misconduct and constitute official misconduct, IMO. Failure to follow recognized police or forensic protocol is generally a sign of misconduct, IMO.

It matters because some people are suggesting that Amanda (and Raffaele by extension) were deliberately targeted for framing from the 2nd November despite the police and Mignini knowing they were innocent all along, in order to take the heat off Rudy Guede.

I think this is nonsense. It's the classic question - conspiracy or cock up. I opt for cock up unless someone believing in the conspiracy can show me some extraordinary evidence for their extraordinary claim.

The evidence planting / fabricating weeks and months on, when the initial evidence leading to the arrests fell apart, is a separate issue and not one that I dispute.

 

[Samson]

Why does either alternative matter? If the police/prosecutor violated the rights of the suspects - the eventual defendants - under Italian law or ECHR case law. doesn't that official misconduct constitute a violation that must be accounted for - by, for example, disallowing the false evidence such as false, coerced statements from all trials, criminal or civil?

Part of the question being posed is: When was the official misconduct planned? (That is, when did the framing begin?) And perhaps there is no single answer to that, since one cannot see inside the mind of Mignini. But on the first day the body was discovered, there were intentional failures by the police to measure/record the victim's body temperature and to effectively document the broken window and scattered glass for forensic analysis. These failures both establish intent to commit official misconduct and constitute official misconduct, IMO. Failure to follow recognized police or forensic protocol is generally a sign of misconduct, IMO.

Numbers, I am sure you are familiar with the amazingly comprehensive photographs of the shutter damage, the impaled glass shard, the fresh scuff mark on the window surround below, and the scattering of glass inside the room that perfectly accounts for a high velocity throw from outside.
Further, there is no accounting for the inaccuracy that almost misses the window in a staging, yet is perfectly expected in a throw from 11 feet. Also the undamaged shutter panel says the whole frame had freedom to swing on impact.
From time to time I check Hendry's photographs and usually find a new idea to help with my understanding.
Good to see you on this forum.

ETA my point was to say that this failure of forensics is one of form, as the photographs are available forever for those with good intent to reverse the injustice in a functional manner.

 

[anglolawyer]

Why does either alternative matter? If the police/prosecutor violated the rights of the suspects - the eventual defendants - under Italian law or ECHR case law. doesn't that official misconduct constitute a violation that must be accounted for - by, for example, disallowing the false evidence such as false, coerced statements from all trials, criminal or civil?

Part of the question being posed is: When was the official misconduct planned? (That is, when did the framing begin?) And perhaps there is no single answer to that, since one cannot see inside the mind of Mignini. But on the first day the body was discovered, there were intentional failures by the police to measure/record the victim's body temperature and to effectively document the broken window and scattered glass for forensic analysis. These failures both establish intent to commit official misconduct and constitute official misconduct, IMO. Failure to follow recognized police or forensic protocol is generally a sign of misconduct, IMO.

Legally, not much, morally, a fair bit (well, even legally or at any rate psychologically much, since judges are human and tend to react strongly - not always in a good way - to suggestions of extreme impropriety).

 

[Chris_Halkides]

how to count and to use a ruler

Isn't the real question not what the word means but whether (at any given moment) the cops were fabricating evidence at all and, if so, whether they were doing so

(i) knowing A & R to be innocent, or
(ii) believing them to be guilty?

IMO they have probably been in category (ii) throughout. What with confirmation bias, the repugnance of the very idea of being wrong and given the absence of any clearly exculpatory evidence that cannot be reconciled with some fanciful reconstruction of events, however improbable, I am less inclined to believe (i) (but I'm open to argument).

anglolawyer,

It is difficult to believe that Ippolito cannot count the number of rings in a shoeprint or that Rinaldi doesn't know how to use a ruler. Perhaps they believed the pair to be guilty, and decided to goose the case. Or perhaps they didn't care one way or the other, once a higher up declared "case closed."

 

[Bill Williams]

Isn't the real question not what the word means but whether (at any given moment) the cops were fabricating evidence at all and, if so, whether they were doing so

(i) knowing A & R to be innocent, or
(ii) believing them to be guilty?

IMO they have probably been in category (ii) throughout. What with confirmation bias, the repugnance of the very idea of being wrong and given the absence of any clearly exculpatory evidence that cannot be reconciled with some fanciful reconstruction of events, however improbable, I am less inclined to believe (i) (but I'm open to argument).

This sums up my position too.

Ditto. Inasmuch as I respect Steve Moore, I see neither the evidence nor the need to go to the "they were trying to cover up something about Rudy," in the framing of Knox, and particularly Sollecito as a way to get at know.

If it walks like a duck it is most often a duck.

 

[Numbers]

Numbers, I am sure you are familiar with the amazingly comprehensive photographs of the shutter damage, the impaled glass shard, the fresh scuff mark on the window surround below, and the scattering of glass inside the room that perfectly accounts for a high velocity throw from outside.Further, there is no accounting for the inaccuracy that almost misses the window in a staging, yet is perfectly expected in a throw from 11 feet. Also the undamaged shutter panel says the whole frame had freedom to swing on impact.
From time to time I check Hendry's photographs and usually find a new idea to help with my understanding.
Good to see you on this forum.

ETA my point was to say that this failure of forensics is one of form, as the photographs are available forever for those with good intent to reverse the injustice in a functional manner.

Thanks for reminding us (and me in particular) of the available police photography and the analysis done by Hendry and other non-police or defense experts for the window break-in and of course the climb to the window. The police were responsible enough to take some photographs, however, they should have done among other forensic work, fracture analysis of the glass, especially if they wished to scientifically support their claim of a staged break-in. I am not sure if the police fully documented the protective grid over the lower window and the ground below it.

The evidence and non-police analysis of available evidence clearly demonstrates that the break-in resulted from a rock thrown from outside and that a climbing entry was feasible by, for example, an individual of Rudy Guede's height and presumed physical ability.

Guede's possession of the laptop from the Perugia lawyers' office when he was discovered (arrested?) in the Milan nursery school, would have been assumed by police and prosecutor to indicate that he had stolen these items by burglary (in the US). His claim that he bought them would be a defense against the burglary charge, and would need support. The similarities of the break-ins at the lawyers's office and the Kercher et al. flat is, of course, telling.

An unknown, except to the PLE, is how many such second-story burglaries were being committed in Perugia and by how many different individuals. While the police and prosecutor may have instituted their frame-up of AK (and therefore RS) to protect Rudy Guede, it is also possible that they started the frame simply as a matter of convenience and efficiency. It allowed them to claim to have solved the case within a few days, and saved them the work and trouble of actually investigating. And of course, the initial theory of a sex-ritual motive fit nicely with Mignini's previously documented obsessions (as written of in Preston and Spezi's book Monster of Florence).

 

[Bill Williams]

anglolawyer,

It is difficult to believe that Ippolito cannot count the number of rings in a shoeprint or that Rinaldi doesn't know how to use a ruler. Perhaps they believed the pair to be guilty, and decided to goose the case. Or perhaps they didn't care one way or the other, once a higher up declared "case closed."

How many times, though, did Ippolito miscount rings on a shoe print to goose a case on a known mafiosi who nobody cared about?

ETA - it's odd this precision about framing, when footprints vs. foottracks gets pooh-poohed. I'm just saying.

 

[Grinder]

Yes, you should be bothered by secret sources. Yet, my intent was to put it out there and name it as such. It lets the reader make up their own mind as to the veracity of it.

I disagree that the source should either be named or the whole thing not mentioned. The alternative is to be clear about the nature of the sources, and let people decide for themselves. As mentioned here, the issue then becomes the reputation of the person making the claim. If you think I'm full of it, then that's the cost of doing business the way the business is done.

"Now do you like the unsourced references to Amanda's cocaine use and drug dealer connections?"

I know what you're getting at. However, it's not a matter of unnamed sources in this regard. There is actual evidence to the contrary of the claim. Once again, you do not like that source - John Follain - as you have mentioned (!!). Yet it is clear - Amanda and Raffaele had had the hair test done which supposedly picks up drug use, and this is confirmed by a source friendly to the PLE!

Bill with respect how can I accept your unnamed sources this time? I will not go back again but the tapes weren't the only time. But I'm not making this personal, you kind of did by implying "trust me", rather it is a general comment on the subject. I disliked it just as much or more when the PGP have done this a along. PQ and his band of lawyers and PG and her "sources".

In the specific case I mentioned with the drug dealer connection, I don't doubt that Amanda was tested and tested negative for coke. I don't believe the coke dealer allegations because of the source and the lack of corroboration. It is possible by the account that she had other business with the guy besides buying for personal use. IOW she could have tested negative and still the story could be true but it isn't credible. It is not because of corroboration and the fact it didn't come out before or during the trial.

As for the recording of the interrogations, while I would love them to come out, it stretches credulity to believe no one has slipped up or sold the story yet.

Does that make it necessarily true? Of course not. But it then falls back into each and every reader/lurker here being fully able to make up their own mind on the veracity of the claim, based on what they perceive to be the trustworthiness of the person making the claim and naming sources (or not).

But Bill you just called me out as a liar (you didn't use the term, it was much more gentle) and then I proved that you had talked about the tapes and when they would be released. I used the same argument then about it being hard to believe nothing had slipped in 5 years (at that time).

It may be a dream that new lurkers are here but it is pretty certain that people will google for information for a long time on this and get hits from JREF. What is my duty as Grinder when someone makes a claim that I know isn't substantiated? What should I say when someone (being nice) lays out a claim about Rudi being broken out of jail by the PLE and being an informant when I know that there has never been any evidence of that? Or that the FBI guy that is making the claim had little to no experience in crime scene investigations of this nature and no experience in Italian small city policing.

So pretty much every time a cockamamie theory (Nappy recognized Rudi's MO or CT reported the crime to Nappy at 6 in the morning) that has no proof it occurred I will challenge it.

If you'll permit, my problem was to make unwarranted extrapolations. I'm wracking my brain for why I did that back then. I'm positive I had good reason to do it - but on the basis of what you dug up I admit from what I know, and the nature of what is now three sources, it was an unwarranted extrapolation.

The scariest part is that yoiu didn't remember it and I did

One of the things to consider is that just because I claim that there are three sources.... I cannot determine that these three are not all codependent on one unnamed source, if you get my meaning. I have never passed that possibility which essentially reduces three sources to one. I have the ablity to recheck what I claim are sources, but have no ability to do the further check - are they all getting their info from one source?

So, if anything is learned from this, it is that humility should guide those who essentially are way, way up in the bleachers with internet access who think they know things.

Well I truly appreciate what you have written here, but I wish you'd lay out much more on sources or not mention stuff. I don't like it when Fox news says "people say" this or that and I don't like it here.

Once again I truly appreciate your efforts in responding to this point.

It's the value of the give and take.

I know absolutely nothing about the gold watch![/QUOTE]

 

[Grinder]

I've come round to this JREF dictionary idea actually. It's very efficient. What the English language needs is fewer words.

Please could I request that everyone is careful to thoroughly footnote their posts though, making it clear which definition of which word they're using. I should hate to waste my time arguing with someone who really agrees with me.

Well done chaps, this is a brilliant new way forward.

 

[Grinder]

Isn't the real question not what the word means but whether (at any given moment) the cops were fabricating evidence at all and, if so, whether they were doing so

(i) knowing A & R to be innocent, or
(ii) believing them to be guilty?

IMO they have probably been in category (ii) throughout. What with confirmation bias, the repugnance of the very idea of being wrong and given the absence of any clearly exculpatory evidence that cannot be reconciled with some fanciful reconstruction of events, however improbable, I am less inclined to believe (i) (but I'm open to argument).

Anglo hello!

The issue came up IIRC over people saying the PLE were framing the kids (some early time). As I knew the widely held definition meant that they needed to innocent. I didn't and don't believe the crazy theory (sorry DF) that the police recognized Rudi's MO as their informant and picked the nearest person (or an American beauty they wanted to photograph naked) and therefore picked Amanda.

When challenged people changed the meaning of framed and said they meant that the police later changed evidence to fit the kids which at some point down the road does seem more possible.

Anyway if the evidence was fabricated I doubt it was done to convict innocent people but rather guilty people to make sure of conviction.

I now subscribe to Lonepine's idea and by fabricated I mean legitimately found evidence.

fab·ri·cate verb \ˈfa-bri-ˌkāt\
: to make or build (something)

so you see the perps made the web of deceit that the police uncovered so it was legitimate fabricated evidence!

 

[anglolawyer]

anglolawyer,

It is difficult to believe that Ippolito cannot count the number of rings in a shoeprint or that Rinaldi doesn't know how to use a ruler. Perhaps they believed the pair to be guilty, and decided to goose the case. Or perhaps they didn't care one way or the other, once a higher up declared "case closed."

The shoe print is very frustrating because the Sollecito family went public with it rather than keeping it under their hat(s). It would have been good to discredit Ippolito although, such was the mindset of the system up to Hellman, that it probably would have taken a heck of a lot more for the railroad job to be held up.

Anyway, you know better than me those outrageous American cases in which, even when innocence has been demonstrated to all but the most demented, the state prosecutor is still saying s/he/they did it. That's where I think Comodi and Mignini most probably are and I have spent a long time thinking of them in much worse terms. After all, why would an innocent person ever confess?

 

[anglolawyer]

Anglo hello!

The issue came up IIRC over people saying the PLE were framing the kids (some early time). As I knew the widely held definition meant that they needed to innocent. I didn't and don't believe the crazy theory (sorry DF) that the police recognized Rudi's MO as their informant and picked the nearest person (or an American beauty they wanted to photograph naked) and therefore picked Amanda.

When challenged people changed the meaning of framed and said they meant that the police later changed evidence to fit the kids which at some point down the road does seem more possible.

Anyway if the evidence was fabricated I doubt it was done to convict innocent people but rather guilty people to make sure of conviction.

I now subscribe to Lonepine's idea and by fabricated I mean legitimately found evidence.

fab·ri·cate verb \ˈfa-bri-ˌkāt\
: to make or build (something)

so you see the perps made the web of deceit that the police uncovered so it was legitimate fabricated evidence!

Thanks for the recap. It is part and parcel of these cases, once a clear picture of innocence emerges, to focus on the activities of the cops and wonder at what point (if at all) they strayed from the path of righteousness. Sometimes the answer is 'never' - they just believe some eye witness - while others things are murkier. This case is one of those. All murk.

 

[Anode]

I've come round to this JREF dictionary idea actually. It's very efficient. What the English language needs is fewer words.
Please could I request that everyone is careful to thoroughly footnote their posts though, making it clear which definition of which word they're using. I should hate to waste my time arguing with someone who really agrees with me.

Well done chaps, this is a brilliant new way forward.

Ah, yes! We'll call it newspeak. It's a doubleplusgood idea!

 

[Dan O.]

Before Rudy is ID'd they may have thought A&R were guilty. When they make the blatantly false claim that Amanda had called Rudy the day after the murder they are covering for their incompetence. After that they are no longer searching for the truth but on a hunt for incriminating evidence so they can avoid admitting that they made a mistake.

 

[Samson]

Before Rudy is ID'd they may have thought A&R were guilty. When they make the blatantly false claim that Amanda had called Rudy the day after the murder they are covering for their incompetence. After that they are no longer searching for the truth but on a hunt for incriminating evidence so they can avoid admitting that they made a mistake.

There are few western countries where there this could work to the point of conviction.

 

[Bill Williams]

Bill with respect how can I accept your unnamed sources this time? I will not go back again but the tapes weren't the only time. But I'm not making this personal, you kind of did by implying "trust me", rather it is a general comment on the subject. I disliked it just as much or more when the PGP have done this a along. PQ and his band of lawyers and PG and her "sources".

In the specific case I mentioned with the drug dealer connection, I don't doubt that Amanda was tested and tested negative for coke. I don't believe the coke dealer allegations because of the source and the lack of corroboration. It is possible by the account that she had other business with the guy besides buying for personal use. IOW she could have tested negative and still the story could be true but it isn't credible. It is not because of corroboration and the fact it didn't come out before or during the trial.

As for the recording of the interrogations, while I would love them to come out, it stretches credulity to believe no one has slipped up or sold the story yet.



But Bill you just called me out as a liar (you didn't use the term, it was much more gentle) and then I proved that you had talked about the tapes and when they would be released. I used the same argument then about it being hard to believe nothing had slipped in 5 years (at that time).

It may be a dream that new lurkers are here but it is pretty certain that people will google for information for a long time on this and get hits from JREF. What is my duty as Grinder when someone makes a claim that I know isn't substantiated? What should I say when someone (being nice) lays out a claim about Rudi being broken out of jail by the PLE and being an informant when I know that there has never been any evidence of that? Or that the FBI guy that is making the claim had little to no experience in crime scene investigations of this nature and no experience in Italian small city policing.

So pretty much every time a cockamamie theory (Nappy recognized Rudi's MO or CT reported the crime to Nappy at 6 in the morning) that has no proof it occurred I will challenge it.



The scariest part is that yoiu didn't remember it and I did



Well I truly appreciate what you have written here, but I wish you'd lay out much more on sources or not mention stuff. I don't like it when Fox news says "people say" this or that and I don't like it here.

Once again I truly appreciate your efforts in responding to this point.

It's the value of the give and take.

I know absolutely nothing about the gold watch!

[/QUOTE]

Grinder - I'm not asking you to accept anything. I've put it out there and if you think it's crap, so be it.

I did not call you a liar. You broke in to an exchange I was having with someone else - a bad habit of mine too - and went on a fishing trip.

Mostly when you do this it is laughable. The stuff you quoted from 2012 I remember doing and take responsibility for - I remember typing it; what I don't remember is why I took the unwarranted extra step.

Which, btw, did not include the word "soon".

You remind me of a good friend. When you're right, you're right. When you're wrong, you're wildly wrong. Sometimes laughably.

That does not take from the times you are right. It just makes you an interesting character, third perhaps to Machiavelli and Sfarzo.

In that order.

 

[Numbers]

Legally, not much, morally, a fair bit (well, even legally or at any rate psychologically much, since judges are human and tend to react strongly - not always in a good way - to suggestions of extreme impropriety).

The prosecutor and police were open to committing misconduct from the first day of discovering Meredith's body, IMO. They may not have focused on AK and RS until another day or two had passed. The suspicious "behavior" of AK, IMO, was 1) her lack of an attorney, 2) her openness to talking to the police, 3) her non-conformity to Italian expectations of feminine behavior, 4) her being an outsider, with no Perugian family or support (except her new boyfriend), 5) her being an American, 6) her being female and thus a fit to Mignini's obsessions.

Remember that Giobbi commented that it was her behavior - such as eating pizza instead of staying home crying and (allegedly) wiggling her hips when putting on protective shoe coverings, that convinced him of her guilt.

 

[Grinder]

The shoe print is very frustrating because the Sollecito family went public with it rather than keeping it under their hat(s). It would have been good to discredit Ippolito although, such was the mindset of the system up to Hellman, that it probably would have taken a heck of a lot more for the railroad job to be held up.

Anyway, you know better than me those outrageous American cases in which, even when innocence has been demonstrated to all but the most demented, the state prosecutor is still saying s/he/they did it. That's where I think Comodi and Mignini most probably are and I have spent a long time thinking of them in much worse terms. After all, why would an innocent person ever confess?

It's as if the judges when shown the "new" evidence say "so what I define evidence in a different way." They probably accuse the defense attorneys of being pedantic and too stuck on formalities

 

[Grinder]

Before Rudy is ID'd they may have thought A&R were guilty. When they make the blatantly false claim that Amanda had called Rudy the day after the murder they are covering for their incompetence. After that they are no longer searching for the truth but on a hunt for incriminating evidence so they can avoid admitting that they made a mistake.

Certainly, a reasonable assessment. I think that their demented minds could not let go of their brilliant theories. I think they were and still believe Amanda's behavior (as they saw it) could only be explained by her involvement. Since she was involved and Raf said she was home with him, he must be lying.

All police keep looking for evidence but the kids should have, at a minimum, been released from jail. By the time they had Rudi the knife DNA was in or shortly thereafter and the show evidence hadn't been debunked, at least publicly.

All we know points to them being incompetent. If they were framing the kids at any point, they did a really lousy job of it. Look at how they handled Nappy's divorce case.

 

[Bill Williams]

Certainly, a reasonable assessment. I think that their demented minds could not let go of their brilliant theories. I think they were and still believe Amanda's behavior (as they saw it) could only be explained by her involvement. Since she was involved and Raf said she was home with him, he must be lying.

All police keep looking for evidence but the kids should have, at a minimum, been released from jail. By the time they had Rudi the knife DNA was in or shortly thereafter and the show evidence hadn't been debunked, at least publicly.

All we know points to them being incompetent. If they were framing the kids at any point, they did a really lousy job of it. Look at how they handled Nappy's divorce case.

Truly, Grinder, I am not saying this to annoy you - but this was essentially Marco Chiacchiera's position as reported by John Follain. Imagine how this would have played out if Chiacchiera (in Follain's version) had been appointed lead detective and not Napoleoni?

There would have been no Amanda Knox/Raffaele Sollecito thread on JREF.