Continuation Part 10: Amanda Knox/Raffaele Sollecito

[Diocletus]

But all this implies that negative TMB tests do not add any further information.
There is simply no plausible alternative, neither about the substance nor about the dynamic; no theory works comprehensively like the simple assumption they are in diluted blood just like the prints with identical features nearby and are linked in a same event (and eve if there was an alternative plausible explanation - there isn't any - still this would be standing as a piece of circumstantial evidence, because also ambiguous indicators can be circumstantial evidence when the potential incriminating indication is precise).

Can you name a situation anywhere in the world where a person has been convicted on the basis of a luminol trace that was negative to TMB?

 

[js202]

But all this implies that negative TMB tests do not add any further information.
There is simply no plausible alternative, neither about the substance nor about the dynamic; no theory works comprehensively like the simple assumption they are in diluted blood just like the prints with identical features nearby and are linked in a same event (and eve if there was an alternative plausible explanation - there isn't any - still this would be standing as a piece of circumstantial evidence, because also ambiguous indicators can be circumstantial evidence when the potential incriminating indication is precise).

More patent sophistry. Or stupidity, take your pick.

You, a non-scientist, because it is convenient to your argumentation about this case, have endeavored to re-write the protocols for field blood-testing, elbowing out the necessity - even validity! - of TMB testing. You do not even begin to address the issue that no confirmatory test of Stefanoni's work was performed.

This is a distilled kind of confirmation bias at work, wherein one begins with the assumption of guilt and works backward. One can safely say that no civilized individual or nation would be satisfied without *confirming* beyond reasonable doubt that blood was present in these often unidentifiable marks.

Machiavelli, on the other hand, is satisfied to parse, obfuscate and dance on the head of a pin in an attempt to argue that the first step of a 3-step process is all one needs to achieve satisfactory evidence of guilt. As Numbers has written, it would be comedic if the stakes were not so high. Instead it is disgusting.

 

[Samson]

Maybe you are being lost on translation, but there is very clearly a plausible alternative explanation for the luminol fluorescence other than that the samples are blood - that the luminol is reacting with something else. This particular debate has gone on for more than five years. Why not now cross the threshold into Ms Kercher's room where the actual murder took place? I am sure you will agree that if Amanda Knox wasn't in that room she couldn't have made bloody prints in the hall. Please explain to me, as if I were a juror, what the evidence for her guilt is INSIDE the room. You make your best efforts to get her to the flat before the murder; you make your best efforts to identify her presence there after the murder. But can you place her in the room?

Kauffer, this is a good way to challenge, and difficult for Mach to answer. The standard guilt model will always be to require proof that the bra clasp is contamination, and on pain of failure, 28 years jail is justice.
Cart before horse.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

cleaning fluids and luminol

Maybe based on the literature that you have read in the last two days.

I commented on the Castello paper in Continuation, Part 6, about a year ago, and I mentioned it two years ago on my blog. Please try to keep up.

Lisa A. Gefrides and Katherine E. Welch wrote, “Either luminol or fluorescein can be sprayed onto large surfaces such as walls or floors and the positive areas areas marked for further testing. Both tests are very sensitive and will indicate bloodstains that may not be visible…One disadvantage to these tests is that both can have false positive reactions. Luminol and fluorescein will react with the same false positives as PH [phenolphthalein] and also with bleach and other cleaning fluids, which may interfere with blood detection on surfaces that have been cleaned. For this reason fluorescein or luminol positive areas should be retested with one of the color change presumptive tests.” (“Serology and DNA” in “The Forensic Laboratory Handbook Procedures and Practice,” Humana Press, 2006).

A technical bulletin on Lightning Luminol said, “Luminol is only a presumptive test and should be used in conjunction with a second field presumptive test and followed by laboratory analysis if sufficient amounts of staining are detected…A second presumptive field test should be used on the areas that were detected positive with Luminol. Results should not be reported as a positive presence for blood, only positive indications of blood. It is recommended that laboratory testing, if possible, be followed on staining areas detected at scenes.” In “The forensic luminol test for blood: unwanted interference and the effect on subsequent analysis,” Anders Nilsson of the Swedish National Laboratory of Forensic Science wrote, “Due to the lower selectivity of the luminol test positive reactions should be verified by other presumptive blood tests like the phenolphthalein test [James, S.H., Kish, P.E. and Sutton, T.P., Principle of bloodstain pattern analysis: theory and practice, 2005 CRC press Taylor & Francis Group, ISBN 978-1-8493-2014-9].”

 

[Chris_Halkides]

A few problems with the foot tracks

But all this implies that negative TMB tests do not add any further information.
There is simply no plausible alternative, neither about the substance nor about the dynamic; no theory works comprehensively like the simple assumption they are in diluted blood just like the prints with identical features nearby and are linked in a same event (and eve if there was an alternative plausible explanation - there isn't any - still this would be standing as a piece of circumstantial evidence, because also ambiguous indicators can be circumstantial evidence when the potential incriminating indication is precise).

It is difficult in a single comment to list out all the things that are wrong with what you are saying. There is no forensic manual that I have ever seen that says that it is OK to conclude that a luminol positive substance is blood just because there is blood elsewhere in a house or apartment. All the foot tracks are of right feet, but where are the left feet? The images cannot be linked to any individual, owing to the lack of detail and misapplication of luminol. In Ms. Knox's room, there is an image of a foot that does not match the length of her second toe (Rep. 180). Therefore, it was probably made by someone else at another time. The substance responsible for reacting with luminol in this instance is unlikely to be blood. Therefore, why should anyone believe that the rest are made in blood?

 

[Chris_Halkides]

DNA and blood

The relationship between DNA sampling and blood sampling seems, to a layman like me, to be very important to this case. Should we conclude that a DNA negative result precludes the the existence of blood? I vaguely remember Peter Gill (perhaps) getting close to saying this, but not actually definitively. When, if ever, might this not be true? However, I remember you being very interested in the blood rep found in Romanelli's room - you raised it in a phone in to Bruce Fisher's radio show when he interviewed Ron Hendry - Yet, it would appear that this sample tested negative for DNA. How so? A related argument exists with the kitchen knife; if the knife was bleach cleaned of blood, could human DNA survive? I wonder if you would think it reasonable to say that the absence of Kercher DNA in most of the luminol hits is actually better evidence that there was no blood even than the negative TMB tests?

IMO the lack of DNA is evidence against a given substance being blood, as opposed to absolute proof that a substance is not blood. The lack of DNA was taken as evidence against the hypothesis that a Kastle-Meyer positive stain was blood in the Gregory Taylor case. However, suppose a substance gave a positive confirmatory test for blood but did not have DNA. There are a couple of possible explanations, such as the presence of an inhibitor of DNA polymerase.

The issue with the knife is somewhat different, because it is a certainty that a knife used to stab someone will have blood. A number of forensic scientists (Johnson and Hampikian, Budowle, and Gill, among others) have said that it is very unlikely that one could clean a knife of blood but not of DNA.

 

[Dan O.]

But all this implies that negative TMB tests do not add any further information.
There is simply no plausible alternative, neither about the substance nor about the dynamic; no theory works comprehensively like the simple assumption they are in diluted blood just like the prints with identical features nearby and are linked in a same event (and eve if there was an alternative plausible explanation - there isn't any - still this would be standing as a piece of circumstantial evidence, because also ambiguous indicators can be circumstantial evidence when the potential incriminating indication is precise).

Machiavelli posted this morning and he is a compleatly new person. He remembers nothing of the discussions that have taken place in this forum. He carries forward none of the arguments that completely discredited his position. He simply hit the reset button and started over again.

Not only has a plausible alternative been provided, that of iron from rust or even a very old blood stain bound to the tile, his position of diluted blood is dashed by the testimony that the Luminol reactions were strong and not the faint glow requiring absolute darkness and night vision goggles to perceive. The dynamic was presented of pre-existing stains in the tiles overstepped by the bloody shoeprint tracts. The shoeprint tract made in dilute blood and wiped up by the forensic investigators themselves leaving no visible trace of blood was still tested positive with TMB proving the sensitivity of TMB in this environment.

The fact that other luminol detected footprints tested negative to TMB is proof that there was no detectable blood there. The fact that these did not yield a DNA profile for Meredith confirms that these were not made with Meredith's blood. There is no ambiguity, no blood + no Meredith DNA = no evidence of bare footed killers tracking blood in the hall.

Wake up Machiavelli. Your trollish exercise of ignoring the facts and prior arguments to restate your starting position doesn't wash here.

 

[Bill Williams]

It is difficult in a single comment to list out all the things that are wrong with what you are saying. There is no forensic manual that I have ever seen that says that it is OK to conclude that a luminol positive substance is blood just because there is blood elsewhere in a house or apartment. All the foot tracks are of right feet, but where are the left feet? The images cannot be linked to any individual, owing to the lack of detail and misapplication of luminol. In Ms. Knox's room, there is an image of a foot that does not match the length of her second toe (Rep. 180). Therefore, it was probably made by someone else at another time. The substance responsible for reacting with luminol in this instance is unlikely to be blood. Therefore, why should anyone believe that the rest are made in blood?

I think you've solved this. The pro-guilt lobby has just proven that the perp was Long John Silver.

 

[Dan O.]

IMO the lack of DNA is evidence against a given substance being blood, as opposed to absolute proof that a substance is not blood. The lack of DNA was taken as evidence against the hypothesis that a Kastle-Meyer positive stain was blood in the Gregory Taylor case. However, suppose a substance gave a positive confirmatory test for blood but did not have DNA. There are a couple of possible explanations, such as the presence of an inhibitor of DNA polymerase.

A while back someone tried to present the argument that the TMB test will prevent a subsequent test for DNA. I found the source for this claim and it was very specific. The TMB test used was Hemastix applied directly to the stain being tested where it left a green die behind and the DNA test used the DNA IQ extraction kit. Something in the TMB test strip was interfering with the DNA separation phase of the DNA IQ kit. Other forms of DNA extraction still worked after the TMB test.

Claiming that there was a PCR inhibitor doesn't fly when the DNA test revealed the presence of Amanda's DNA but not Meredith's.

But then, it is claimed that Amanda can clean up her own DNA while leaving others untouched. Perhaps she is using a genome specific PCR inhibitor

 

[Bill Williams]

Machiavelli posted this morning and he is a compleatly new person. He remembers nothing of the discussions that have taken place in this forum. He carries forward none of the arguments that completely discredited his position. He simply hit the reset button and started over again.

Not only has a plausible alternative been provided, that of iron from rust or even a very old blood stain bound to the tile, his position of diluted blood is dashed by the testimony that the Luminol reactions were strong and not the faint glow requiring absolute darkness and night vision goggles to perceive. The dynamic was presented of pre-existing stains in the tiles overstepped by the bloody shoeprint tracts. The shoeprint tract made in dilute blood and wiped up by the forensic investigators themselves leaving no visible trace of blood was still tested positive with TMB proving the sensitivity of TMB in this environment.

The fact that other luminol detected footprints tested negative to TMB is proof that there was no detectable blood there. The fact that these did not yield a DNA profile for Meredith confirms that these were not made with Meredith's blood. There is no ambiguity, no blood + no Meredith DNA = no evidence of bare footed killers tracking blood in the hall.

Wake up Machiavelli. Your trollish exercise of ignoring the facts and prior arguments to restate your starting position doesn't wash here.

If the style of English has changed, then this may be another user of the account. Check back to the very early "continuations" of this thread, and this has been a common observation among many.

 

[Bill Williams]

Given Machiavelli "rebooting" and going at the same old, same old yet again as if he'd not been rebutted.... I am reminded of this comment of LondonJohn's from 2010 on this very forum....

I am actually starting to seriously believe that certain posters here are engaging in some sort of experiment (academic or otherwise) to gauge whether a barrage of straw man arguments, ad hominem attacks, misrepresentations and downright lies can "win the day" on forums such as these. I can't now think of any other explanation as to why this sort of behaviour is continuing, in the face of repeated corrections - and in the face of repeated admonishment by objective observers. And I'm quite certain that I'm not a conspiracy theorist.....

 

[acbytesla]

More patent sophistry. Or stupidity, take your pick.

You, a non-scientist, because it is convenient to your argumentation about this case, have endeavored to re-write the protocols for field blood-testing, elbowing out the necessity - even validity! - of TMB testing. You do not even begin to address the issue that no confirmatory test of Stefanoni's work was performed.

This is a distilled kind of confirmation bias at work, wherein one begins with the assumption of guilt and works backward. One can safely say that no civilized individual or nation would be satisfied without *confirming* beyond reasonable doubt that blood was present in these often unidentifiable marks.

Machiavelli, on the other hand, is satisfied to parse, obfuscate and dance on the head of a pin in an attempt to argue that the first step of a 3-step process is all one needs to achieve satisfactory evidence of guilt. As Numbers has written, it would be comedic if the stakes were not so high. Instead it is disgusting.

Don't sugar coat it JS.

I've never understood his kind of thinking either. Time and time again we see the guilters ignore and dismiss forensic protocols because it will satisfy their blood lust or their need to be right above all else. Mach doesn't foam at the mouth but he takes the same approach to the case that the prosecution does. Amanda and Raffaele must be guilty so there must be something wrong with the TMB tests. The window is broke and there is a huge rock in Filomena's room so therefore it must be staged. There are no footprints of Amanda and Raffaele in a room full of bloody shoe prints so Amanda and Raffaele must have selectively and magically cleaned theirs. The cooking knife doesn't match the stain on the sheet or Meredith's wounds so their must have been two knives. The digestive and phone evidence shows an early time of death and there is proof that Amanda and Raffaele were elsewhere at that time so ignore that and change the time of death. There are no phone calls, emails or texts between Rudy and Amanda/Raffaele so make Amanda out to be a coke head and a prostitute. There is no evidence of Amanda doing anything remotely criminal so take a noise ticket and party and blow that up out of proportion.

I am so incredibly sick of their exaggerations and evidence created out of thin air. I can't imagine how Amanda and Raffaele must feel and deal with all this. I'm so impressed with how calmly they have dealt with all this. I'd have gone crazy by now.

 

[js202]

Don't sugar coat it JS.

I've never understood his kind of thinking either. Time and time again we see the guilters ignore and dismiss forensic protocols because it will satisfy their blood lust or their need to be right above all else. Mach doesn't foam at the mouth but he takes the same approach to the case that the prosecution does. Amanda and Raffaele must be guilty so there must be something wrong with the TMB tests. The window is broke and there is a huge rock in Filomena's room so therefore it must be staged. There are no footprints of Amanda and Raffaele in a room full of bloody shoe prints so Amanda and Raffaele must have selectively and magically cleaned theirs. The cooking knife doesn't match the stain on the sheet or Meredith's wounds so their must have been two knives. The digestive and phone evidence shows an early time of death and there is proof that Amanda and Raffaele were elsewhere at that time so ignore that and change the time of death. There are no phone calls, emails or texts between Rudy and Amanda/Raffaele so make Amanda out to be a coke head and a prostitute. There is no evidence of Amanda doing anything remotely criminal so take a noise ticket and party and blow that up out of proportion.

I am so incredibly sick of their exaggerations and evidence created out of thin air. I can't imagine how Amanda and Raffaele must feel and deal with all this. I'm so impressed with how calmly they have dealt with all this. I'd have gone crazy by now.

Agreed, in toto. Amongst the first things I would have done with part of my book royalties, if I were AK and RS, would be to offer a bounty - say $5,000 US, each - to unveil the Harry Rags, Yummis, Michael/Fulcanellis, etc., so that these individuals' private reputations would be permanently conjoined with the online lunacy and venom they have cheerfully promulgated for the last seven years. All are cowards and twisted bottom dwellers who would presumably shrivel if the light of day shone upon their faces. One or two might even follow in Brenda Leyland's footsteps, which would do the world precious little injury.

 

[acbytesla]

Agreed, in toto. Amongst the first things I would have done with part of my book royalties, if I were AK and RS, would be to offer a bounty - say $5,000 US, each - to unveil the Harry Rags, Yummis, Michael/Fulcanellis, etc., so that these individuals' private reputations would be permanently conjoined with the online lunacy and venom they have cheerfully promulgated for the last seven years. All are cowards and twisted bottom dwellers who would presumably shrivel if the light of day shone upon their faces. One or two might even follow in Brenda Leyland's footsteps, which would do the world precious little injury.

I might have too, but that probably wouldn't have been the wise thing to do. It would make them look vengeful and maybe as crazy as the lunatics. I really understand the desire. I feel just like you do. That is why I am so impressed with them. They have been amazingly calm throughout this nightmare. I'm sure I would have lost it and said or done something really stupid.
Some of these people are serious creeps. There is a jazz musician from Nova Scotia or Prince Edward Island Canada who make veiled death threats against Amanda. It really makes me sick. I think that BR Mull finally stopped and got some help. I haven't seen a post from him anywhere in a long time...but then again, maybe I haven't been looking as much as I use to.

 

[js202]

I might have too, but that probably wouldn't have been the wise thing to do. It would make them look vengeful and maybe as crazy as the lunatics. I really understand the desire. I feel just like you do. That is why I am so impressed with them. They have been amazingly calm throughout this nightmare. I'm sure I would have lost it and said or done something really stupid.
Some of these people are serious creeps. There is a jazz musician from Nova Scotia or Prince Edward Island Canada who make veiled death threats against Amanda. It really makes me sick. I think that BR Mull finally stopped and got some help. I haven't seen a post from him anywhere in a long time...but then again, maybe I haven't been looking as much as I use to.

Points well taken. It's easy to observe from the outside and imagine how persons in their position "should" act; unimaginable to be in their position as a matter of fact.

 

[Bill Williams]

Machiavelli - what did you mean when you wrote this:

Wladimiro De Nunzio is a riddle.

He did not have the power to remove Sergio Matteini Chiari, but he was able to force him to step back through a machiavellian chess move, which we can say included a practice of ostracism and blackmail; and it was totally unjustified and unexplainable (to me).

The simple problem is, I don’t have evidence on Wladimiro De Nunzio. He is not an outsider and a discredited small fish like Hellmann and Zanetti.

Moreover, Manuela Comodi had arrested - while in Spoleto - a right-wing politician, a very close friend of Hellmann. They all knew about his resentment, de Nunzio too. The fact that De Nunzio’s role remains in the dark is probably partly a consequence of a Galati’s mistake.

Comodi (and Mignini) understood the trap and wanted to impeach Hellmann and Zanetti on their first wild words at the beginning, but Galati - who as a newcomer had just arrived from Rome - was probably afraid, as he understood the gravity of the situation, about waging a total war against the head of the appeal courts as a first step.

So he did not impeach Hellmann and his court; thus De Nunzio remained in the shadow. This reluctance or caution by Galati was the mistake.

 

[anglolawyer]

Machiavelli - what did you mean when you wrote this:

What do you mean?

 

[Desert Fox]

If I understand, it is mostly the conservatives (aka Fox News) who are anti-Knox in the United States. Is it the reverse in Italy?

 

[Bill Williams]

Machiavelli - what did you mean when you wrote this:

What do you mean?

Machiavelli is suggesting that there is some sort of behind the scenes shenanigans in Hellmann and Zanetti's appointment as judges for the 2011 trial.

He has in this post done more than suggest that De Nunzio may have participated in wrong-doing. Machiavelli here in this thread, in one of the continuations, suggested that at the end of the day Hellmann participated in a Masonic-involved plot, generated by US media interests, to (in essence) throw the trial in 2011.... much like a boxer might throw a boxing match.

I have asked Machiavelli here on this thread if he thinks De Nunzio, the president of the Court of Appeal of Perugia, is a criminal. Your own mileage may vary, but that post of Machiavelli's certainly seems to lean in that direction.

If Machiavelli himself wants to ignore this, then his words about De Nunzio are going to just sit there, I guess.

Intriguingly, Machiavelli suggests that Galati made some unclear tactical mistake because of "caution" or "reluctance" by letting whatever it was De Nunzio was supposed to have done go unchallenged. That is a fair reading of M.'s piece. I, for one, would like clarity on that, as Galati is a major player in this. Caution for what? Reluctance to do what? Galati's mistake in doing what?

 

[Bill Williams]

What do you mean?

What do you suppose these folk mean when they post these challenges to Machiavelli's wisdom on this thread?

I am so incredibly sick of their exaggerations and evidence created out of thin air. I can't imagine how Amanda and Raffaele must feel and deal with all this. I'm so impressed with how calmly they have dealt with all this. I'd have gone crazy by now.

Machiavelli posted this morning and he is a compleatly new person. He remembers nothing of the discussions that have taken place in this forum. He carries forward none of the arguments that completely discredited his position. He simply hit the reset button and started over again.

.....................

Wake up Machiavelli. Your trollish exercise of ignoring the facts and prior arguments to restate your starting position doesn't wash here.

It is difficult in a single comment to list out all the things that are wrong with what you (Machiavelli) are saying.

Kauffer, this is a good way to challenge, and difficult for Mach to answer. The standard guilt model will always be to require proof that the bra clasp is contamination, and on pain of failure, 28 years jail is justice.
Cart before horse.

More patent sophistry. Or stupidity, take your pick.

.....................

Machiavelli, on the other hand, is satisfied to parse, obfuscate and dance on the head of a pin in an attempt to argue that the first step of a 3-step process is all one needs to achieve satisfactory evidence of guilt. As Numbers has written, it would be comedic if the stakes were not so high. Instead it is disgusting.

Can you name a situation anywhere in the world where a person has been convicted on the basis of a luminol trace that was negative to TMB?

The highlighted statement is false.
The green italicized statement is incredibly and outrageously false.