Continuation Part 11: Amanda Knox/Raffaele Sollecito

[Charlie Wilkes]

November is here and I have time on my hands...

Well, instead I consider the luminol footprint set to be excellent and powerful evidence. I think there is huge information there, I think it's serious and precise. The lack of alternative explanation is a key point to the evidence assessment, the improbability of a second alternative to explain this complex and peculiar combination of data which the luminol footprints are, is indeed valid and powerful circumstantial evidence.

Explain again how these footprints fit your conception of the crime, the activity through which you think they were produced. Some of the people here may not be familiar with your theory, and it's better for them to get it from you than from me.

 

[platonov]

In case you didn't notice, the point has not been settled, surprisingly. Nencini claims it is of 'undoubted importance' but, rather like your inability to post a link, seems unable to say why in 355 pages of drivel. Mach lobbed it into the discussion recently also, as part of his osmotic case, a very strange part given that Massei, Hellman and the ISC all ignored it, but it seems nothing can stop you guilters re-heating old crap in the hope that nobody is watching.

Let's just agree you are full of hot air and outside your comfort zone and leave it at that, shall we?

More confusion – I was trying to help out Dan O.
& it seems I have upset you (again)

Obviously - if you are unfamiliar with the evidence. Why don’t you try reading up on it.
Follow the link I gave earlier.
I don’t think I can help any further.

 

[Numbers]

So his defense attorney thinks it was all an innocent mistake. How surprising.

It's also not the point as you well know. You love to quote scientific articles, but prefer not to mention that many of them are authored by professional defense witnesses. Like Dan Krane, who owns Forensic Biofinformatics, a for profit firm that is estimated to take in 500k - 1 million in revenues annually.

The interests of Pex, Krane, and others you cite are frequently aligned with the interests of defense attorneys in the guise of protecting innocents or raising standards, their beloved buzzwords. Defeating DNA evidence is what they get paid a lot of money to do, and pretending their research isn't agenda driven is a bit naive.

Dan Krane is a Professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at Wright State University as well as CEO and Chairman of Forensic Bioinformatics. His online resume includes this statement:

Highlights of Professional Service:
Court recognized expert witness in 90 criminal proceedings since 1991 (22 different states, three federal courts, three courts martial, Australia, Northern
Ireland and England); Two-time gubernatorial appointee to Virginia’s Scientific Advisory Committee (a twelve-member panel charged by Virginia statute with overseeing the policies and practices of Virginia’s Department of Forensic Science); Two-time recipient of the College of Science and Mathematics “Outstanding Teacher Award;” lead author of the best-selling undergraduate textbook “Fundamental Concepts of Bioinformatics.”

For the legal systems of the US and other western democracies, including the members of the Council of Europe (adherent to the ECHR), in criminal trials there is an adversarial system with a prosecution and a defense. The defense has every right in these systems to have expert support.

Your position would seem to favor the prosecution, which sometimes presents inaccurate results, junk science, or other misrepresentations, without question. That position is simply bias and not in accord with the adversarial system.

 

[platonov]

Time on your hands – excellent.

Explain again how these footprints fit your conception of the crime, the activity through which you think they were produced. Some of the people here may not be familiar with your theory, and it's better for them to get it from you than from me.

CW. There is an old quotation, from an Englishman IIRC, which might be employed here.

‘Any fool may write a most valuable book by chance, if he will only tell us what he heard and saw with veracity.’

Now I am not calling you a fool (obviously) & I’m certainly not advising you to write a book.
However if you could respond to this post HERE and back up your surprising claims we may finally have some excitement and forward movement in Cartwheel world.

What is the big secret – Or do you withdraw the 'claims' in the post I quoted in the link ?

 

[anglolawyer]

More confusion – I was trying to help out Dan O.
& it seems I have upset you (again)

Obviously - if you are unfamiliar with the evidence. Why don’t you try reading up on it.
Follow the link I gave earlier.
I don’t think I can help any further.

No, not upset at all, Platonov. Just bewildered by your antics. I am not running around trying to work out what you are referring to. There is no evidence of the lamp's presence. If you want to say otherwise, just post it.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

Spector trial sideshow

A bit more on James Pex from the link previously given:

"Superior Court Judge Larry Paul Fidler said he did not have enough evidence to determine whether misconduct had occurred, but before jurors returned to the courtroom for more testimony from the expert, the judge informed Pex that based on the perjury allegations, he had the right to an attorney.

"If you cannot afford an attorney, the court will appoint one for you at no cost to yourself," Fidler told him.

"I read my transcripts from yesterday. I don't need one," Pex replied."

I have to wonder whether or not the prosecutor was just grandstanding. An additional problem with attacking Mr. Pex is that in the quotes I presented today, he is saying exactly what every forensic scholar is saying, that luminol is only presumptive, etc. That makes the Spector trial look even more irrelevant.

 

[Dan O.]

No, not upset at all, Platonov. Just bewildered by your antics. I am not running around trying to work out what you are referring to. There is no evidence of the lamp's presence. If you want to say otherwise, just post it.

Do the guilters still think that lamp is a key piece of evidence? The lamp was in Meredith's room durring the investigation. But who moved it there, when and why are still unknown. Meredith could have borrowed Amanda's lamp since Amanda hadn't been staying in the cottage for several nights. The postal police might have brought the lamp in or the medical team that was there before the cameras arrived. Those would be relavent testimonies about the lamp. But all we get is Mignini having Amanda identify her lamp and perhaps one of the Italian roommates testified that the lamp came with the room. Nothing ties the lamp to the murder.

 

[anglolawyer]

Do the guilters still think that lamp is a key piece of evidence? The lamp was in Meredith's room durring the investigation. But who moved it there, when and why are still unknown. Meredith could have borrowed Amanda's lamp since Amanda hadn't been staying in the cottage for several nights. The postal police might have brought the lamp in or the medical team that was there before the cameras arrived. Those would be relavent testimonies about the lamp. But all we get is Mignini having Amanda identify her lamp and perhaps one of the Italian roommates testified that the lamp came with the room. Nothing ties the lamp to the murder.

You know I don't agree - except with the most important point that if the lamp were there it would not prove anything against Knox. Yet, Nencini thinks (for secret reasons, which is OK with Mach) that it had 'undoubted significance'. Incredible.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

prosecution versus defense witnesses

So his defense attorney thinks it was all an innocent mistake. How surprising.

It's also not the point as you well know. You love to quote scientific articles, but prefer not to mention that many of them are authored by professional defense witnesses. Like Dan Krane, who owns Forensic Biofinformatics, a for profit firm that is estimated to take in 500k - 1 million in revenues annually.

The interests of Pex, Krane, and others you cite are frequently aligned with the interests of defense attorneys in the guise of protecting innocents or raising standards, their beloved buzzwords. Defeating DNA evidence is what they get paid a lot of money to do, and pretending their research isn't agenda driven is a bit naive.

Not his defense attorney, Spector's attorney IIUC. But I think we might finally have made a breakthrough. The hostility toward defense expert witnesses and slavish devotion to prosecution expert witnesses has been a consistent theme going back to the early days when Fiona posted here.

Defense expert witnesses know that one mistake can end their career, so they act accordingly. Specifically with respect to Dr. Krane, he also has an academic career to consider. He is the author of a textbook on bioinformatics and is a coauthor on many academic papers. The notion that defense expert witnesses are prostitutes and prosecution witnesses and forensic police witnesses are noble and pure is empirically wrong (think of Joyce Gilchrist, for example) and logically absurd (if anything prosecution witnesses are under greater pressure to tailor their results toward what their client wishes). However, it is exactly what one expects from those with a blindly authoritarian mindset.

 

[Bill Williams]

Well, instead I consider the luminol footprint set to be excellent and powerful evidence. I think there is huge information there, I think it's serious and precise. The lack of alternative explanation is a key point to the evidence assessment, the improbability of a second alternative to explain this complex and peculiar combination of data which the luminol footprints are, is indeed valid and powerful circumstantial evidence.

Explain again how these footprints fit your conception of the crime, the activity through which you think they were produced. Some of the people here may not be familiar with your theory, and it's better for them to get it from you than from me.

A couple of things.

1) Machiavelli is copying the method of the prosecution. He does not need evidence, that he can "think this" is really his authority.

2) "The lack of alternative explanation".... he wants an alternative explanation even before it's proven to be blood. This is called, confirmation bias. It is letting one's theory of the crime determine what other evidence is or isn't relevant.

3) and, as Charlie Wilkes says, he does this without even telling us what his theory is.​

A former Machiavelli even said that a theory of the crime was not even necessary.

 

[platonov]

Wow

Do the guilters still think that lamp is a key piece of evidence? The lamp was in Meredith's room durring the investigation. But who moved it there, when and why are still unknown. Meredith could have borrowed Amanda's lamp since Amanda hadn't been staying in the cottage for several nights. The postal police might have brought the lamp in or the medical team that was there before the cameras arrived. Those would be relavent testimonies about the lamp. But all we get is Mignini having Amanda identify her lamp and perhaps one of the Italian roommates testified that the lamp came with the room. Nothing ties the lamp to the murder.

Wow.

Leaving aside the various CT’s [Them Italians are liars] it appears that even after all this time you have missed a rather important component of the cross-examination of Knox on the lamp issue.

It’s been explained scores of times, much like the RG sentence reduction and is just as simple.

And yet.

 

[Bill Williams]

Wow.

Leaving aside the various CT’s [Them Italians are liars] it appears that even after all this time you have missed a rather important component of the cross-examination of Knox on the lamp issue.

It’s been explained scores of times, much like the RG sentence reduction and is just as simple.

And yet.

What was the lamp used for?

 

[anglolawyer]

What was the lamp used for?

She dropped her ear-ring and obviously had to find it which of course she did but then locked the door, threw the keys away but only then realised she forgot the lamp so then Raffaele tried to break the door down to get it back so then what? They said 'oh well, **** it. What's the big deal?' and just called Filomena. At least that's what I think happened. Platonov has some testimony on this.

 

[Diocletus]

What was the lamp used for?

Somebody was trying to find Mignini's head and they needed a lamp to see up in there.

 

[carbonjam72]

Yes. These points are all true.

So there are four viable possible "quantum states" of police/prosecution motivation detected so far, and they can be mixed according, perhaps, to one's subjective desire; the mixing fractions each must lie between 0 and 1 and the total of the fractions must be 1.

The idea of 'quantum states' of motivation is a fun construct, not sure if I can go along with it as a methodology for description of events, but its a nice creative effort.

Leaving our analysis at the level of guess work and 'quantum states' is an unsatisfying answer to me, I want to know what happened, and who's responsible, I want someone in authority to start taking names and kicking ass. Starting obviously, with that bellowing buffoon Giuliano Mignini.

I think its clear that Amanda and Raf are innocent. I don't think the outcome of any court proceeding against them in this regard is at all interesting, or close. It's not a contest, there's no basis for a conviction, or even an arrest, nor a trial. They never should have been charged, much less convicted, and re-convicted.

That they have been convicted is a result of errors and mistakes in the Italian legal system. The source of those errors and mistakes, are fascinating.

Basically we're left asking the question; are they stupid or corrupt? And I think the answer is one of relative evil. It is a thoroughly corrupted system, where the judges do their best to protect the public at large, from judicial and prosecutorial corruption. A judge who intentionally finds innocent defendants guilty at a first instance trial of a regular murder in Italy, is morally superior to a judge who would intentionally convict innocent people of a 'satanic sect' murder. From the Italian POV, they were treated leniently, as wrongfully convicted innocents.

I think that's what we have here in this case. It's a question of relative evil. How much does the Italian judiciary really need to take from Amanda and Raffaele? Their whole lives? Or has seven years, including four in prison, is that enough to feed the beast?

I think in Italy, the people have been conditioned to accept that sacrifices must be made. So occassionally innocent persons will be drafted into these Italian Comedias for the public good. Yes, every now and then innocent people will be obliged to occupy themselves in an Italian prison, even life sentences, and there is this sense that they should just be good sports about it.

Italy won't change overnight. But the judiciary is a fortress that must be demolished, and rebuilt from the ground up. Until then, Italy should be relegated to "the kid's table', so far as international affairs are concerned. Because they will have demonstrated they lack the maturity to take their place among civilized countries.

 

[codyjuneau]

I'm wondering if I can ask you to focus a little longer on this issue.

If Mignini, Napoleone, Zugarini, recognize Guede's MO at the Kercher crime scene (there's video of Zugarini and Napoleone greeting Mignini at the crime scene which I find mesmerizing), AND, they know that Perugian authorities (whoever) intervened with Milan just 5 days earlier to free Guede and bring him back to Perugia, that's a big deal. It means they own his crimes. It means they aren't just covering for Guede, they are covering their own asses.

Now, tell me again, what is so compelling about the reasons they gave for claiming they knew immediately that the break-in was staged?

.
Do you have a link to that video Carbon?

Thanks
Cody
.

 

[carbonjam72]

Big Mig and the Perugians, sounds like a punk rock band...

.
Do you have a link to that video Carbon?

Thanks
Cody
.

Well, let me try to see if I can find it. It's the video when Mignini first arrives on the crime scene, I think at about 2pm on Nov 2, 2007 if memory serves.

(I think it may even be included in Andrea Vogts documentary, 'Is Amanda Knox Guilty', but I might be wrong about that. It also might not be official footage, it could be from press footage on the scene).

But Mignini arrives in his car, gets out, and he's greeted first I believe by Napoleone, and then by Zugarini. It's the handshake with Zugarini that I'm stuck on.

There's no sound that I recall, and the handshake is fast and passing, but there's body language there I can't shake. Almost like Mignini is thanking her as much as greeting - as if this dialogue were being exchanged:

M: Thanks for the heads-up
Z: I thought you would want to know -

Zugarini kicking in the glass downstairs could be to spread glass around downstairs, in case any glass from the upstairs window was tracked downstairs by the 'unknown perp' (or possibly "Rudy", might they have thought, if indeed they recognized his MO).

I think Napoleone said Mignini "authorized" Zugarini to kick in the downstairs glass door.

Sorry Cody, wish I had the link and cites for you, hope someone else can jump in with the goods.

That's what happens with these kinds of armchair investigations, you see so much good stuff its hard to keep it all organized and recoverable.

 

[Numbers]

The idea of 'quantum states' of motivation is a fun construct, not sure if I can go along with it as a methodology for description of events, but its a nice creative effort.

Leaving our analysis at the level of guess work and 'quantum states' is an unsatisfying answer to me, I want to know what happened, and who's responsible, I want someone in authority to start taking names and kicking ass. Starting obviously, with that bellowing buffoon Giuliano Mignini.

I think its clear that Amanda and Raf are innocent. I don't think the outcome of any court proceeding against them in this regard is at all interesting, or close. It's not a contest, there's no basis for a conviction, or even an arrest, nor a trial. They never should have been charged, much less convicted, and re-convicted.

That they have been convicted is a result of errors and mistakes in the Italian legal system. The source of those errors and mistakes, are fascinating.

Basically we're left asking the question; are they stupid or corrupt? And I think the answer is one of relative evil. It is a thoroughly corrupted system, where the judges do their best to protect the public at large, from judicial and prosecutorial corruption. A judge who intentionally finds innocent defendants guilty at a first instance trial of a regular murder in Italy, is morally superior to a judge who would intentionally convict innocent people of a 'satanic sect' murder. From the Italian POV, they were treated leniently, as wrongfully convicted innocents.

I think that's what we have here in this case. It's a question of relative evil. How much does the Italian judiciary really need to take from Amanda and Raffaele? Their whole lives? Or has seven years, including four in prison, is that enough to feed the beast?

I think in Italy, the people have been conditioned to accept that sacrifices must be made. So occassionally innocent persons will be drafted into these Italian Comedias for the public good. Yes, every now and then innocent people will be obliged to occupy themselves in an Italian prison, even life sentences, and there is this sense that they should just be good sports about it.

Italy won't change overnight. But the judiciary is a fortress that must be demolished, and rebuilt from the ground up. Until then, Italy should be relegated to "the kid's table', so far as international affairs are concerned. Because they will have demonstrated they lack the maturity to take their place among civilized countries.

The "quantum states" solution is of course not a satisfying solution at all. The question is, what information is required to select one as the real-world answer? How does one obtain that information? Is it practical or feasible to find out more? Should one simply select the solution that is most satisfying emotionally or logically? If one has a strong suspicion that indeed the police and prosecutor had a relationship with Guede, and therefore created the frame to protect themselves from moral responsibility, how can that suspicion be verified? Does it need to be?

Based on this case, ECHR statistics and some ECHR cases, the Preston and Spezi book Monster of Florence, two legal journal articles about Italy's experience in adopting an adversarial trial system, and Christopher Duggan's history Fascist Voices, I've come to believe that Italy has some issues relating to its judicial system. In brief, I believe that there are ideological differences between some relatively large part of the Italian judiciary - call them the authoritarians - and another part of the Italian judiciary. The authoritarians' ideology does not focus on or prioritize human rights issues in the way that they are idealized in western democracies.

Italy also has issues with corruption and organized crime; these problems may exceed those in some other western European countries. See:
http://www.transparency.org/country#ITA
But it will be up to the Italians, with gentle hints from their partners in the Council of Europe, to work on reforms.

We also need to be aware that other countries, including the US, have some of these problems of wrongful convictions and corruption, but perhaps occurring sometimes in a more subtle way. For example, in the US, official misconduct by police and/or prosecutor was a factor in 59% (397/672) of exonerations for wrongful homicide convictions (1989 - Nov. 6, 2014). See:
https://www.law.umich.edu/special/exoneration/Pages/ExonerationsContribFactorsByCrime.aspx#chart2

 

[JREF2010]

A couple of things.

1) Machiavelli is copying the method of the prosecution. He does not need evidence, that he can "think this" is really his authority.

2) "The lack of alternative explanation".... he wants an alternative explanation even before it's proven to be blood. This is called, confirmation bias. It is letting one's theory of the crime determine what other evidence is or isn't relevant.

3) and, as Charlie Wilkes says, he does this without even telling us what his theory is.​

A former Machiavelli even said that a theory of the crime was not even necessary.

Its interesting reading the words of the Judges. It makes them so much more human, and an ugly reality they don't know anything either.

 

[carbonjam72]

The "quantum states" solution is of course not a satisfying solution at all. The question is, what information is required to select one as the real-world answer? How does one obtain that information? Is it practical or feasible to find out more? Should one simply select the solution that is most satisfying emotionally or logically? If one has a strong suspicion that indeed the police and prosecutor had a relationship with Guede, and therefore created the frame to protect themselves from moral responsibility, how can that suspicion be verified? Does it need to be?

Based on this case, ECHR statistics and some ECHR cases, the Preston and Spezi book Monster of Florence, two legal journal articles about Italy's experience in adopting an adversarial trial system, and Christopher Duggan's history Fascist Voices, I've come to believe that Italy has some issues relating to its judicial system. In brief, I believe that there are ideological differences between some relatively large part of the Italian judiciary - call them the authoritarians - and another part of the Italian judiciary. The authoritarians' ideology does not focus on or prioritize human rights issues in the way that they are idealized in western democracies.

Italy also has issues with corruption and organized crime; these problems may exceed those in some other western European countries. See:
http://www.transparency.org/country#ITA
But it will be up to the Italians, with gentle hints from their partners in the Council of Europe, to work on reforms.

We also need to be aware that other countries, including the US, have some of these problems of wrongful convictions and corruption, but perhaps occurring sometimes in a more subtle way. For example, in the US, official misconduct by police and/or prosecutor was a factor in 59% (397/672) of exonerations for wrongful homicide convictions (1989 - Nov. 6, 2014). See:
https://www.law.umich.edu/special/exoneration/Pages/ExonerationsContribFactorsByCrime.aspx#chart2

I love these questions.

The Dali Lama recently spoke in New york, and it was live cast on the web. The level of discourse was astounding, I thought, but these types of questions - knowledge, truth, authenticity, identity, perception - shows this is all in a very long and respected tradition of human endeavor. The subtlety of the arguments is something you just don't normally encounter in regular discourse.

In the case at hand, I guess the answer is, it depends what you're after. If all you want to know, is whether guilt has been proved beyond a reasonable doubt, well that's any easy one. Duh, of course not (for you lurking guilters).

But I want to know the truth of what happened. I want to know why Giuliano Mignini choose the absolutely gentlest person in the world, as the ideal subject for his latest witch hunt. Or perhaps that is why; he mistook Amanda's gentle nature for weakness, and an easy kill.

The contrast between Amanda's plain goodness, and Mignini's clearly evil nature could not be more striking. It's that contrast that makes me unable to turn away. I know there are many injustices in the world. I feel this is one I can write about.

So, I want to know what happened, how it all got started. I want the idiot Mignini to be made to explain himself. He never will of course, but perhaps we can give him voice.