Continuation Part 11: Amanda Knox/Raffaele Sollecito

[Desert Fox]

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I tend to agree with you. The almost randomness of the choice (this one looks like the cleanest knife) from Raffaele's apartment is equal to the kind of razzle dazzle you'd see on a TV show.

REAL LIFE FORENSICS is not like the show CSI. Any COMPETENT investigator would have taken all the knives at Rafaele's apartment and had them all tested.

Every bit of this case is like a TV detective show. It's all showmanship. The wrapping up of the mop, picking the murder weapon out of a draw of knives and magically being right, to Mignini deciding it was a staged break-in the minute he got there, all thinking they were Sherlock Holmes (Mignini even admits to liking Sherlock Holmes and liked to pretend he was as smart as him) and they could solve crimes with one look at the crime scene, not the evidence, but the crime scene only.

Not to mention the brilliance of that one detective saying he knew they were guilty because of pizza,

Maybe he should read this quote from Sherlock Holmes:
'It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.'

-A Scandal in Bohemia

 

[Annella]

I would be interested in Machiavelli's opinion on this translation from an article where the distinguished ex Judge Edoardo Mori is interviewed after he left the judiciary in disgust. After 42 yrs of service. Oh...he was also a Magistrato di Cassazione!
Mori is Italy's foremost expert on ballistics and firearms.

" The courts are crammed with spin doctors, who claim to be able to speak on any subject, from graphology to fingerprints. They often do not even have a college degree. In the English-speaking world there is such a concern for the protection of the rights of the accused, that if in the process it turns out that an expert has made a mistake, the authorities (office )take control of all its previous surveys, to proceed to a revision process. In Itay, experts who make blatant blunders continue to be called by repeat offender prosecutors ( pm's) and are fearless, as if nothing had happened. "

 

[carbonjam72]

Good question. If you read German, you could buy the book and provide a brief summary in English on the forum.

Buy why not have a US English edition? Would the publisher/authors be responsible for a UK person buying the book?

1. I don't read German. But if its kindle, at least it might let me copy paste my way through google translate. (I've seen a few stray translated quotes, it actually doesn't appear to have too much novel reporting, but I may be jumping the gun).

2. Those pesky Brits seem to understand US english! But without an English version available, I would think the issue is sidestepped for the most part. Legal costs in the UK are notorious, and I'm learning the IT is no bargain either.

3. If a UK person should buy a book they're not supposed to read, why the whole empire could fall apart. By god man, we just narrowly held onto Scotland!

 

[Kevin_Lowe]

My explanation is blood.

This thread moves very fast and my internet access is spotty at the moment, but I just want to flag this as a classic bit of confirmation bias in action.

The pro-guilt faction need luminol to be something it isn't. They need it to be a magic wand that lights up blood and only blood. That way they can make the random footprints made in who-knows-what substance and made at who-knows-what time into evidence of a magical undetectable clean-up conducted on the night of the murder.

(That is why they so treasure the one paper saying that luminol outperformed TMB in a highly acidic environment. That paper doesn't actually say that luminol is a magic wand that lights up blood and only blood, but if you squint and wish very hard you can get that out of it).

Once they have fixed this belief, they have a problem because there were multiple luminol hits at Raffaele's house, where no judge has ever hypothesised a murder or a clean-up. Rational people might see that evidence and think to themselves "this is evidence that things found in a normal home other than blood from a recent murder will light up in contact with luminol". The pro-guilt community can't think that though, because that would spoil their fun. Thus we get this vague nonsense from Machiavelli because he cannot articulate a clear scenario to explain how blood was splashed about in Raffaele's house without looking a total fool, yet he needs this to have happened to avoid his entire thesis crashing down.

 

[Bill Williams]

Very well put. I've always believed the problem with people here is they raise the burden of proof to absurd levels. In doing so, they are able to believe in an incontrovertible set of false "facts" about the case, not pieces of evidence that deserve their own scrutiny, and need to be weighed in totality. Chronological:

AK/RS statements to police: two people who spent the night together can't produce even a semblance of the same timeline, can't remember if they had sex (with one party having had his first sexual experience in the last week), and with RS eventually admitting his statements were "rubbish," after which he doesn't back AK throughout the trial.
AK's confession: Argued to be coercion (in less than 2 hours), yet she makes up the entire witness to rape and murder scenario without being prompted whatsoever. She never states police suggested Lumumba raped and murdered MK, she comes up with that all on her own, and also puts herself there.

DNA: As I've said before, it's amazingly unlucky that RS shows up on the clasp and MK shows up on RS's knife. But the bad luck goes on. Footprints that don't match Guede, and don't exonerate AK/RS, are also found. Additionally, there are several combinations of AK and RS DNA, even in Filomena's room where that would be especially unlikely. Cue Halkides to cite the studies of professional defense experts who claim it is.

Luminol: Mach has said it best, but it takes an incredible leap of faith to believe that luminol hits were the result of anyting other than blood when a pool of blood was found within 10 feet of them. I guess AK/RS got even more unlucky that turnips or iron deposits showed up, with footprints, that also contained the DNA of AK and MK in several places.

Then there are all the retroactive attempts to create alibis such as RS's many gaffes -- "pricked" MK with the knife, wrote emails to professors, using his relatives to cast doubt on AK.

This is only a partial list, but I'm sure many posters will go back to the dogma and remind me why every fact I posted is wrong. Have at it, but my position is the same:

These are either two of the unluckiest accused people in history, or they're the luckiest murderes to have such a fervent brigade of believers. Either way, their end run around justice is about to come to a close.

Griffinmill. Why does the Pro-guilt lobby get to invent facts?

- after which he doesn't back AK throughout the trial.
- yet she makes up the entire witness to rape and murder scenario without being prompted whatsoever.
- RS shows up on the clasp and MK shows up on RS's knife. (The DNA on the clasp was from a group of men from which RS could not be ruled out.)
- (foottracks are found) and don't exonerate AK/RS, are also found. (So this is the high level of "proof" that you started your post with.....
- there are several combinations of AK and RS DNA (where?) (Corrected by griffinmill as a typo)
- takes an incredible leap of faith to believe that luminol hits were the result of anyting other than blood) in an occupied, lived in house with normal everyday sustances which react with luminol, and this is before showing how even some of the Scientific Police's own little booties themselves glowed with luminol.​

If this is the basis for there being an endrun around justice.... holey moley.

 

[Charlie Wilkes]

This thread moves very fast and my internet access is spotty at the moment, but I just want to flag this as a classic bit of confirmation bias in action.

The pro-guilt faction need luminol to be something it isn't. They need it to be a magic wand that lights up blood and only blood. That way they can make the random footprints made in who-knows-what substance and made at who-knows-what time into evidence of a magical undetectable clean-up conducted on the night of the murder.

(That is why they so treasure the one paper saying that luminol outperformed TMB in a highly acidic environment. That paper doesn't actually say that luminol is a magic wand that lights up blood and only blood, but if you squint and wish very hard you can get that out of it).

Once they have fixed this belief, they have a problem because there were multiple luminol hits at Raffaele's house, where no judge has ever hypothesised a murder or a clean-up. Rational people might see that evidence and think to themselves "this is evidence that things found in a normal home other than blood from a recent murder will light up in contact with luminol". The pro-guilt community can't think that though, because that would spoil their fun. Thus we get this vague nonsense from Machiavelli because he cannot articulate a clear scenario to explain how blood was splashed about in Raffaele's house without looking a total fool, yet he needs this to have happened to avoid his entire thesis crashing down.

Maybe Amanda and Raffaele were sliding around on bathmats at Raffaele's apartment, too. That's what they were doing at the crime scene, according to Machiavelli. That's why the luminol footprints are scattered here and there and form no pattern linking them to the crime.

 

[Planigale]

This is not an acceptable approach, when applied to reality such as in evidence analysis. You cannot accept an illogical sequence of actions as it was something normal. It is not true that people do not follow logical patterns. They do commit foolish things, but the sequence of actions by an individual follows some logic, it is never a sequence of events disconnected from each other.
The important thing to understand is that the single questions "why did Guede lock a bedroom" are not to be assessed each one by one, they must be considered all together.
The FOAs are contending a very unlikely scenario, by a very unusual type of perpetrator. And they claim that very peculiar actions took place (like a second walk back in the corridoor, a washing, a second entry, a post-mortem rape, a second washing and so on) of which there is absolutely no evidence, or evidence of the contrary. They have quite a burden to prove something, at lest they should start by showing why their sequence is more logical than the alternatives.
The FOAs scenario is also utterly self-contradictory: think about the location in time of the stepping on the pillowcase for example, or the denial and assertion of a cleanup at the same time.
Also look at their lack of alternatives when trying explanations about innocent substances and dynamic for the luminol prints, and their failure to contest the bathmat print measurments.
Now, think that there would be a simple point when it comes to assess evidence: which one is more logical. How do you put together luminol footprints and shoeprints. Washed away shoeprint and bathmat print. Raping and killing. And so on. Do you think one should accept a minestone with all elements mixed together without any logical thread whatsoever, say this is good, and choose it over alternative explanations that include logic?

Errors in your argument
1) The denial that people behave illogically goes against modern psychology. Many decisions are made below a level of conscious thought.
2) That because you can not come up with a logical explanation there is not one.
3) Even when people explain an action it is usually post hoc rationalisation.
Do you really think that in the stress of the moment Guede stopped and thought, what are the pros and cons of locking this door? He just did it.

You say that we posit an unusual perpetrator in Guede as a lone assailant. The truth is burglaries ending in rape of a lone female are common, this happened to an acquaintance of mine, a nurse asleep mid afternoon after a night shift. I agree progression to murder is less common but well recognised. The scenario you argue for a group murder where only two of the three are acquainted with each other, and only for a short period, resulting in a rape murder for no good reason, is unique.

 

[Numbers]

More potentially relevant ECtHR case-law.

Sejdovic v. Italy 56581/00 Final 01/03/2006

Two important points:
1. Domestic remedies must be practically available, and not simply theoretically available; depending on circumstances, a complaint may be registered by substance and not simply a formalism since the protection of human rights may require flexibility.
Relevance to AK - RS case: If there was some impediment to filing a formal complaint, e.g. for police abuse during interrogation, a substantive complaint may be adequate.

2. The ECtHR is empowered to point out defects or impediments to the protection of human rights in a CoE state's laws. It is reluctant to specify remedies, however, since that is the responsibility of the state working with, or under the guidance of, the Committee of Ministers of the CoE. {This was an area of controversy with Mach.}

Re point #1:

44. In the context of machinery for the protection of human rights, the rule on exhaustion of domestic remedies must be applied with some degree of flexibility and without excessive formalism. At the same time, it requires, in principle, that the complaints intended to be made subsequently at international level should have been aired before those same courts, at least in substance and in compliance with the formal requirements and time-limits laid down in domestic law (see, among many other authorities, Azinas v. Cyprus [GC], no. 56679/00, § 38, ECHR 2004-III, and Fressoz and Roire v. France [GC], no. 29183/95, § 37, ECHR 1999-I).

45. However, the obligation under Article 35 requires only that an applicant should have normal recourse to the remedies likely to be effective, adequate and accessible (see Sofri and Others v. Italy (dec.), no. 37235/97, ECHR 2003-VIII). In particular, the only remedies which the Convention requires to be exhausted are those that relate to the breaches alleged and are at the same time available and sufficient. The existence of such remedies must be sufficiently certain not only in theory but also in practice, failing which they will lack the requisite accessibility and effectiveness (see Dalia v. France, 19 February 1998, § 38, Reports 1998-I). In addition, according to the “generally recognised rules of international law”, there may be special circumstances which absolve applicants from the obligation to exhaust the domestic remedies at their disposal (see Aksoy v. Turkey, 18 December 1996, § 52, Reports 1996-VI). However, the existence of mere doubts as to the prospects of success of a particular remedy which is not obviously futile is not a valid reason for failing to exhaust domestic remedies (see Sardinas Albo v. Italy (dec.), no. 56271/00, ECHR 2004-I, and Brusco v. Italy (dec.), no. 69789/01, ECHR 2001-IX).

46. Lastly, Article 35 § 1 of the Convention provides for a distribution of the burden of proof. It is incumbent on the Government claiming non-exhaustion to satisfy the Court that the remedy was an effective one available in theory and in practice at the relevant time, that is to say, that it was accessible, was capable of providing redress in respect of the applicant's complaints and offered reasonable prospects of success (see Akdivar and Others, cited above, § 68).

Re point #2:

119. The Court observes that under Article 46 of the Convention the Contracting Parties undertake to abide by the final judgments of the Court in any case to which they are parties, execution being supervised by the Committee of Ministers. It follows, among other things, that a judgment in which the Court finds a violation imposes on the respondent State a legal obligation not just to pay those concerned the sums awarded by way of just satisfaction under Article 41, but also to choose, subject to supervision by the Committee of Ministers, the general and/or, if appropriate, individual measures to be adopted in their domestic legal order to put an end to the violation found by the Court and to redress as far as possible the effects. Subject to monitoring by the Committee of Ministers, the respondent State remains free to choose the means by which it will discharge its legal obligation under Article 46 of the Convention, provided that such means are compatible with the conclusions set out in the Court's judgment (see, mutatis mutandis, Scozzari and Giunta v. Italy [GC], nos. 39221/98 and 41963/98, § 249, ECHR 2000-VIII).

120. In Broniowski v. Poland ([GC], no. 31443/96, §§ 188-94, ECHR 2004-V) the Court considered that, where it found that a violation had originated in a systemic problem affecting a large number of people, general measures at national level could be called for in the execution of its judgments. This kind of adjudicative approach by the Court to systemic or structural problems in the national legal order has been described as a “pilot-judgment procedure”. The procedure is primarily designed to assist the Contracting States in fulfilling their role in the Convention system by resolving such problems at national level, thereby securing to the persons concerned the Convention rights and freedoms as required by Article 1 of the Convention, offering them more rapid redress and, at the same time, easing the burden on the Court, which would otherwise have to take to judgment large numbers of applications similar in substance (see Broniowski v. Poland (friendly settlement) [GC], no. 31443/96, §§ 34-35, ECHR 2005-IX).

121. The Court observes that in the present case the unjustified obstacle to the applicant's right to a fresh determination by a court of the merits of the charges against him appears to result from the wording of the provisions of the CCP in force at the material time on the conditions for applying for leave to appeal out of time. This might suggest that there was a defect in the Italian legal system such that anyone convicted in absentia who had not been effectively informed of the proceedings against them could be denied a retrial.

126. The Court accordingly considers that, where, as in the instant case, an individual has been convicted following proceedings that have entailed breaches of the requirements of Article 6 of the Convention, a retrial or the reopening of the case, if requested, represents in principle an appropriate way of redressing the violation (see the principles set forth in Recommendation No. R (2000) 2 of the Committee of Ministers, as outlined in paragraph 28 above). However, the specific remedial measures, if any, required of a respondent State in order for it to discharge its obligations under the Convention must depend on the particular circumstances of the individual case and be determined in the light of the Court's judgment in that case, and with due regard to the Court's case-law as cited above (see Öcalan, loc. cit.).
127. In particular, it is not for the Court to indicate how any new trial is to proceed and what form it is to take. The respondent State remains free, subject to monitoring by the Committee of Ministers, to choose the means by which it will discharge its obligation to put the applicant, as far as possible, in the position he would have been in had the requirements of the Convention not been disregarded (see Piersack v. Belgium (Article 50), 26 October 1984, § 12, Series A no. 85), provided that such means are compatible with the conclusions set out in the Court's judgment and with the rights of the defence (see Lyons and Others v. the United Kingdom (dec.), no. 15227/03, ECHR 2003-IX).

 

[Samson]

In addition to the two points made by Chris in his response to this post, I'd add another major one. It speaks to the lack of proper knowledge of human gastrointestinal anatomy and operation on the part of the person making this "argument":

There was indeed some food matter found at the very end of the small intestine, at the ileocaecal junction (i.e. where the small intestine becomes the large intestine). It is of course true to say that this food matter would have passed through the duodenum on its way to the position in which it was found.

BUT....... the spot where it was found is some SIX METRES (around 20 feet) along the small intestine. That's how long the adult human small intestine is! It would be functionally impossible either a) for that food matter to have been accidentally manipulated or "slid" along that distance, or b) for that food matter to have been anything to do with Kercher's last meal.

In a typical adult, food takes from four to six hours to transit the small intestine (in addition to time spent in the stomach of course). It's therefore a near certainty that this food matter was related to a snack consumed by Kercher at home some time in the early-mid afternoon, before she left for her friends' house.

And as pointed out above, it's fallacious to think that the autopsy pathologist might possibly have accidentally manipulated any food matter along that whole length of intestine, and nor is it possible for the food matter to have "slid" down that length. The small intestine is an elastic tube that is highly constricted in its resting state (not dissimilar to a long deflated balloon. It would take real, concerted effort to manipulate food along any section of the small intestine. That didn't happen.

It's really very simple. Kercher's last meal was demonstrably still entirely within her stomach at the time of death, and the small amount of food matter at the end of her small intestine was associated with a different meal consumed much earlier in the afternoon. And owing to the happy accident that Kercher happened to have a stomach t(lag) time at the upper end of the limit, coupled with firm knowledge of the last time she was provably alive, means that we can without doubt place Kercher's time of death at some time between 9pm and 10pm, with a very high degree of probability that it was between 9pm and 9.30pm.

And that fact that a ToD prior to 9.30pm also fits with all the other evidence (failure to re-phone mother, still wearing outer clothes, failure to take damp washing out of washing machine, no texts sent, no evidence of reading uni text book, Guede's specific mentioning of the scream at "9.20-9.30ish" (very probably because he feared that somebody outside the cottage might have heard this scream)) only serves to bolster its credibility.

It's also perhaps worth noting that the stomach/intestines evidence was (and still is) immensely important in totally refuting Massei's court's theory of the crime, and it also puts a massive hole in the prosecution case. Remember that Massei ruled that Kercher must have been killed some time later than 11.30pm, since this allowed the earwitness testimony and Curatolo's account of timings to be ruled reliable and valid, and since it allowed Massei to construct a "sex game gone wrong" escalation of violence.

There is NO SCIENTIFIC WAY in which the stomach/duodenum evidence is consistent with a ToD later than 11.30pm. That's why it was such a high-profile debating point just after the Massei verdict. And while it's true that there's an intrinsic element of imprecision in stomach/intestinal evidence, we can state with total certainty in this particular instance that death must have occurred before 10pm, and almost certainly before 9.30pm. This is still very important, since it renders the earwitness testimony irrelevant and inadmissible, and raises (yet another) huge red flag over Curatolo's testimony. It also of course means that it's very hard indeed to construct a plausible narrative whereby Knox and Sollecito, having had provable computer interaction in Sollecito's apartment at 9.26pm, decide for some reason to rush over to the cottage, either hooking up with Guede (with whom they have had no phone contact) on the way, or meeting him there (but why?), then having an escalating argument with Kercher that culminates in a group attack and murder.

This murder was carried out by just one person, Guede, acting alone.

This is a huge education to me, this post. I was aware of the issue of food at the ileocaecal junction, but had not realised how easy it would be to infallibly refute the notion it could call into question the gastric evidence.
PGP are on the ropes on this. The Italians won't care, but the Americans will.

There are other issues raised, during my banning from dot org for legitimately emailing two members, for example tight clothes, viral presence leading to much later vomiting.

However, there is a statistical issue.
We are required to accomodate two unlikely scenarios,
1. Meredith is murdered.
2. Meredith has a gastric condition that is asymptotic on a bell curve.
This is by no means trivial, both events are independently unlikely, therefore it is strongly probabilistic that another explanation fits.

And it does perfectly of course.

There is an interesting dialogue going on.
Machiavelli moves her dinner earlier to denigrate all relevance ascribed to gastric evidence.
Someone suggests the British friends must have murdered her if we pay any heed to the standard gastric emptying scans.
Rag says only body temperature is now used for times of death.

And so on.
But consider, we know Rudy was in the house when Meredith arrived home, and we know she was killed. If we fix alive at 9pm as certain, and move dinner as late as practicable according to testimony, all the planets line up, and gastric emptying comes neatly into the bell curve.

LondonJohn, I do not accept 10pm as remotely possible, and if there is an adverse result in march, I think there should be way more work on this marvellous exculpatory evidence.

 

[Numbers]

From: SUPERVISION OF THE EXECUTION OF JUDGMENTS AND DECISIONS OF THE EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS
7th Annual Report of the Committee of Ministers 2013

http://www.coe.int/t/dghl/monitoring/execution/Source/Publications/CM_annreport2013_en.pdf

C. Increased interaction between the Court and the Committee of Ministers

37. The European Court’s interaction with the Committee of Ministers, in implementing Article 46, is constantly evolving. For several years now, the Court contributes to the execution process more and more frequently and in various ways, e.g. by providing, itself, in its judgments, recommendations as to relevant execution measures (“pilot” judgments and “judgments with indication of interest for execution (under Article 46)” in that the Court considers different questions linked with execution without resorting to a full-fledged pilot judgment procedure) or more recently by providing relevant information in letters addressed to the Committee of Ministers.

38. Today, the European Court thus provides such recommendations notably in respect of individual measures in a growing number of cases. Pursuant to Article 46, it may in certain circumstances, also decide the effect that should be given to the violation finding, order directly the adoption of relevant measures and fix the time limit within which the action should be undertaken. For example, in case of arbitrary detention, restitutio in integrum will necessarily require, among other things, release from detention. Thus, in several cases, the Court has ordered immediate release of the applicant¹⁴.

39. Moreover, in the context of general measures, notably in the “pilot” judgment procedure, the Court examines nowadays in more detail the causes behind the structural problems, with a view to making, where appropriate, recommendations or more detailed indications, and even require the adoption of certain measures within specific deadlines (see Rule 61 of the Rules of Court). In this context, to support more complex execution processes, the Court has used the “pilot” judgment procedure across a range of contexts¹⁵, generating, or risking to generate, an important number of repetitive cases, notably in order to insist on the rapid setting up of effective domestic remedies and to find solutions for already pending cases¹⁶.

14. See Assanidze v. Georgia, No. 71503/01, judgment of 08/04/2004, Ilascu v. Republic of Moldova and Russian Federation, No. 48787/99, judgment of 08/07/2004 and Fatullayev v. Azerbaijan, No. 40984/07, judgment of 22/04/2010.
15. See for instance Broniowski v. Poland (application No. 31443/96; Grand Chamber judgment of 22/06/2004 – pilot judgment procedure brought to an end on 06/10/2008); Hutten-Czapska v. Poland (application no. 35014/97, Grand Chamber judgment of 19/06/2006 and Grand Chamber friendly settlement of 28/04/2008).
16. See e.g. Burdov No. 2 v. Russian Federation, No. 33509/04, judgment of 15/01/2009; Olaru v. Republic of Moldova, No. 476/07, judgment of 28/07/2009 and Yuriy Nikolayevich Ivanov v. Ukraine, No. 40450/04, judgment of 15/10/2009.

 

[toto]

But now she has also killed a flatmate.

Clearly that's in dispute.

 

[Dan O.]

Clearly that's in dispute.

Machiavelli is using it as a starting premiss.
.

 

[Samson]

Machiavelli is using it as a starting premiss.
.

The only thing we know for certain is Amanda killed Meredith,
or
The only thing we know for certain is Meredith was killed.

Gentlemen place your bets.

 

[Numbers]

From: SUPERVISION OF THE EXECUTION OF JUDGMENTS AND DECISIONS OF THE EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS
7th Annual Report of the Committee of Ministers 2013

http://www.coe.int/t/dghl/monitoring...ort2013_en.pdf


A. Scope of the supervision

7. The main features of the Contracting States’ undertaking “to abide by the final judgment of the Court in any case to which they are parties” are defined in the Committee of Ministers’ Rules of Procedure (Rule 6.2). The measures to be taken are of two types.

8. The first type of measures – individual measures – concern the applicants. They relate to the obligation to erase the consequences suffered by them because of the violations established so as to achieve, as far as possible, restitutio in integrum.
9. The second type of measures – general measures – relate to the obligation to prevent violations similar to that or those found or putting an end to continuing violations. In certain circumstances they may also concern the setting up of remedies to deal with violations already committed (see also §36).

10. The obligation to take individual measures and provide redress to the applicant has two aspects. The first is, for the State, to provide any just satisfaction - normally a sum of money - which the Court may have awarded the applicant under Article 41 of the Convention.

11. The second aspect relates to the fact that the consequences of a violation for the applicants are not always adequately remedied by the mere award of a just satisfaction by the Court or the finding of a violation. Depending on the circumstances, the basic obligation of achieving, as far as possible, restitutio in integrum may thus require further actions, involving for example the reopening of unfair criminal proceedings, the destruction of information gathered in breach of the right to privacy, the enforcement of an unenforced domestic judgment or the revocation of a deportation order issued against an alien despite a real risk of torture or other forms of illtreatment in the country of destination. The Committee of Ministers issued a specific recommendation to member States in 2000 inviting them “to ensure that there exist at national level adequate possibilities to achieve, as far as possible, “restitutio in integrum” and, in particular, “adequate possibilities of re-examination of the case, including reopening of proceedings, in instances where the Court has found a violation of the Convention” (Recommendation No. R(2000)2)6.

12. The obligation to take general measures aims at preventing violations similar to the one(s) found and may, depending on the circumstances, imply a review of legislation, regulations and/or judicial practice. Some cases may even involve constitutional changes. In addition, other kinds of measures may be required such as the refurbishing of a prison, increase in the number of judges or prison personnel or improvements of administrative procedures.
__________________________
That the Committee of Ministers may ask a CoE state to consider constitutional changes as a result of a ECtHR judgment was controversial for some posters (guilters) on this forum.

 

[Kauffer]

Very well put. I've always believed the problem with people here is they raise the burden of proof to absurd levels. In doing so, they are able to believe in an incontrovertible set of false "facts" about the case, not pieces of evidence that deserve their own scrutiny, and need to be weighed in totality. Chronological:

AK/RS statements to police: two people who spent the night together can't produce even a semblance of the same timeline, can't remember if they had sex (with one party having had his first sexual experience in the last week), and with RS eventually admitting his statements were "rubbish," after which he doesn't back AK throughout the trial.

AK's confession: Argued to be coercion (in less than 2 hours), yet she makes up the entire witness to rape and murder scenario without being prompted whatsoever. She never states police suggested Lumumba raped and murdered MK, she comes up with that all on her own, and also puts herself there.

DNA: As I've said before, it's amazingly unlucky that RS shows up on the clasp and MK shows up on RS's knife. But the bad luck goes on. Footprints that don't match Guede, and don't exonerate AK/RS, are also found. Additionally, there are several combinations of AK and RS DNA, even in Filomena's room where that would be especially unlikely. Cue Halkides to cite the studies of professional defense experts who claim it is.

Luminol: Mach has said it best, but it takes an incredible leap of faith to believe that luminol hits were the result of anyting other than blood when a pool of blood was found within 10 feet of them. I guess AK/RS got even more unlucky that turnips or iron deposits showed up, with footprints, that also contained the DNA of AK and MK in several places.

Then there are all the retroactive attempts to create alibis such as RS's many gaffes -- "pricked" MK with the knife, wrote emails to professors, using his relatives to cast doubt on AK.

This is only a partial list, but I'm sure many posters will go back to the dogma and remind me why every fact I posted is wrong. Have at it, but my position is the same:

These are either two of the unluckiest accused people in history, or they're the luckiest murderes to have such a fervent brigade of believers. Either way, their end run around justice is about to come to a close.

Well, if you want to believe that luminol fluorescence outside Ms Kercher's bedroom must mean blood because there was blood in the bedroom, despite being schooled in this matter on numerous occasions by real scientists, then I don't suppose you are going to be capable of bringing any learning to this or any other subject.

There is a certain rather disturbing, cultish reverence you have for this Machiavelli character - the eschewing of knowledge and learning in favour of blind faith in the rantings of a composite internet character, is not conducive to any kind of progress.

But find one bona fide forensic scientist or crime scene investigator prepared to consider the evidence in this case who will conclude from the evidence that either Ms Knox or Mr Sollecito is guilty of murder? You cannot. Not one of them would support such a view. And neither would a real jury.

There is not one scintilla of evidence that Ms Knox was ever in Ms Kercher's bedroom. Why doesn't that bother you? Why is that not at least reasonable doubt in your mind? Why is a small sample of Mr Sollecito's DNA declared to be, with others, on Ms Kercher's bra hook but not her bra, proof of guilt, when there is no other trace of him in the room. What evidence would you expect to see in a small room in which a violent knife murder has taken place involving a victim and THREE assailants and massive blood loss?

 

[anglolawyer]

Griffinmill

By 'raising the bar absurdly high' do you mean excluding from consideration evidence which even the Italian courts ruled unusable? I ask because you include the 'confessions' in your list of reasons for believing in guilt. My surmise is that you, along with the likes of Mignini and Maresca, think there is something wrong with laws that protect the rights of suspects. No innocent person would ever implicate themselves in a crime they didn't commit, after all. Nor do the police ever conduct themselves improperly, correct?

 

[Diocletus]

AK/RS statements to police: two people who spent the night together can't produce even a semblance of the same timeline, can't remember if they had sex (with one party having had his first sexual experience in the last week), and with RS eventually admitting his statements were "rubbish," after which he doesn't back AK throughout the trial.

They said they were at home. Every still-existing objective piece of evidence directly reflecting on their whereabouts supports that, and it appears that the police destroyed other evidence, except Curatalo. As to Curatalo, we have the court that actually heard this witness saying that he's not reliable because, among other things, he was on drugs and was confused about the date, and then we have another court (ISC) who didn't hear this witness directing yet a third court (Nencini) to hold that the witness was credible without calling him in to testify, which that court did. So, we have two courts who never heard a witness stating as a matter of law that the witness is reliable notwithstanding the conclusions of the court that did hear the witness. Ridiculous.

AK's confession: Argued to be coercion (in less than 2 hours), yet she makes up the entire witness to rape and murder scenario without being prompted whatsoever. She never states police suggested Lumumba raped and murdered MK, she comes up with that all on her own, and also puts herself there.

Don't we all agree that false confessions/accusations happen? If so, what's the minimum amount of time required to elicit such a statement from a person denied the assistance of counsel? If it had been 4 or 6 hours, would you be more inclined to agree with the coercion argument?

DNA: As I've said before, it's amazingly unlucky that RS shows up on the clasp and MK shows up on RS's knife.

That Kercher DNA would show up on the knife as contamination is not surprising to me. This lab was operated in a way that guarantees that contamination will occur and will be picked up in the reported results, because Stefanoni was amplifying LCN samples as a matter of course but wasn't observing LCN protocol. The extraordinary lengths taken to suppress of the underlying data seals the deal for me.

The bra clasp is obviously contaminated. You can see the schmutz on there.

Luminol: Mach has said it best, but it takes an incredible leap of faith to believe that luminol hits were the result of anyting other than blood when a pool of blood was found within 10 feet of them. I guess AK/RS got even more unlucky that turnips or iron deposits showed up, with footprints, that also contained the DNA of AK and MK in several places.

No TMB confirmation and no DNA in almost all of them? Still waiting for someone to come up with the case where a court has used such evidence. Could be out there, but I've looked and can't find it. Can you help?

 

[Dan O.]

It's amazing how many totally stupid and incompetent people are involved on the guilt side of this case. They have some innate blindness that prevents them from seeing facts as they are and spins them through a lense of confirmation bias.

Take Patrizia Stefanoni for instance. She was the first to handle the bra clasp after the discovery. She picked it up and held it in her dirty little fingers the day it was rediscovered 6 weeks after the violent murder. She analized and photographed it in her lab. And yet she repeatedly states in her testimony that the clasp was cut off with a knife in conformance to the prosecutions theory that Raffaele cut the clasp off with his knife to remove the bra.

Patrizia Stefanoni of the police forensic lab in Rome is a stupid incompetent guilter.

(bra clasp not cut with a knife)

 

[Machiavelli]

Errors in your argument
1) The denial that people behave illogically goes against modern psychology. Many decisions are made below a level of conscious thought.

But, this is a 'straw man'; it changes the premise that you object. Indeed behaviours are motivated below a conscious level, but sub-conscious mind (whatever the term, 'inconscious' or 'subconscious' you chose) is profoundly organized and logical. "Logical" does not mean "conscious".

2) That because you can not come up with a logical explanation there is not one.

But if nobody can present a logical explanation, we have to note it.

3) Even when people explain an action it is usually post hoc rationalisation.
Do you really think that in the stress of the moment Guede stopped and thought, what are the pros and cons of locking this door? He just did it.

Again, I repeat the concept: am not taking the single actions one by one and ask myself about the logical vaules (cause, function, purpose) of each one separately. Let's take the data altogether and see where there are logical patterns. I assume that if Guede ever locked the door, then certainly his subconscious mind was motivated to this decision by some logical reason, but I do not expect him to be aware of it nor will I try to find it out deducing it from the single action taken in isolation.
However I do question myself about consistency, which also includes consistency of behaviour; I question myself for example about consistency between trail of bloody shoeprint from bedroom to house door, and absence of any trace of shoeprints back from house door to bedroom. If Guede did both the walks, is the complete visiblity of the first trail consistent with the complete absence of the second trail (not even highlighted with luminol)? It's clear to me that there is a poor grade of consistency between the two assumptions. And I can't fail to not that there is a complete lack of proof about the second action.
So the same for example I ask myself:if Rudy locks the bedroom door (hypothetical, unproven hypotheses), this action entails some purpose; is this purpose consistent with the other actions that I have attributed to Guede? If the possible purposes and motives of this latter action that I putatively attribute to Guede, are not consistent with purposes of his other actions, I have to note it. I also need to note that there is a poor consistency on first sight between facts like leaving bloody shoeprints and the washing of bare feets. And washing your trousers, to the point of getting your wet foot completely wet as well, it is not really consistent with not dripping bloody water around.
Haematoma on the vagina is not consistent with a sexual violence after a fatal stabbing, since you know peripheral pressure would drop immediately as consequence of hypovolemic shock. Spending minutes for washing himself between the fatal stabbing and the alleged post-delictum rape, it's a further element that won't be consistent with her still being alive during the post-delictum rape or with her having a vital blood pressure.
The stepping on the pillow with bloody shoes is not consistent with being located before the alleged washing in the bathroom. But it is also inconsistent with the post-mortem rape theory if it is located after the washing, because in the post morte-rape theory the pillow is places under the victim's body.
The placement of a pillow under the victim's body is not consistent with a bloody hand print on it, if it's placed there after the washing of hands.
The washing of hands of Guede in the small bathroom is not consistent with the absence of Guede's blood cells in basin and bidt and on the edge of the drains.
The post-mortem rape theory is not consistent with the absence of bloody handprints or blood smears on the victim's body. The semen stain/shoeprint theory is not consistent with locating the moment of stepping on the pillow before the moment when the pillow was placed under the body.

But these are only some of the inconsistencies.
We didn't even speak about the autopsy report like how to immobilize a vitcim and many other things, concerning behaviour and modus operandi also.

So to conclude, the problem is not asking about the psychological meaning or logical value of each action. It's about looking if there are logical patterns. The actions and elements that I listed above are a set of elements that show a poor consistency.

You say that we posit an unusual perpetrator in Guede as a lone assailant. The truth is burglaries ending in rape of a lone female are common, this happened to an acquaintance of mine, a nurse asleep mid afternoon after a night shift.

This is not true, certainly not in Italy. In Perugia in years around 2006-2012 there was an average between 600 and 1000 break ins in private houses per year. In less than 1-2 cases per year violent behaviours (threat) occurred, and there is significantly less than 1 case per year of physical violence. There was no case of rape or physical injury over the recent years.
But this is beyond the point. First, you need to consider that the FOAs theory is not a theory of 'burglary ending in rape', it is a theory of break in a private house that ends in a homicide followed by a post mortem-rape.
No way this is a common kind of crime.

I agree progression to murder is less common but well recognised. The scenario you argue for a group murder where only two of the three are acquainted with each other, and only for a short period, resulting in a rape murder for no good reason, is unique

.

It's an illusion. It's not true that a group crime committed by students with no good reason would be less common than the theory of killing and post-mortem rape presented by the FOAs. Both are extremely uncommon crimes. Still, we have the same statistical argument: both events are too unusual, we are too far away in the tail of the Gaussian curve in order to draw useful inference from comparing probabilities. It is also not true that only two are acquainted with each other, since Knox and Guede knew each other, Knox had been knowing Guede for longer than Sollecito, and has been partying together with Guede inside that very same house (so Knox is a trait d'union who knows both perpetrators).
Yet, there are cases of murder with features that resemble the situation of somehow 'normal' looking students who commit murder or an acquaintance or a flatmate in strange circumstances, maybe related to sex; for example an Iranian student of the Art Academy was killed in Milan by her female roommate together with her boyfriend, in February of 2014, apparently after forcing her to take part to a sex game. I don't want to seek out strange violent crimes in the recent records, but just know that there are cases of every kind, there are horrendous strange cases in the US, and some in Europe too. I recall 3-4 years ago for example in Skt. Petersburg, of a couple of 20 year old students who killed and ate their 16 year old girl roommate

 

[Diocletus]

This is not true, certainly not in Italy. In Perugia in years around 2006-2012 there was an average between 600 and 1000 break ins in private houses per year. In less than 1-2 cases per year violent behaviours (threat) occurred, and there is significantly less than 1 case per year of physical violence.

Great stats. Does that include the one where Rudy Guede broke in and threatened a guy with a knife?