Continuation Part 12: Amanda Knox/Raffaele Sollecito

[Numbers]

Council of Europe Criticizes Italy for Defamation Law and Practices:
Violation of Human Rights for Freedom of Expression

www.coe.int/en/web/commissioner/-/defamation-in-italy-a-draft-law-to-be-changed

Defamation in Italy : a draft law to be changed

When Parliament started reviewing the legislation on defamation last October, there were great hopes that Italy finally would succeed in carrying out a long overdue legal reform and strengthening media freedom in the country. Regrettably eight months later, the new draft law still falls short of both national and international standards and the whole reform process appears to be stuck in the Senate. The current version of the draft still includes the possibility to file penal suits for defamation, increases monetary fines and lacks effective deterrent measures to prevent the abuse of the law by the plaintiffs.

The current legal framework criminalising defamation has led to Italy losing court cases in international tribunals and receiving repeated criticism, especially because of prison sentences handed down to journalists. Already in 1984, this anomaly was exposed by the Italian Court of Cassation. Since then, Italy has been regularly condemned by the Strasbourg Court for violating the right to freedom of expression enshrined in the European Convention on Human Rights because of disproportionate criminal sanctions in defamation cases.

Meanwhile the instrumental use of defamation suits and claims for damages continues to hamper media freedom in Italy, as documented by the long list of journalists targeted by spurious legal actions published by Ossigeno per l’Informazione, an observatory which carries out valuable awareness raising work on threats against journalists in the country.

We, our predecessors and other bodies of the Council of Europe, OSCE and the United Nations, have called on the Italian authorities for decades to reform anachronistic legislation which stifles criticism and muzzles the media toward a modern set of provisions which would strengthen free expression by removing prison sentences and excessive fines.

If the latest draft law adopts some of our recommendations, above all the removal of the prison sentence for defamation, other elements remain a source of serious concern, particularly those which have been mentioned earlier. These concerns could have already been dispelled if some amendments which had been proposed to improve the draft law had not been met by a negative opinion by the rapporteur, who was also backed by the Government.

But not everything is lost. Italy can still reverse a situation which puts it in breach of agreed international human rights standards, including those established by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the European Convention on Human Rights and the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union. The best way to achieve this would be to stop considering defamation as a criminal offence altogether.

Freedom of expression, and its corollary of media freedom, is a human right that does not exist by chance; it is the result of lessons learned from the past on how to strengthen democracy. In particular free media helps protect the rule of law and is a key source of information necessary for citizens’ effective participation in a democratic society. It also sustains democracy by helping protect a variety of human rights. Instances of torture, discrimination, corruption or misuse of power have many times come to light because of the courageous work of journalists. Truth-telling is often the first, essential step to start redressing human rights violations and hold governments accountable.

However, as long as defamation is considered a crime and journalists can be threatened with disproportionate sanctions and fines, a chilling effect risks limiting the exercise of freedom of expression. This situation does not only stifle the media, but ultimately deprives citizens of their right to information, thus affecting negatively the healthy functioning of democracy.

We therefore call on the Italian Senate to amend the draft law on defamation. To better reflect both national and international standards, a new law should be designed around three main sustaining principles. First of all, defamation should be fully decriminalised. The mere existence of laws which criminalise the offense to the reputation of a person results in undesirable forms of self-censorship.

Second, the law should allow for corrections and apologies as remedies. In case civil sanctions are necessary, they have to be proportionate. Excessive and disproportionate damages awarded in civil defamation cases can exert heavy pressure on the offender, whose economic survival can be threatened in some cases.

Third, stronger deterrent provisions should be introduced to avoid the abuse of defamation law by the plaintiffs. This safeguard is necessary to ensure that the overall balance of the law and of its implementation is in favor of media freedom and freedom of expression.

Apart from these legal measures, a cultural change is also needed. International standards require policy and opinion makers, as well as public personalities, to accept a higher degree of public criticism and scrutiny, refraining from violent or intimidating reactions. This is crucial to help media operate freely.

Only a minority of the European countries have officially fully decriminalised speech offences. By upgrading its legislation on freedom of expression Italy can lead the way in the battle to decriminalise defamation. It is an opportunity that cannot be missed. Fully overhauling the legal framework on defamation is an essential step to sustain the country’s democratic fabric.


Frank La Rue, UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression

Dunja Mijatović, OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media

Nils Muižnieks, Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights

 

[Bill Williams]

Not only would this case not have made it to court in the UK and not only would Ms Knox and Mr Sollecito not have been arrested, it would not have occurred to anyone to consider they could possibly have been involved, as the Perugians did. And our police are not always the brightest bunch are they?

I must quibble. Early on the PLE should have entertained the possibility that Amanda could have been involved, because she was one of the two key-holders in town. Even though the PLE dismissed way, way too flippantly the ease of a break-in through Filomena's window, the second most likely entry point, the front door, HAD to be at least investigated.

The case went south immediately because an untrained idiot decided firstly that the burglary was fake and probably an attempt at an insurance fraud and then, following the discovery of the body, another idiot decided that Rommanelli's room window was too high to climb to (referenced later by idiot Ricciarelli, too lazy to check, with his Spider-Man comment). So the investigation is derailed before it starts. The context is a fake and staged burglary. And real burglars don't fake and stage burglaries, they commit real ones.

All true, but still.... if it was investigative myopia which focussed too soon on to Knox (and Sollecito), it would have been the same the other way around. To focus on the obviousness of a break-in through Filomena's window does not get the PLE off the hook in at least checking the other investigative lines: namely, the one Marco Chiacchiera drew, to see who might have been a boyfriend of Meredtih's who may have

- shown up unannounced at about 9:30 pm Nov 1st
- or who was let in by a keyholder at that time​

When the real burglar and murderer, (whose actual presence at the crime scene had already been eliminated), inconveniently and ineradicably emerged a couple of weeks later, he had to be woven, improbably, into the already written story as the wronged accomplice of the stagers. You couldn't make this up. It's so improbable. And yet it happened. The PLE should move to Hollywood and become script writers. They'd coin it in!

Ok, now I give. Knox should have been investigated (properly and without the "whore" and "cow" rhetoric), if only to be properly eliminated from the pool of suspects.

 

[Planigale]

Actually:
1. I only said that Knox's DNA (in particular, only one of Knox's DNA instances, trace A - but not so trace I) can be the consequence of its cleaning; not that it must be. It might be directly from wielding the knife, and not have been well cleaned like the blade.

2. I have absolutely no moral judgement about Knox's private behaviors. I wouldn't see them as morally reprehensible themselves (albeit I reject arguments that her character features would point away from Guede or from the drug fuelled sexual aggression scenario; and also, one thing is to consider character features alone, like narcissism or other aspects of personality, which may be harmless and shared by millions of individuals, another thing is consider them together with other elements, like put those harmless features in the context of a peculiar scenario in which they may become clues).

3. My certainty of her guilt beyond doubt stems from a set of pieces of evidence of various kinds, which you reject on grounds that I consider irrational and/or pointless.

4. I have a judgment which may have a Mora aspect on some Knox's actions, which are not her private behaviors. This goes with Sollecito's actions too. I don't have a problem with her drug use or sexual habits; but I do have a problem with her manipulative letter of Nov.4 or her manipulative hand written notes, with her non credible account of facts, with the "blood on hands", with her alleged waiting and loosing time after discovering "strange things" instead if searching for Meredith, her not getting close to Metedith's room because she already did "her part" and so on, I have extreme problems with her fingering an innocent: her being a manipulative liar, unreliable and inconsistent would have a moral aspect even in the event she was innocent (especially in that event); the same with Sollecito: his diary where I find his "reconstructing and trying to remember" disgusting, his disgusting hand pricking lie, and so on...

Thank you. As ever you are patient and courteous with us.

For our readers. The argument is this; assuming one is the wielder of a knife stabbing someone in the neck and severing a major artery. The knife would be covered in significant amounts of the victims blood. Blood full of DNA. Blood is sticky it gets into nooks and crannies and dries there. The amount of DNA from the wielder transferred to the knife will be much smaller if any. The ratio of DNA of victim vs. wielder should be millions to one. One then cleans the knife no trace of blood is left on it. The only trace of the victims DNA is a couple of cells worth. Most people can understand that a cleaning process will be unselective it will clean the wielders and the victim's DNA equally. The ratio of DNA between wielder and victim's DNA would remain the same. Yet what was found on the knife was substantially more DNA of Knox than Kercher. The DNA cannot be argued to have been left by Knox stabbing MK. If the knife was used in the murder, the DNA of Knox cannot originate from the murder, but has to be from post cleaning. Elsewhere it is claimed that Knox could clean her DNA from the murder scene selectively leaving Guede's. Here we have the reciprocal case, Knox can selectively clean the victim's DNA and blood from the knife whilst leaving her own in situ.

Is this important? This is the principle evidence that Nencini relies on to explain Knox's participation in the murder. Yet one needs no more than common sense to see the fallacy in the argument.

I do not blame Nencini for this. The argument was put by Stefanoni. This is proof to me of her bias. She should be giving an unbiased professional opinion. Instead she presents this obviously fallacious argument that the DNA findings indicate Knox stabbed MK just to bolster the prosecution case. Any competent and honest professional would have given a fair and balanced assessment of the evidence but not Stefanoni. (The alternative is she is too stupid and incompetent to recognise the stupidity of what she said).

 

[CoulsdonUK]

Respectfully, I doubt that. The rule exists as an aspect of the jury system, jurors being deemed too stupid to be trusted not to be swayed by material that does not form evidence in the trial itself. Judges are, or consider themselves to be, far above such things so I think (in fact I am sure) it would be OK for a convicted felon, or anybody, to get a book out pending his or her appeal. It's open season as soon as the guilty verdict comes in for any journo or true crime type to write more or less what they want, never mind any appeals. So, I'm pretty sure you're wrong about this and also, that you are implying the judges of the CSC might have been adversely influenced by their books, which is quite something when you think about it.

Just a mo; Raffaele has not been convicted, has he? Furthermore, under Italian jurisprudence a defendant is not considered convicted until the third level trial confirmation.

 

[Numbers]

Excerpt From the Council of Europe, the UN, and OSCE article on Defamation Law in Italy:

The current legal framework criminalising defamation has led to Italy losing court cases in international tribunals and receiving repeated criticism, especially because of prison sentences handed down to journalists. Already in 1984, this anomaly was exposed by the Italian Court of Cassation. Since then, Italy has been regularly condemned by the Strasbourg Court for violating the right to freedom of expression enshrined in the European Convention on Human Rights because of disproportionate criminal sanctions in defamation cases.

Meanwhile the instrumental use of defamation suits and claims for damages continues to hamper media freedom in Italy, as documented by the long list of journalists targeted by spurious legal actions published by Ossigeno per l’Informazione, an observatory which carries out valuable awareness raising work on threats against journalists in the country.

So when posters here ask what is the prediction for the defamation suit brought by Mignini against Raffaele Sollecito, without satirical intent, I can say that I expect the most negative consequences for Mr. Sollecito, and in due time an application to the ECHR. The judgment from the ECHR will find Italy has once more violated Convention Article 10 {emphasis added}:

1. Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right
shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart
information and ideas without interference by public authority
and regardless of frontiers. This Article shall not prevent States
from requiring the licensing of broadcasting, television or cinema
enterprises.

2. The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it
duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities,
conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and
are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national
security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention
of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for
the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing
the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for
maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary.

 

[anglolawyer]

Just a mo; Raffaele has not been convicted, has he? Furthermore, under Italian jurisprudence a defendant is not considered convicted until the third level trial confirmation.

But also, they don't have juries. No jury, no probs with hearsay.

Anyhow, I don't see the problem. What is his story anyway? 'I wasn't there'. How many ways of saying it are there?

 

[Bill Williams]

But also, they don't have juries. No jury, no probs with hearsay.

Anyhow, I don't see the problem. is hisS story anyway? 'I wasn't there'. How many ways of saying it are there?

I had never heard it explained that the hearsay rule was tied to the jury system. Does this mean that the rule does not apply in a judge-only system, in the sense that a lawyer at-trial would not need to object to hearsay being brought to the proceedings and trust that the judge would self-correct?

 

[Machiavelli]

IIUC, Mignini argued for and obtained a "Life" sentence at Guede's original trial, meaning 30 years without possibility for reduced time. (So I accept your statement is partially true to that extent).

However, didn't Mignini later argue that Rudy Guede showed remorse, and therefore was entitled to mitigation at Rudy's appeal?

No.

Rudy got generic mitigation on his appeal, tho happened basically on ground of consistency as a consequence of the fact that the other two suspects, meanwhile, had managed to obtain generic mitigation circumstance too.

But Mignini had nothing to do with the appeal trial where Guede git the mitigation. There was another prosecution by that time. Mignini won his case with the 30 years sentencing and with that his job on that case was closed.

That Rudy's sentence was dropped from Life to thirty years, less mitgation brought Rudy down to 24 years, and then one third fast track discount from there brought Rudy down to 16 years. Isn't that how Rudy got 16 years?

On first instance there wasn't a life sentence, only a life request, but it was unrealistic given that it was a fast track trial; obviously Mignini made a hyperbolic request in order to obtain the possible maximum, that was a 30 years (would have been life without the fast track reduction) sentence. He obtained that.
On appeal, with another prosecution, Guede obtained generic mitigation (from life down to 24 years) which becomes 16 years because of the fast track reduction.
Mignini had nothing to do neither with the mitigation, nor with the reduction. He was not even working at the case any longer.

Concerning Antonio Vinci, my understanding of the Monster of Florence crimes, is based on reading "The Monster of Florence" by Douglas Preston and Mario Spezi.

I understand that that is your source and your bible. Yet Vinci is a honest and innocent person, while Spezi is a convicted man, and Preston a proven liar.

The story they tell made a case I found convincing that Antonio Vinci is in fact the lone serial killer behind the Monster of Florence crimes. And there is ZERO credible evidence that a satanic sect had anything to do with it. [Q

Your problem is precisely the absence of any other source on which you may check whether the information from Spezi and Preston is true. You seem to have no contact with newspaper sources, trial papers, investigation and legal context, probably not even with the language.
Yet you buy Spezi's propaganda story about Carlizzi, and you failed to draw elementary conclusions from facts like that Mignini arrested Carlizzi calking her a false witness who talked while having no clue about facts, or the fact that Carluzzi's theory about Narducci was fundamentally different from Mignini's. When you were faced by the evidence that Mignini arrested her, you refused to draw the obvious consequence and you climbed on a contradictory and absurd idea that he Mignini may have followed Carlizzi's theories until them.

And Mignini's 'Narducci trail' is a hallucination that tormented scores of innocent people, "a kind of delirium", to quote a judge.

Obviously you don't have a clue about anything like testimonies and evidence

And yes, I find it very telling that Mignini sides with Rudy Guede ...

Mignini prosecuted Guede and got hm sentenced to 30 years. This is not "siding with Guede" to any reasonable person. Btw Mignini was also extremely harsh against Guede in his closing arguments. Obviously Mignini never sided with Guede, it's delusional to say so.

 

[platonov]

Real world vs Cartwheel world

I can't figure you out, Platonov. There seems to be something between your ears and yet ...
So they committed the crime together with Guede, then they forgot to agree on a story, then they crumbled under the pressure of a short and friendly interview but then, despite being separately represented and, in his case, being encouraged to ditch her, steadfastly maintained their non-involvement through four years of imprisonment.

He could have walked anytime he liked if he had concocted a story that put the blame on her. Easy. He helped her clean up because he was smitten. Ach, this is a waste of time. You are probably beyond help. Too bad.

Still struggling with the MA I see

Friendly ?? On the surface perhaps but these are cops investigating a brutal murder. In the real world one wouldn’t find it very friendly
when there are 30yr jail terms also on the agenda.

OK this is where you give yourself away, one shouldn’t post in anger. Only in cartwheel world where Amanda is the centre of the universe and it’s all a giant conspiracy against the beautiful young American does this argument hold sway. Perhaps it works like that in Columbo also?

But in the real world this is nonsense. She, like him, was just a killer who was being investigated.
If he rolls over on her he will still be held while the investigation proceeds & she will retaliate. There was an element of that In their scribbling in the first couple of weeks (that you are probably not familiar with).

The only people pressing RS to separate himself from her were his family. He couldn’t however – see if you can work out why?

This ‘the cops were using him to get at her’ is part of the conspiracy theory sold to the rubes in the english speaking world.
RS’s father had to go on Italian TV to disavow it after it unwisely appeared in the US published book.

In fact a couple of weeks into the case once the wiretaps of RS’s family were heard [making threats against the cops etc] they were probably keener
on him than her but they were both going down.

Now back in the real world – See if you can come up with an explanation for why RS threw her under the bus.

 

[Bill Williams]

And Mignini's 'Narducci trail' is a hallucination that tormented scores of innocent people, "a kind of delirium", to quote a judge.

Obviously you don't have a clue about anything like testimonies and evidence

And yes, I find it very telling that Mignini sides with Rudy Guede ...

Mignini prosecuted Guede and got hm sentenced to 30 years. This is not "siding with Guede" to any reasonable person. Btw Mignini was also extremely harsh against Guede in his closing arguments. Obviously Mignini never sided with Guede, it's delusional to say so.

I very much wish, Machiavelli, that you had not invoked Micheli in that other thread.... because the only one being called "delusional" in court, is Mignini when Michaeli called the Halloween ritual murder motive a "fantasy".

It's a little hard to believe, that a judge who calls major portions of the prosecution case "a fantasy", turns around and then sets over AK and RS for trial.

The other one who uses this kind of language is yourself - you call it "delusional" that Mignini sided with Guede. The whole fast-track trial - which is defined as a regular trial without the evidence phase - had both sides, Rudy's defence and Mignini's prosecution - with motive to lessen Rudy's participation in the crime, while not challenging things like "multiple attackers". This was the very thing the ISC said was now a judicial fact in the Rudy-process in which AK and RS had no representation. Then in March 2013, ISC ordered a new 2nd grade trial (ie. the Florence trial in 2013) to find it as factual that AK and RS were those other attackers.

So let's get this straight. Anyone, acc. to you, to disagrees with Mignini is delusional. Yet, judges in Italy don't mind calling Mignini someone himself who deals in "fantasy".... even as those judges set over the accused for trial.

I now sincerely wish you'd never made reference to Micheli.

 

[Bill Williams]

Still struggling with the MA I see

Friendly ?? On the surface perhaps but these are cops investigating a brutal murder. In the real world one wouldn’t find it very friendly
when there are 30yr jail terms also on the agenda.

OK this is where you give yourself away, one shouldn’t post in anger. Only in cartwheel world where Amanda is the centre of the universe and it’s all a giant conspiracy against the beautiful young American does this argument hold sway. Perhaps it works like that in Columbo also?

But in the real world this is nonsense. She, like him, was just a killer who was being investigated.
If he rolls over on her he will still be held while the investigation proceeds & she will retaliate. There was an element of that In their scribbling in the first couple of weeks (that you are probably not familiar with).

The only people pressing RS to separate himself from her were his family. He couldn’t however – see if you can work out why?

This ‘the cops were using him to get at her’ is part of the conspiracy theory sold to the rubes in the english speaking world.
RS’s father had to go on Italian TV to disavow it after it unwisely appeared in the US published book.

In fact a couple of weeks into the case once the wiretaps of RS’s family were heard [making threats against the cops etc] they were probably keener
on him than her but they were both going down.

Now back in the real world – See if you can come up with an explanation for why RS threw her under the bus.

Platonov - you still have not demonstrated that. Mignini is suing Raffaele for defamation this week, partly on the basis that Raffaele is not doing that. If Raffaele was doing that, either he or Bongiorno would be in a prosecutor's office somewhat saying, "We'd like to cooperate." That is not happening. Where do you get this stuff?

There is no one outside of the pro-guilt lobby who is claiming what you are claiming. Everyone else is reading Raffaele's appeals document to Cassazione, and reading it correctly.

Answer me this: who outside the pro-guilt lobby is saying that Raffaele is throwing Amanda under a bus? You had better get that news to Cassazione, because it is ruling in March 2015 and what it has before it says the opposite!

These pro-guilt factoids are like whack-a-mole: every once in a while a guilter strays into a neutral website with the factoid - and devoid of any proof. I get the feeling it will always be thus.

 

[Machiavelli]

Thank you. As ever you are patient and courteous with us.

For our readers. The argument is this; assuming one is the wielder of a knife stabbing someone in the neck and severing a major artery. The knife would be covered in significant amounts of the victims blood. Blood full of DNA. Blood is sticky it gets into nooks and crannies and dries there. The amount of DNA from the wielder transferred to the knife will be much smaller if any. The ratio of DNA of victim vs. wielder should be millions to one. One then cleans the knife no trace of blood is left on it. The only trace of the victims DNA is a couple of cells worth. Most people can understand that a cleaning process will be unselective it will clean the wielders and the victim's DNA equally. The ratio of DNA between wielder and victim's DNA would remain the same. Yet what was found on the knife was substantially more DNA of Knox than Kercher. The DNA cannot be argued to have been left by Knox stabbing MK. If the knife was used in the murder, the DNA of Knox cannot originate from the murder, but has to be from post cleaning. Elsewhere it is claimed that Knox could clean her DNA from the murder scene selectively leaving Guede's. Here we have the reciprocal case, Knox can selectively clean the victim's DNA and blood from the knife whilst leaving her own in situ.

Is this important? This is the principle evidence that Nencini relies on to explain Knox's participation in the murder. Yet one needs no more than common sense to see the fallacy in the argument.

(...)

I know that this about the DNA ratios is your argument on the knife evidence. But I disagree with it, I consider it baseless and pointless. The argument has several flaws that make it illogical; I won't mention all of them, but we may just point out some.
1. Knox's DNA and Meredith's DNA originate from different parts of the knife. There is in principle no reason to assume that the handle was cleaned by the murderer as carefully as the point.
2. Knox's DNA is an indication about who was holding the knife, but it must be understood that, from a logical point of view as a piece of evidence, Knox's DNA is far a less important finding compared to the victim's DNA on the blade, therefore any reasoning or deduction about its origin would be secondary and have no effect. You can't take something that doesn't have determinant implications as if on the same level of something that has, and you cannot use the first to disprove the second.
3. It is not true that the knife is the principal element; this is an innocentisti theory. But it is not true. There are many pieces of evidence of independent origin, equally important, and Knox would be convicted even without knife.
4. Other biological reasons, like type of cells carrying Knox's DNA and the victim's ones are different, and may be affected differently by chemical effects of a washing (epithelial cells vs. leukocytes); also, there is some lack of ground in assuming the calculation of a ratio: Sample I was extremely small, , far below the 2007 detection capabilities, whereas sample B might well have been around 200 picograms, and we don't know anything about what the other samples would yield if tested with a more sensitive technique.

 

[tsig]

What's the point of saying it, then, if it is not a de facto admission of Italian judicial corruption? You're hardly inclined to give advice favourable to the defence!

The whole point of a defence advising as you suggest, is to avoid giving a corrupt judiciary fuel. The fact that you suggest it DID give Cassazione fuel, seems less a criticism of Raffaele and his ghost writer, than it is a warning to millions of Italians that they, too, can expect this from their judiciary.

Is this phrase familiar to you?

"Everything you say can and will be used in court against you"

Seems like a good reason not to publish a book about the crime you are accused of.

What's corrupt about using what the accused freely gives?

 

[platonov]

Please to remember the ........

Platonov - you still have not demonstrated that. Mignini is suing Raffaele for defamation this week, partly on the basis that Raffaele is not doing that. If Raffaele was doing that, either he or Bongiorno would be in a prosecutor's office somewhat saying, "We'd like to cooperate." That is not happening. Where do you get this stuff?

There is no one outside of the pro-guilt lobby who is claiming what you are claiming. Everyone else is reading Raffaele's appeals document to Cassazione, and reading it correctly.

Answer me this: who outside the pro-guilt lobby is saying that Raffaele is throwing Amanda under a bus? You had better get that news to Cassazione, because it is ruling in March 2015 and what it has before it says the opposite!

These pro-guilt factoids are like whack-a-mole: every once in a while a guilter strays into a neutral website with the factoid - and devoid of any proof. I get the feeling it will always be thus.

Oh Bill

You had it and now it’s gone again.
Nov 5/6th remember.
The clappy smileys? Credit where its due etc

 

[Bill Williams]

Oh Bill

You had it and now it’s gone again.
Nov 5/6th remember.
The clappy smileys? Credit where its due etc

Nice post. You still have not demonstrated anything.

 

[Bill Williams]

Is this phrase familiar to you?

"Everything you say can and will be used in court against you"

Seems like a good reason not to publish a book about the crime you are accused of.

What's corrupt about using what the accused freely gives?

What you implied above was that the judiciary would change its point of view because Raffaele had said unkind things about them, not because of information about the crime therein.

 

[Bill Williams]

I know that this about the DNA ratios is your argument on the knife evidence. But I disagree with it, I consider it baseless and pointless. The argument has several flaws that make it illogical; I won't mention all of them, but we may just point out some.
1. Knox's DNA and Meredith's DNA originate from different parts of the knife. There is in principle no reason to assume that the handle was cleaned by the murderer as carefully as the point.
2. Knox's DNA is an indication about who was holding the knife, but it must be understood that, from a logical point of view as a piece of evidence, Knox's DNA is far a less important finding compared to the victim's DNA on the blade, therefore any reasoning or deduction about its origin would be secondary and have no effect. You can't take something that doesn't have determinant implications as if on the same level of something that has, and you cannot use the first to disprove the second.
3. It is not true that the knife is the principal element; this is an innocentisti theory. But it is not true. There are many pieces of evidence of independent origin, equally important, and Knox would be convicted even without knife.
4. Other biological reasons, like type of cells carrying Knox's DNA and the victim's ones are different, and may be affected differently by chemical effects of a washing (epithelial cells vs. leukocytes); also, there is some lack of ground in assuming the calculation of a ratio: Sample I was extremely small, , far below the 2007 detection capabilities, whereas sample B might well have been around 200 picograms, and we don't know anything about what the other samples would yield if tested with a more sensitive technique.

Just when I thought this was not the old Machiavelli, a post of complete tripe appears. Welcome back, Machiavelli!

 

[Machiavelli]

What you implied above was that the judiciary would change its point of view because Raffaele had said unkind things about them, not because of information about the crime therein.

RS and AK in their book may have written things that are manifestly false or contradicting their previous stories (not just bad or nice things about the judiciary).

 

[Machiavelli]

I very much wish, Machiavelli, that you had not invoked Micheli in that other thread.... because the only one being called "delusional" in court, is Mignini when Michaeli called the Halloween ritual murder motive a "fantasy".

It's a little hard to believe, that a judge who calls major portions of the prosecution case "a fantasy", turns around and then sets over AK and RS for trial.

(..).

Major portion? What? No major portion, except in your view if things. In your mind mentioning Halloween was a major portion of the prosecution arguments; in reality it had zero importance. You still believe a story of "different motives", maybe you still believe there was some major change in the motive, or that motive is an argument or that has a relevance whatsoever. The obvious fact is Micheli accepted the prosecution's charges and evidence in toto, except the charge of money theft.

 

[Machiavelli]

I very much wish, Machiavelli, that you had not invoked Micheli in that other thread.... because the only one being called "delusional" in court, is Mignini when Michaeli called the Halloween ritual murder motive a "fantasy".

It's a little hard to believe, that a judge who calls major portions of the prosecution case "a fantasy", turns around and then sets over AK and RS for trial.

The other one who uses this kind of language is yourself - you call it "delusional" that Mignini sided with Guede. The whole fast-track trial - which is defined as a regular trial without the evidence phase - had both sides, Rudy's defence and Mignini's prosecution - with motive to lessen Rudy's participation in the crime, while not challenging things like "multiple attackers". This was the very thing the ISC said was now a judicial fact in the Rudy-process in which AK and RS had no representation. Then in March 2013, ISC ordered a new 2nd grade trial (ie. the Florence trial in 2013) to find it as factual that AK and RS were those other attackers.

(...)

AK and RS had full representation at the Guede fast track trial.
They had the same prerogatives than Guede and prosecution.

Get back now to the fact that it us delusional to state that Mignini sided with Guede. Start with admitting that first, before attempting to divert again the talk on something else.