Machiavelli
Philosopher
- Joined
- Sep 19, 2010
- Messages
- 5,844
In essence what Nencini is saying is; The defence in requesting acoustic studies are questioning the veracity of the witness i.e. are implying that the witness is lying. Since the defence have no grounds for thinking the witness would lie there is no reason to question the veracity of the witness therefore there are no grounds to do the acoustic analysis.
In fact the defence are doing no such thing they are challenging the interpretation of the prosecution. The witness could be absolutely accurate in terms of what she heard and when. It is the prosecution who attribute the scream heard to MK, concluding that she was alive at this time, therefore the time of death must be later than the time of the scream; a vital issue. The defence were challenging this interpretation by the prosecution and hence this evidence of time of death. Nencini was clearly wrong to deny the defence request, on the grounds he gave, this would appear to be grounds for appeal, or for an application to ECHR in due course.
But the court also implies something that was said explicitly by the prosecution at the Florence trial: it is unrealistic that an audiometric test could rule out the prosecution interpretation, for that appears to be scientifically impossible even prima facie based on common sense.