Continuation Part 13: Amanda Knox/Raffaele Sollecito

[Numbers]

This is a trial, not a scientific research.

And that is why the forensic police in Italy are called the "NOT Scientific Police".

Using Google Translate, I find I should have written:

And that is why the forensic police in Italy are called the "NON polizia scientifica".

I hope that that translation is idiomatic.

The failure of the scientific police and "Doctor" Stefanoni to use a standard methodology, to validate any new methodology, to ignore international standards and protocols determined by empirical studies, to improperly collect forensic specimens, to suppress data and misreport results, and to suppress a full explanation of their data, results, and lab contamination levels is neither good nor ethical science or police work.

 

[AmyStrange]

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So it is perfectly acceptable to you to imprison somebody using bad science?
Why don't you just go back to looking for a third nipple?

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Remember the good old days when all you had to do was drown someone to see if they were a witch or not.

Now you got all kinds of science (DNA is part of science, right?) getting in the way of all that drowning.

SATIRE OFF
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This is a trial, not a scientific research.

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Like it or not Mach, scientific research IS part of the legal process, always has been and always will be.

You've got the science of fingerprinting, ballistics, fiber analysis, and even the science of human physiology when you do an autopsy or take someone's temp to see when they died. Even digestion is part of that scientific menagerie.

And as a result, the trial is a kind of peer review of all the forensic science used to convict someone, and when you don't allow full disclosure of the evidence so this peer review can be accomplished, all you are really doing is going back to drowning someone to see if they're a witch,

d

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[Planigale]

Patrizia Stefanoni is a real doctor and anyone who states the contrary should be aware of the rebound of his unproven statements on his own credibility.

The paragraph that you refer in your comment might be at page 70 of Stefanoni's testimony of May 22. 2009.

This is what Stefanoni actually says:



Translation:



What Stefanoni states is not that different from what she says on Nov. 2. 2007 after all. But let's note that the words torn and cut are both subjective. In fact the fabric was apparently neither torn nor cut, it was unsewed. And I don't think a scientific analysis of the thread was perfored. Some people presented different ideas about the way how it was unsued: with one naked hand, or with two hands, or with a hand and the help of a blade. I think Maresca believed the murderer used a blade to help himself on unseing the clasp bit, others had various theories.

Mach, not to make any point about this but appreciating you are not a native English speaker.

Unsewn is not a term that is used in this circumstnce. A seam may become unsewn or unravelled but this implies a spontaneous action. If one 'unstitches' the term used is to unpick a seam, one has a special tool to do this, but can use a pair of small pointy nose scissors. The best term to use is to say the seam parted. This implies it became unstitched by traction on the two sides. The traditional parting of seams is the back seam of trousers down the middle of the seat, which parts when one bends over.

 

[Kaosium]

Stefanoni presented the charts of X and Y profiles with all alleles and peaks heights indicated as requested by the defence.
So all the 'alleles' were there, in the hand of the defence prior to Oct. 4. 2008.

No, they weren't--that's the issue here.

It should be noted that the interpretation of the alleles, as recorded in the technical report, was contested by Prof. Pascali in the course of the G.U.P. [preliminary] hearing, on 10-04-2008.

The dispute concerned the interpretation of certain peaks held to be alleles by Prof. Pascali and stutter by Dr. Stefanoni.

In particular, on p.100 of the transcript of the interrogation, we read as follows:

Question (Prof. Pascali): “There a lot of peaks with neither a name nor a number of R.S.U.[=R.F.U.?]; can you give us the lot files so we can interpret them?”

Answer (Dr. Stefanoni) (pp.100-101) “So as you correctly say, the height, or rather the indication, to put it better, is, as you rightly point out, not recorded for certain peaks appearing in this electropherogram; it’s obviously true that we can see that they aren’t there, but this is for a simple reason, because since I interpreted this mix, I obviously took it as my responsibility to regard these alleles, so to speak, or these peaks, as insignificant, because from my point of view they’re stutter, they’re artifacts that are absolutely described and measured, quantified both in the literature and in the kit that I use.”

What she's saying here is that these weren't alleles, they were stutter. She wasn't calling those peaks as alleles, but as 'stutter' which is an artifact of the measuring device, they do not indicate human biological material but the limitations of the machines humans build. If you read through that page following this excerpt you'll see an exhausting discussion of what stutter is, what Stefanoni knows about it, and that she disregarded the protocols she testified to in court in order to pretend they were stutter---to conceal the fact there were other contributors to the clasp.

Now, here is what Stefanoni appended to the RTIGF in 2008. As you can see, there's no peak heights or peak areas and it is essentially worthless because the main peaks (Meredith's) all exceed the scale. She also only 'called' (as alleles) a fraction of the peaks present, pretending the rest were stutter and not labeling them let alone present peak height and area data. As you may recall from our previous discussions the peak height and area data is instrumental to determining if a peak is an allelle, stutter, or something else. She has hidden all the data that would suggest those peaks are really alleles, which figures being as she's pretending that only Raffaele and Meredith contributed to the bra clasp.

To keep track of this, note that she's calling only 3 alleles for D8S1179, the top left one. They are 13, 15 & 16.

On Oct. 4. 2008 Bongiorno admitted that the peaks area was a new request they were making that day and they didn't do before (but they had obtained the charts and data of peaks heights as they requested).

Now here is what they received, the electropherogram (for the bra clasp 165B) Stefanoni produced which was used in the Massei trial. Now we have peak heights and Stefanoni has 'found' some more alleles. For the top left one (D8S1179) we now have four alleles, she found a '12' to go along with the 13, 15 & 16 in her RTIGF.

(A side note: obviously lawyers and judges are not experts and can only discuss between each other about material that it immediately 'readable' or 'recognizable' to them; Bongiorno admitted she didn't know the difference between peask height and peaks areas).

This is a problem with lawyers, judges and juries not just in Italy, but here as well. It was probably what caused Hellmann to appoint independent experts, something Nencini will probably live to regret he didn't.

Here's what the independent experts were finally able to get from Stefanoni.

Looking at the top left one, D8S1179, you can see we now have six peaks. In addition to the 13,14, & 16 originally in the RTIGF, and adding the '12' that showed up for the ones she printed in court, we now have an '11' and a '14.' The eleven is only 39 RFUs, so going by the 50 RFU threshold it can be ignored, but as you can see from this chart there's a difference between the RTIGF and reality in a number of different locations (loci) besides just that top left one.

This is what Stefanoni was able to do because she possessed the EDFs and no one else did. As you can see she's produced three different interpretations of the bra clasp--all from the same data--but by changing the parameters of what gets labeled and given peak heights and area she changes drastically a mixture between two individuals to one with an absolute minimum of four contributors. In this case she called it a mixture between Raffaele and Meredith and wrongfully discarded the alleles which didn't conform to that view and hid the data which would allow others to challenge that.

I am rather interested in why Pascali didn't come and visit the laboratory to examine the log files under some adversarial procedure, if he really wanted to see them (do blow ups of some image detail maybe, or extract other data information).
On Oct. 4. he somehow backtracked from his Sept. 27. request of log files, and he accepted that all what he needed further was just the data about the peaks area.

All Stefanoni wanted to let him do was essentially look at a computer screen of the electropherogram, like before she printed it. That's not worth anything more the electropherogram itself. What he needed to be able to do was change the settings to show the data Stefanoni was hiding, one simple example of that is the peak height and peak area data that showed up in the electropherograms we've looked at that she produced subsequent to the ones in her RTIGF. In this instance that's all Pascali needed, though he didn't get peak area, just peak height.

The edfs are so people can see what Stefanoni is trying to hide in all the DNA work, like she was busted doing so for the bra clasp. All the peak heights, peak areas and everything else Stefanoni tried to edit out of the electropherograms she produced. Then someone should take a look at the ones she didn't produce electropherograms for, to see if there's anything interesting there. It has been established beyond doubt that Stefanoni tried to hide exculpatory evidence like the TMB negatives and the extra contributors to the bra clasp and lied about those as well as the amount of material in the knife blade, what could she possibly be hiding in the data she never let anyone see?


'A Roman wilderness of pain?'

 

[Planigale]

Thank you for the correction. I hurry and don't proof as I should and if I had done so would have written a letter from Stefanoni concerning Pascali's request. But at least there is documentation which can clear up my lapse.

I wonder what laboratories all over the world were doing in 2007-2008 regarding protocol with regards to file sharing, discovery, EDFs, etc.? And what were the judicial laws concerning such?

There is a misapprehension that the electropherograms represent the data output directly. They do not. The choice of baseline, Y scale filters and linearity will change the appearance of the graph, in particularly the low level signal that might represent contamination. Stefanoni seems to be somewhat arbitrary in her practice. Sometimes she ignores peaks over 50rfu, but on the knife blade she accepted peaks below 50. Most of the high level peaks have values over 1000. On a paper copy with a small Y scale small peaks indicating contamination are virtually invisible. There are rules for including and excluding peaks that may be due to 'stutter'. These rules may be laboratory specific, but they should not be arbitrary allowing Stefanoni to count in peaks she wants and exclude those she does not. This is suspect centered approach (which Nencini fails to understand why it is wrong).

The laboratory should have a SOP on reporting profiles, specifying criteria for excluding peaks as stutter. Also specifying definition of contamination and the action to be taken in the event of contamination. (As an aside it is inconceivable that this laboratory had no events of contamination, they either lied or failed to recognise contamination events). The defence should have access to these SOPs to make sure the profiles were consistently and correctly interpreted. This does not imply corruption on the part of Stefanoni, she is human and thus fallible.

With the EDF one can check the settings for the machine, the calibration and speed and volume of injection sample , things that will effect the size of response. One would want these to be consistent for different samples.

A good discussion can be found here
https://forensicdnaconsulting.wordp...perts’-report-in-the-amanda-knox-case-part-2/
Things to note; how compressed the paper graph is, how one can zoom in on the electronic version, and how the paper version presented in the original court document and the electric version are not from the same run.

In looking for contamination is important to look for low level signal arounf 50 RFU it is not clear that this was done, one cannot do it from the paper records provided. Since there are things one can do to alter the magnitude of the signal measured one needs to not only see the output, but also the input to see if they are comparable. If in looking at the knife Stefanoni used settings (e.g. injection time) that amplified the signal and got values around 50 rfu, in looking for contamination in samples with different settings one might want tools for peaks above 30. One only knows this from the EDF.

ETA Kaosium (changed to caesium by my spell check) above has described the issues very well.

 

[Dan O.]

I may not have fully replied to this bit:

Patrizia Stefanoni is a real doctor and anyone who states the contrary should be aware of the rebound of his unproven statements on his own credibility.

It has a simple rebuttal: Matriculation must be proven.

Would it be so difficult to provide a link confirming Stefanoni's credentials? Either Machiavelli has nothing and is playing some kind of game or Machiavelli is withholding the evidence as some kind of game. Either way, it is Machiavelli's own credibility that is lost.

I did due diligence in researching before making my claim. I was able to find the other Patrizia Stefanoni that really is a doctor and provides verifiable links to prove it. It is a shame that a charlatan is soiling a good name so reference to the misdeeds of the forensics spurt need to be distinguished from the real Doctor Patrizia Stefanoni.

Could there be information that I missed that would change my stance: Possibly. I expect there is a lot of data that I don't have. When I revisit a subject I'll make a few more searches just to see if anything new pops up. So far I haven't seen anything that goes beyond "40 years (going on 48), BA in Biological Sciences". But I'll let everyone here know if I do.

 

[Planigale]

I may not have fully replied to this bit:

​

It has a simple rebuttal: Matriculation must be proven.

Would it be so difficult to provide a link confirming Stefanoni's credentials? Either Machiavelli has nothing and is playing some kind of game or Machiavelli is withholding the evidence as some kind of game. Either way, it is Machiavelli's own credibility that is lost.

I did due diligence in researching before making my claim. I was able to find the other Patrizia Stefanoni that really is a doctor and provides verifiable links to prove it. It is a shame that a charlatan is soiling a good name so reference to the misdeeds of the forensics spurt need to be distinguished from the real Doctor Patrizia Stefanoni.

Could there be information that I missed that would change my stance: Possibly. I expect there is a lot of data that I don't have. When I revisit a subject I'll make a few more searches just to see if anything new pops up. So far I haven't seen anything that goes beyond "40 years (going on 48), BA in Biological Sciences". But I'll let everyone here know if I do.

According to Stefanoni

"Mi sono laureata in Biologia, presso la Facoltà di Scienze dell'Università di Napoli Federico II, nel 1995." She did a laurea sperimentale as part of this, this would be the final year research project most science graduates will do for their BSc. Her degree may be the equivalent of a BSc or a BSc/MSc program, but it not equivalent to a PhD.

 

[LondonJohn]

I am rather interested in why Pascali didn't come and visit the laboratory to examine the log files under some adversarial procedure, if he really wanted to see them (do blow ups of some image detail maybe, or extract other data information).
On Oct. 4. he somehow backtracked from his Sept. 27. request of log files, and he accepted that all what he needed further was just the data about the peaks area.

Oh dear. You are still apparently labouring under the delusion that the letter from Stefanoni was an invitation to Pascali to come and view the EDFs. It was not. It was a letter from Stefanoni to Micheli trying to persuade him (Micheli) from not allowing Pascali to see the EDFs.

I suggest you read the letter again. It explicitly says that the "offer" of granting Pascali access to the EDFs (under those crazy and improper conditions....) is wholly contingent on Micheli making an order to that effect. In other words, Micheli would first have had to order that Pascali can see the EDFs before Pascali would even have the chance of evaluating whether the conditions Stefanoni was attaching to her offer were reasonable.

To make it easy for you, I'll provide the relevant passage from the letter (in English translation) to show you where you're going wrong (bracketed italics for comprehension):

If (you, Judge Micheli) rule that this computer data should be provided (to Pascali) ((in which case it would be) unique in the history of forensic work known in this office) the writer (Stefanoni) is prepared to provide (the data), under the conditions that.....


So what you should be asking yourself is not why Pascali didn't come and visit Stefanoni's laboratory to view the EDFs. Instead, you should be asking yourself why Micheli didn't order that Pascali should even be allowed to see the EDFs. If Micheli didn't grant that order, then Pascali had no chance of seeing the EDFs, conditions or no conditions attached.

 

[LondonJohn]

The highlighted part doesn't exist in Stefanoni's letter, neither explicitly nor implicitly.
What may be suggested implicitly in Stefanoni's letter, is that Pascali may think that Stefanoni is a fraud (not that Micheli thinks so).

What Stefanoni then states - textually, and nothing more than this - is that the log files are not indispensable to an expert, but if the judge decides to release them then she is ready to present them; in that event they shall be viewed under controlled conditions (through some adversarial procedure).

Ah what you've done here is that you've selectively highlighted. The part immediately preceding your highlighted section is crucial. It is the words "Stefanoni seeks to imply".

I'll explain it again. Stefanoni is telling Micheli that Pascali doesn't need the EDFs in order to do his analysis. She's also telling Micheli that EDFs are never provided to the defence teams. And she's also telling Micheli that the only reason Pascali might want/need to see the EDFs is if he (Pascali) suspects her of fraud in her own analysis.

So she's seeking to imply to Micheli that if he (Micheli) considers that Stefanoni did a good (and non-fraudulent) job, there is no reason whatsoever for him to order the release of the EDFs to Pascali. By extension, she's seeking to imply that if Micheli does order the EDFs to be released to Pascali, then he too (Micheli) must be allowing for the possibility that Stefanoni committed fraud (since otherwise there would be no reason to order the release of the EDFs).

 

[LondonJohn]

According to Stefanoni

"Mi sono laureata in Biologia, presso la Facoltà di Scienze dell'Università di Napoli Federico II, nel 1995." She did a laurea sperimentale as part of this, this would be the final year research project most science graduates will do for their BSc. Her degree may be the equivalent of a BSc or a BSc/MSc program, but it not equivalent to a PhD.

The mystery is why Machiavelli is so desperate to assert that not-a-real-doctor Stefanoni has a PhD. Perhaps it's personal......

As you point out, all the evidence point to the fact that Stefanoni has nothing more than a graduate degree. She's a competently-educated lab scientist. And that's fine. But what she's not is an accredited expert in her field. And that's important when one comes to weighing her views and opinions against those of others who really are experts in the field.

Of course one of the (many) ironies here is that a lab scientist with Stefanoni's level of qualifications and experience should have been more than capable of conducting a fair and competent examination of the DNA in this case. Unfortunately, Stefanoni provably went well beyond the limits of her own understanding in seeking to present the prosecutors with favourable results. She patently had no proper understanding of low-template DNA work, but ploughed on regardless.

And quite why she was also leading the team responsible for processing the crime scene is more than baffling. Again, she provably has no proper understanding of the correct ways to process the scene in pretty much every aspect: sealing the scene; identifying a safe access route in and out of the scene; ensuring no cross-contamination within the scene; wearing appropriate protective clothing and changing it regularly; identifying sources of forensic evidence properly; collecting forensic evidence properly, being careful to minimise the chance of contamination or other mistakes; placing forensic evidence into appropriate receptacles/envelopes/bags for transportation and storage..............etc..............

 

[Samson]

The mystery is why Machiavelli is so desperate to assert that not-a-real-doctor Stefanoni has a PhD. Perhaps it's personal......

QUOTE]
Machiavelli now states Maresca has become a friend. What is going on? Maybe Machiavelli would explain to the forum when this process began.

 

[platonov]

It's not complicated.

I don't think any of the comments are are necessarily believed by the commenters but rather posted for shock value and/or to get a reaction from others.

It is possible that the comments are deliberately derogatory and intended to hurt and insult. If so, one can only hope that those kinds of sentiments will eventually disappear from the public realm (sooner rather than later).

I did smile and smh at Strozzi's explanation about good girls in Italy.

More likely but I think the last line from my first link sums up the matter quite well.
On this agreed and it would also reduce greatly the volume of the American sex killer’s online support.

Oh, In itself it’s just typical groupie xenophobic rubbish, sure. I always let it pass. But given that it was a blatant falsehood posted, just down the page from my post with links to the original, to ‘whitewash’ Dan O’s original comment it’s nature in this case is quite apparent. That is; support Dan O’s comment without having to stand over it. The original comment is probably too ?? blatant to be regarded as a ‘dog-whistle’ but at least 20 groupies have defended it or attacked the couple of posters who commented on it.
I find the whole episode then and now it quite straightforward.

 

[Antony]

I would not doubt that Maresca's motivations include a desire for monetary gain. But he may also be motivated by a desire to support his friends in the police and judiciary (including prosecutors).

The Kerchers may not be motivated by a desire for enrichment. They may have been convinced early on, when they were emotionally vulnerable because of Meredith's murder, by the prosecution that Amanda and Raffaele were guilty. There is also "survivor's guilt": the survivor feels guilty (perhaps totally wrongly) that he could or should have done more to protect the victim, and must find someone to blame. That person might be the one who only by luck escaped being a victim herself - that is, Amanda. Had she come home to the cottage when Guede was there, rather than Meredith, she would have been the victim.

And had Meredith then been the first person on the scene on Nov 2, then she (and perhaps Giacomo Silenzi) would be fighting for her freedom right now. I shudder to think what disgusting things the guilters would find to say about the Kercher family if that had been the way this worked out.

But of course, things might have worked out differently. We don't know whether the Knox/Mellas family would have fallen victim to the equivalent manipulation and exploitation that the Kerchers were subjected to. It's easy for grief and rage to overpower reason, but there are still some relatives of murder victims (Jim Swires comes to mind) who don't go along with faulty legal processes.

 

[Diocletus]

More likely but I think the last line from my first link sums up the matter quite well.
On this agreed and it would also reduce greatly the volume of the American sex killer’s online support.

Oh, In itself it’s just typical groupie xenophobic rubbish, sure. I always let it pass. But given that it was a blatant falsehood posted, just down the page from my post with links to the original, to ‘whitewash’ Dan O’s original comment it’s nature in this case is quite apparent. That is; support Dan O’s comment without having to stand over it. The original comment is probably too ?? blatant to be regarded as a ‘dog-whistle’ but at least 20 groupies have defended it or attacked the couple of posters who commented on it.
I find the whole episode then and now it quite straightforward.

I find the unabashed, obnoxious and consistent anti-semitism on pmf to be much more interesting. They even have a whole subforum devoted to it

My question is why are wrongful conviction advocates so uniformly anti-Semitic?

 

[Diocletus]

But wasn't it during Hellmann that Novelli testified about the gap? And visited the lab and looked over the samples which had been tested prior to the gap?

I don't believe so, and any event don't believe he wrote a report on this issue. Happy to be corrected, though. Hard to believe he would be shameless enough to write a report saying in effect that instead of using proper lab technique, it's ok to have an accidental gap that serves as your control.

 

[Samson]

I find the unabashed, obnoxious and consistent anti-semitism on pmf to be much more interesting. They even have a whole subforum devoted to it

My question is why are wrongful conviction advocates so uniformly anti-Semitic?

Diocletus, I find the PMFs more challenging, regrettably, than this forum. I clicked Kaosium's music link and the Doors kept playing, yet the PMFs are obsessed with demonstrating their knowledge of classical music and ballet* (*Peter Quennell I wonder why)
My fond wish is this case will be ascribed its massive importance by a new generation of academics.

The legendary Fiona is happily home again. I thought she reviewed her take on the case with Hellmann, but that is all over. Hang em high Fiona, the lying murdering couple!!!???

 

[Chris_Halkides]

"virtually unheard of" not to release the electronic data

In response to a question on this subject, Professor Dan Krane wrote, “The biggest concern that I personally have regarding this case is the refusal of the prosecution to provide the defense with a copy of the electronic data that underlies the DNA test results -- that is virtually unheard of world-wide today and it would be especially important to review that data in a case such as this which seems to involve such low level samples.”

If Stefanoni said that such data are never released, either she is mistaken or she is correct. Yet if the latter, then Italy is not showing the rest of the world how to evaluate forensic data, to paraphrase Maresca's boast.

 

[Machiavelli]

The mystery is why Machiavelli is so desperate to assert that not-a-real-doctor Stefanoni has a PhD. Perhaps it's personal......

As you point out, all the evidence point to the fact that Stefanoni has nothing more than a graduate degree. She's a competently-educated lab scientist....

I will hit back on this lie because I am absolutely sure of winning. Because this shows how petty, false and stupid the pro-Knoxes assertions are. It is self evident - from all news sources - that Stefanoni was an assistent orifessir and had studied the field for 13 years. The stupid false myths on your part just cast light on your credibility, this is why it is worth recalling how liar the innocentisti camp is.

 

[LondonJohn]

I will hit back on this lie because I am absolutely sure of winning. Because this shows how petty, false and stupid the pro-Knoxes assertions are. It is self evident - from all news sources - that Stefanoni was an assistent orifessir and had studied the field for 13 years. The stupid false myths on your part just cast light on your credibility, this is why it is worth recalling how liar the innocentisti camp is.

So post a link to her doctoral thesis, plus any academic research where she is one of the lead authors. I could do that for any PhD-qualified person I know. But nobody here can find any such information about Stefanoni, despite numerous honest attempts to do so.

But no problem, because you should be able to find (and link to) this information for the lovely Ms Stefanoni, should you not?

PS I loved your "this is why it is worth recalling how liar the innocentisti camp is" sign-off! Lovely stuff! It's a real bind when facts matter more than unsupported opinions, isn't it

 

[LondonJohn]

PS: Have you figured out your misinterpretation of the Stefanoni letter to Micheli yet, Mach?!