Continuation Part 14: Amanda Knox/Raffaele Sollecito

[Numbers]

I'm guessing this is compensation for wrongful conviction.

Italy may try to say that Amanda is responsible for her own arrest, due to the calunnia conviction. However, giving in on that point and agreeing to a maximum payout of 500,000 to both Amanda and Raf, could be a point of concession for a friendly settlement at ECHR, along with expunging the conviction, and a declaration of innocence (if there is such a thing).

I am assuming though, that lawyers fees is a separate matter, and 'uncapped' as a result.

CPP Art. 314 is compensation for wrongful detention, including precautionary detention. I think that is all that Raffaele was imprisoned for. I am not sure if after the first provisional conviction, under Italian law, if that time in prison was considered part of the murder conviction sentence.

CPP Art. 643 is compensation for wrongful conviction when one receives a "revision" trial or retrial to correct the original conviction. As things stand now, it seems Amanda needs one to receive compensation for the prison time of about 3 years that she was sentenced to, and had already served, for calunnia.

 

[komponisto]

Yabbadabbadoooooooo!!!!!



I've not been on the forum recently, but I had to come back for this! (I did read the thread on Wednesday as well.)

Same here, by the way! (Actually I hadn't been on the forum since it moved, and was surprised to find that it had done so.)

I was convinced there would be a confirmation of the convictions. I was so shocked when Hellmann was overturned, I thought it impossible the Italian system would turn back from the road it was on. I felt so bad for Raffaele in particular.

Ditto again.

The sense of relief is overwhelming.

This, too.

Nearly four years ago, labouring under a misapprehension, I rashly predicted the Lockerbie conviction would be overturned before the Knox/Sollecito situation was favourably resolved. This very day, the High Court of Justiciary in Edinburgh kicked the current appeal application down the road again. http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/sccrc-megrahi-petition-todays.html That fight goes on.

But this one, miraculously, has resolved.

Yabbadabbadoooooooo!!!!!!!

Amen! Rolfe, I've always appreciated your contributions on this case, and as I've mentioned before, they impressed me enough to start taking Lockerbie seriously as a possible investigative and judicial failure, when it hadn't previously occurred to me to doubt the official story.

I don't know whether this has been pointed out here yet, but there's now an interesting connection between the two cases: Amanda recently interviewed Annie Lareau, who was the best friend of Theodora Cohen.

 

[komponisto]

Yo Rolfe! Hoots mon! Pity they got off without your digestion point (maybe it will be in the motivation).

They didn't need the digestion point. There was no evidence of guilt in the first place. The digestion thing was just the point that made me absolutely certain they couldn't possibly have done it, as opposed to there simply being no reason at all to believe that they were.

The digestion point was in Raffaele's appeal to the SC!

 

[Numbers]

My suggestion is that Italy should adopt rules for DNA evidence similar to those indicated by the American Bar Association. Some very sharp minds worked on them, and adopting them would not embarrass any one person in particular but would potentially prevent convictions on the basis of slipshod DNA profiling. The only idea I have for adding to the ABA standards is to include a line that indicates that such electronic records much be stored for a very long time after a conviction. It is not always true that a high profile case leads to reform. I hope that this one does.

I would suggest that the electronic records of DNA profiling be stored even after the convicted person is released from prison; perhaps for an additional 10 or 20 years, at least for major felonies including rape and murder.

 

[anglolawyer]

The digestion point was in Raffaele's appeal to the SC!

While you are here, kompo, first it's nice to see you again and second a huge thanks (to you and your collaborators) for the high quality translations of C-V and H-Z. Those were indispensable to our understanding and discussion here.

 

[carbonjam72]

There has been conversation on this thread about what now can't be said about Amanda and Raffaele, but I like to think about what now can be witten. For example, Amanda and Raffaele's books can now be published in Italy and the UK. My bet is that both books will be published in both places, perhaps with addendums.

That's a great thought. It will be interesting to see how they sell. Quite briskly I'd imagine.

Great trading posts with you,

Thanks to you as well,

Jay (MRN)

 

[codyjuneau]

I still think we should chase down those EDFs and the questura recordings if they exist.

Your contributions here, both before I started posting and since, have been immense.

I suspect that recordings of the interrogations were made but that police managers who were involved that evening and Mignini connived to deny it. If any of them retained a copy of the recordings, which probably would have been made in and retained as a digital file, they could destroy it to conceal their guilt. If others can get their hands on the file they can sell it to a media organization or publisher for a million Euros.

There is one place where such a file may exist. It could exist on a remote storage device, if the recording system at police headquarters automatically backed up files to a remote (off-site) storage device.

.
Re the highlighted part.

Prior to this case, a Perugian company, I can't remember the name offhand, installed a new co-ordinated computer system in the Questura police station. That system probably included the audio recording equipment that would have been used to record the interrogations, plus an ongoing service to automatically and routinely back up the Questura's data to the company's off-site data storage system.

Now the interesting thing is, that this same company, was later contracted to produce the video cartoon that Mignini and Commodi tried to show in court. As I recall, they were paid a sum of 180,000 Euros for it.

So was the cartoon a payoff to ensure the interrogation recordings never see the light of day?

A competent investigation should be able to find out.

Cody
.

 

[carbonjam72]

I still can't quite believe it's actually happened. And not even a fudged, "not enough evidence" from the ISC. A definitive, "they didn't do it".

I didn't expect it to be that conclusive, even if they did acquit. Amazing.

I'm not trying to blow my own horn (Ahh-ooo-gaa). But you did suggest even yesterday I think, that I was a bit over the top optimistic. And I did kind of guess right as to full acquittal with no retrial.

Now I am fully aware that a stopped clock is right twice a day, and a roll of the dice can be expected to be correctly ascertained 1 in 6 times by carefully reading the entrails of a pigeon, and I could have gotten lucky for the same reasons.

But.

Does anyone give any credence to my haribrained dietrologia theory today? I feel I've earned the right to ask.

 

[Samson]

And relevant from Amanda's blog, this is signed over there, as most well wishers are.

"Dear Amanda,
I am very happy for you, and I had tears of joy after the just Italian Supreme Court decision tonight. I always believed that you are innocent. I followed your case since the beginning, when it was reported in The New York Times in 2007. I read your book also.
I come from Croatia, part of former Yugoslavia, that was a communist dictatorship and where numerous mounted political processes were held, Many people were falsely accused and most of them admitted incrimination against themselves under pressure and torture. You are not an exception but more like the rule. There were cases where hundreds admitted crimes which they never committed, and it was later found that the secret Yugoslav police did that themselves.
I am happy for you and wish you the best of luck in life."

 

[Strozzi]

Selene Nelson is a close friend of one of Meredith's friends at her last dinner. Good luck to them, but shame on the whole tribe for deserting Meredith's truest friend.

The British women should write an article about how Mignini and the police "played" them. But it would take moral courage and self-honesty to look back critically at their pile-on behavior.

 

[carbonjam72]

Why Patrick Lumumba turned down an award from Italy for his false arrest and detention is a good question. I agree there was a news (tabloid) report that Lumumba was taking the case to the ECHR, but there is no record of it in HUDOC, under the name "Lumumba". (The only such case is a "Lumumba v Sweden" decision of inadmissible.)

Some of us have speculated that police or prosecutor pressure may have forced Lumumba to file his civil case against Amanda. But I don't know if there is concrete evidence of that. Maybe Lumumba came to see Amanda as the source of his problems with the police, rather than understanding the police had targeted him and Amanda, with Raffaele accused to deny Amanda's alibi.

I agree that Patrick probably was pressured to file a complaint against Amanda at Mignini's request, so he could get her confession heard by the trial court.

Question is, does that mean that Patrick admitting he shouldn't filed that case, would that open Patrick up to prosecution for having filed a false claim?

I don't know. Not a fan of Patrick though. I can see him as a victim as well. But only to a point.

 

[acbytesla]

CPP Art. 314 is compensation for wrongful detention, including precautionary detention. I think that is all that Raffaele was imprisoned for. I am not sure if after the first provisional conviction, under Italian law, if that time in prison was considered part of the murder conviction sentence.

CPP Art. 643 is compensation for wrongful conviction when one receives a "revision" trial or retrial to correct the original conviction. As things stand now, it seems Amanda needs one to receive compensation for the prison time of about 3 years that she was sentenced to, and had already served, for calunnia.

Thank you Numbers for all your hard work ferreting out the indesrcepancies in the DNA testing as well as your competent review of the salient laws and cases of the ECHR.

 

[Samson]

I'm not trying to blow my own horn (Ahh-ooo-gaa). But you did suggest even yesterday I think, that I was a bit over the top optimistic. And I did kind of guess right as to full acquittal with no retrial.

Now I am fully aware that a stopped clock is right twice a day, and a roll of the dice can be expected to be correctly ascertained 1 in 6 times by carefully reading the entrails of a pigeon, and I could have gotten lucky for the same reasons.

But.

Does anyone give any credence to my haribrained dietrologia theory today? I feel I've earned the right to ask.

You were right CJ and vocal. I always concurred, on the most fundamental theorem that there was too much information to perpetuate an obvious untruth.

But:

I still believe in cock up theory that morphed into conspiracy to save the contented looking thug's career. He should be jailed for 28 and a half years right now.

 

[carbonjam72]

An article posted on Salon today rehashes most of the guilder talking points. Reading it you would not have a clue that the double DNA knife was discredited long ago.

Selene is rather special. Samson has suggested she was a friend of one of Meredith's British friends (I had heard she was a sorority sister).

Selene's writings have been described as 'psychotic' in some quarters.

I feel sorry for her. She's a young person, and she'll be forever linked to those silly guilter screeds. I always thought she was being used and manipulated by Quennel or McCall, or others in the tabloid world connected to the Kerchers, and that whole PR effort, which is what it was.

I feel no need to respond to those silly arguments anymore. The cassation ruling made them all irrelevant.

Salon should have done Selene a favor, and not have published. Or made her wait a day or two, until there was time to reflect. Not that it would have helped, but it might have. Anyway, I'm done with all that.

 

[Antony]

I still can't quite believe it's actually happened. And not even a fudged, "not enough evidence" from the ISC. A definitive, "they didn't do it".

I didn't expect it to be that conclusive, even if they did acquit. Amazing.

It feels like a different world today.

Yes, I know they're just 2 individuals among thousands who've suffered similar or worse treatment in different countries, but maybe the publicity will lead to something being done about other injustices.

 

[Kauffer]

I'm guessing this is compensation for wrongful conviction.

Italy may try to say that Amanda is responsible for her own arrest, due to the calunnia conviction. However, giving in on that point and agreeing to a maximum payout of 500,000 to both Amanda and Raf, could be a point of concession for a friendly settlement at ECHR, along with expunging the conviction, and a declaration of innocence (if there is such a thing).

I am assuming though, that lawyers fees is a separate matter, and 'uncapped' as a result.

There are a number of issues here for Amanda:

1) compensation for 1 years imprisonment
2) Article 6 violation at ECHR for calunnia - just satisfaction award
3) vacation of calunnia conviction and sentence - compensation for 3 years imprisonment
4) New ECHR application - length of trial etc - just satisfaction award.

Not sure if 2 removes the compensation element of 3

Not sure what you mean by 'concessions for a friendly settlement'. All this stuff won't go into one big pot. The judiciary isn't going to get involved with the ECHR. That's the business of the government.

She stands convicted for calunnia - Cassation's acquittal hasn't and will not change that. Only the ECHR can change that. Looking at the issue a little more closely, it may well be that a friendly settlement will not work at all, because in order to trigger a vacation of conviction/retrial, you need an adjudicated Article 6 violation. Assuming that erasure of criminal record is the most important thing here for Amanda, she may need the ECHR to rule. It could get quite complex.

 

[Sergei Walankov]

Like I lot of PIPs, I spent the early part of my fascination with this case thinking Knox and Sollecito were probably implicated in some way. The first two books I read were Follain's then Nadeau's, which obviously didn't help. Komponisto's posts at Lesswrong had quite a bit to do with me coming down hard in favour of innocence.

 

[Numbers]

There are a number of issues here for Amanda:

1) compensation for 1 years imprisonment
2) Article 6 violation at ECHR for calunnia - just satisfaction award
3) vacation of calunnia conviction and sentence - compensation for 3 years imprisonment
4) New ECHR application - length of trial etc - just satisfaction award.

Not sure if 2 removes the compensation element of 3

Not sure what you mean by 'concessions for a friendly settlement'. All this stuff won't go into one big pot. The judiciary isn't going to get involved with the ECHR. That's the business of the government.

She stands convicted for calunnia - Cassation's acquittal hasn't and will not change that. Only the ECHR can change that. Looking at the issue a little more closely, it may well be that a friendly settlement will not work at all, because in order to trigger a vacation of conviction/retrial, you need an adjudicated Article 6 violation. Assuming that erasure of criminal record is the most important thing here for Amanda, she may need the ECHR to rule. It could get quite complex.

My impression is that sometimes ECHR does not allow a friendly settlement because it wishes to make statements about rights in its judgment. However, every friendly settlement entails a statement from the State that it had violated certain rights of the applicant.

 

[Samson]

The British women should write an article about how Mignini and the police "played" them. But it would take moral courage and self-honesty to look back critically at their pile-on behavior.

I believe Amanda says she has never heard one word from anyone she met in Italy. It would be a great project for an ambitious young investigative journalist to seek interviews with each and every one. I would find the reading riveting.

 

[acbytesla]

That's a great thought. It will be interesting to see how they sell. Quite briskly I'd imagine.

Great trading posts with you,

Thanks to you as well,

Jay (MRN)

Great trading posts to you as well. I know I was a minor contributor compared to the likes of Rolfe, Numbers, Chris, Kaosium, Charles Wilkes, Dan O, Anglo YOU and so many others I am failing to mention.. (please forgive me) I just hope I contributed a little something to the discussions the last 4 years.

Tim McGraw.
aka actesla