Continuation Part 15: Amanda Knox/Raffaele Sollecito

[Bill Williams]

I didn't say anything of the sort. Only a court of law can ascertain guilt or not thereof.
IMHO Richard Owen reported entirely in good faith. The police, too, IMV, had genuine foundation for their belief, for example, a witness report or receipt/s, which they relayed to Owen, again in good faith, but subsequently turned out to be mistaken, a receipt for something else or a mistaken shopkeeper. I remain sceptical the information was imaginary or imparted in bad faith.

Think about it. You are a policeman. How stupid would you look if you deliberately "framed" someone, and then the real culprit turns up later.

In a court trial, it is quite common for a defendant to be charged with just a few specimen charges, rather than all of them (eg., Harold Shipman).

Likewise, with evidence, in this case, there were over 468 physical samples alone. It would be impractical and unwieldy to focus on every single one of them at the hearing.
The policeman in court testified he could not trace where the bleach was bought. But the two bottles do exist.

Why? Do you only focus on the samples that prove guilt and ignore those which tend to exonerate?

The difficulty of "impractical and unwieldy" is not a problem for the defnece, it is the duty of the prosecution to make the case, beyond a reasonable doubt - and ignoring things because of impracticality or unwieldiness does not serve justice.

In fact this sounds a lot like Patrizia Stefanoni's reaction to being asked to make full disclosure. When being asked to release the raw data files, she wrote to the court saying that she would "release" them, only if she got to control the way they were released, and that the complainers came to her lab.

It is telling that many who have implied guilt for AK and RS over the years have sided with this "limited release of data". Full disclosure is an embedded part of rightful judicial practise for a reason.

 

[Kauffer]

I didn't say anything of the sort. Only a court of law can ascertain guilt or not thereof.
IMHO Richard Owen reported entirely in good faith. The police, too, IMV, had genuine foundation for their belief, for example,a witness report or receipt/s, which they relayed to Owen, again in good faith, but subsequently turned out to be mistaken, a receipt for something else or a mistaken shopkeeper. I remain sceptical the information was imaginary or imparted in bad faith.

Think about it. You are a policeman. How stupid would you look if you deliberately "framed" someone, and then the real culprit turns up later.
In a court trial, it is quite common for a defendant to be charged with just a few specimen charges, rather than all of them (eg., Harold Shipman).

Likewise, with evidence, in this case, there were over 468 physical samples alone. It would be impractical and unwieldy to focus on every single one of them at the hearing.

The policeman in court testified he could not trace where the bleach was bought. But the two bottles do exist.

[/HILITE]

1) How difficult was it to establish that all of the receipts in question apart from one came from the time before the murder and that none of them relates to the purchase of bleach? You brought up these reports for evidence against Amanda and Raffaele. Yet they were untrue, as you have had explained to you but still cannot admit.
2) The real culprit, Guede, did "turn up later", or rather, after the police had stupidly declared that the case was closed having arrested three innocents, instead of waiting for the evidence to be processed revealing Guede's incontrovertible guilt thus wrecking the theory of the crime. Rather than backtrack, the police and prosecutor decided to double down on the innocents, until Lumumba's alibi witness humiliated them. Yet still they would not stop.
3) Bottles of bleach "do exist" in my kitchen. Like Raffaele, I am also not guilty of anybody's murder.

 

[Wattson]

However, if someone insists on approaching this from a suspect-centric point of view, then it's easier to think of it as bleach.

And if your only aim is to keep the fantasy alive then it "must" be bleach.

 

[Dan O.]

I always laugh about the bleach. Consider the testimony of the police saying there was the smell of bleach at Raffaele's apartment. One, I use bleach all the time to clean countertops, rags and of course white clothes. Second, the smell of bleach doesn't last that long and Meredith was killed on the first and this was the fifth. Third, Raffaele hadn't been in his flat for about 12 hours. None of this is incriminating unless keeping clean is against the law.

You may be making the same mistake I had when first examining this bleach smell report. I had assumed that the bleach was smelled when the police took Raffaele back to his flat in the morning of the 6th which is also when they collected the knives. But in Oreste Volturno's testimony his visit to the cottage was on November 8.

Oreste also says that the flat had been sealed for 3 days but there are not 3 days between these visits. And when were they supposed to be using this bleach in the flat? The house cleaner was there in the afternoon starting after 14:00. That evening they were out at a friends place having dinner. They arrive at the police station at sometime before 22:30 and are both arrested by the next morning.

 

[Dan O.]

Richard Owen is a journalist.

Richard Owen was a journalist. He put down his pen and retired in 2010 before the Hellmann trial even got started.

 

[acbytesla]

I didn't say anything of the sort. Only a court of law can ascertain guilt or not thereof.
IMHO Richard Owen reported entirely in good faith. The police, too, IMV, had genuine foundation for their belief, for example, a witness report or receipt/s, which they relayed to Owen, again in good faith, but subsequently turned out to be mistaken, a receipt for something else or a mistaken shopkeeper. I remain sceptical the information was imaginary or imparted in bad faith.

Think about it. You are a policeman. How stupid would you look if you deliberately "framed" someone, and then the real culprit turns up later.

In a court trial, it is quite common for a defendant to be charged with just a few specimen charges, rather than all of them (eg., Harold Shipman).

Likewise, with evidence, in this case, there were over 468 physical samples alone. It would be impractical and unwieldy to focus on every single one of them at the hearing.

The policeman in court testified he could not trace where the bleach was bought. But the two bottles do exist.

Actually to a certain degree, I think it is possible that Richard Owen was told by someone that worked for the Perugian authorities the misinformation he reported in his articles. But that doesn't mean it was a reliable source. The fact that Owen didn't NAME his source should clue you in on how reliable the source was.

Your faith that this information that you think is incriminating seems absurd to thinking unbiased observers. There is no reason that such evidence wouldn't be presented at the trial. Remember, this is the same prosecution team that presented the noise ticket of Amanda's. They threw everything at Raff and Amanda including the kitchen sink.

All of us can believe what we want. Kids believe in Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy and the Wizard of Oz. But that doesn't make them true. Believing in the accuracy of newspaper articles seems foolish to me considering just how often they are wrong.

Smart people learn to read between the lines or just reserve judgement until the facts are in. This is what your post is missing. The patience and the willingness to cross check it against the trial itself. It would seem that anyone judging someone of a capital crime would ignore information from unnamed sources.

But maybe that's just me.

 

[acbytesla]

I didn't say anything of the sort. Only a court of law can ascertain guilt or not thereof.
IMHO Richard Owen reported entirely in good faith. The police, too, IMV, had genuine foundation for their belief, for example, a witness report or receipt/s, which they relayed to Owen, again in good faith, but subsequently turned out to be mistaken, a receipt for something else or a mistaken shopkeeper. I remain sceptical the information was imaginary or imparted in bad faith.

Think about it. You are a policeman. How stupid would you look if you deliberately "framed" someone, and then the real culprit turns up later.

In a court trial, it is quite common for a defendant to be charged with just a few specimen charges, rather than all of them (eg., Harold Shipman).

Likewise, with evidence, in this case, there were over 468 physical samples alone. It would be impractical and unwieldy to focus on every single one of them at the hearing.

The policeman in court testified he could not trace where the bleach was bought. But the two bottles do exist.

Are you suggesting that the the ECHR could be minded to throw the Italian state a bone as a reward perhaps for the magnanimous gesture of its Supreme Court ruling in favour of Amanda in the main case?

In order for this to happen, the ECHR would have to reverse itself - to over turn a consistent and robust jurisprudence with regard to the procedural rights of suspects and conclude instead that statements made without benefit of counsel can, after all, be used to convict even when such statements are not adopted by a defendant.

Such a ruling would send shockwaves around Europe and indeed the world. The implications of it would substantially affect and place extraordinary limitations upon the ability of future applicants to argue meaningfully for violations of their human rights while under police interrogation.

Imagine the United States reversing Miranda. Imagine, if you will, the United States revoking the 5th, 6th and even 14th amendments.

Actually I don't have a clue about this. Still in the scheme of things the callunia conviction is a minor offense and the ECHR has a large backlog. I also think that they might not always want to be overturning different countries legal decisions. That there might be political ramifications I am unaware of.

 

[Desert Fox]

I always laugh about the bleach. Consider the testimony of the police saying there was the smell of bleach at Raffaele's apartment. One, I use bleach all the time to clean countertops, rags and of course white clothes. Second, the smell of bleach doesn't last that long and Meredith was killed on the first and this was the fifth. Third, Raffaele hadn't been in his flat for about 12 hours. None of this is incriminating unless keeping clean is against the law.

Lastly, how can a jury consider as evidence what someone thought they smelled?

Personally, I think the cops just made up the smell story because it sounds incriminating. How does any defense attorney respond to that?

I think a closed room might allow the smell of bleach to remain a little longer. Still, probably not days.

You see this in many cases where the prosecutors will throw everything they can, no matter how stupid, in an effort to get something to stick.

 

[acbytesla]

I didn't say anything of the sort. Only a court of law can ascertain guilt or not thereof.
IMHO Richard Owen reported entirely in good faith. The police, too, IMV, had genuine foundation for their belief, for example, a witness report or receipt/s, which they relayed to Owen, again in good faith, but subsequently turned out to be mistaken, a receipt for something else or a mistaken shopkeeper. I remain sceptical the information was imaginary or imparted in bad faith.

Think about it. You are a policeman. How stupid would you look if you deliberately "framed" someone, and then the real culprit turns up later.

In a court trial, it is quite common for a defendant to be charged with just a few specimen charges, rather than all of them (eg., Harold Shipman).

Likewise, with evidence, in this case, there were over 468 physical samples alone. It would be impractical and unwieldy to focus on every single one of them at the hearing.

The policeman in court testified he could not trace where the bleach was bought. But the two bottles do exist.

Why do You think that Richard Owen reported in good faith? Do you know him? You are familiar with how much back checking he does on his reports. You know that him
and the editorial staff at the Times have no interest in selling the advertising that comes with a salacious story.

As for policemen I think your perspective is way off base. One, you don't even know if Owen's source is a police officer. Two, the source isn't "framing" anyone since trials don't take place in the papers. Three, what does he care what Owen writes in an English language paper?

You act as if any of these people are actually held accountable for their inaccuracies.

 

[davefoc]

I didn't say anything of the sort. Only a court of law can ascertain guilt or not thereof.
IMHO Richard Owen reported entirely in good faith. The police, too, IMV, had genuine foundation for their belief, for example, a witness report or receipt/s, which they relayed to Owen, again in good faith, but subsequently turned out to be mistaken, a receipt for something else or a mistaken shopkeeper. I remain sceptical the information was imaginary or imparted in bad faith.

Think about it. You are a policeman. How stupid would you look if you deliberately "framed" someone, and then the real culprit turns up later.

In a court trial, it is quite common for a defendant to be charged with just a few specimen charges, rather than all of them (eg., Harold Shipman).

Likewise, with evidence, in this case, there were over 468 physical samples alone. It would be impractical and unwieldy to focus on every single one of them at the hearing.

The policeman in court testified he could not trace where the bleach was bought. But the two bottles do exist.

At this point you do believe the receipts don't exist and never did exist? So your claim here is that Owen reported false information that was reported to him by a person he believed to be reliable? And further your claim here is that the likely explanation is that the person that Owen believed to be reliable made an unintentional mistake when he confused miscellaneous receipts including one for pizza with a receipt for bleach?

All right, it seems farfetched to me. But since we don't know who the person is that was feeding Owen information maybe he was not that smart or reliable and he just accidentally confused a pizza receipt with a bleach receipt.

Perhaps Owen was the unreliable one? Here is an excerpt from an article in "la repubblica" originally quoted by Methos dated Nov 18, 2007:

Mentre la caccia al quarto uomo continua nel massimo riserbo, il giallo di Perugia perde uno dei tasselli che nelle ultime ore erano parsi risolutivi: nei verbali sulla perquisizione in casa di Raffaele Sollecito non ci sono scontrini datati 2 novembre, il giorno dopo l'assassinio della studentessa inglese Meredith Kercher. Di quei due scontrini si era parlato come di uno degli indizi più pesanti a carico del giovane che è in carcere insieme ad Amanda Knox e a Patrick Lumumba Diya, di una prova dell'acquisto in un supermercato di Perugia di due flaconi di candeggina utilizzata per far sparire ogni traccia dell'omicidio.

Google translation

While hunting the fourth man continues in strict confidentiality, the yellow of Perugia lost one of the pieces that in the last hours had seemed decisive: in the minutes on the search in the house of Raffaele Sollecito there are no receipts dated November 2, the day after the murder of British student Meredith Kercher. Of those two receipts he had spoken of as one of the clues to the heaviest load of the young man is in jail along with Amanda Knox and Patrick Diya Lumumba, a proof of purchase in a supermarket in Perugia two bottles of bleach used to any trace of the murder.

Wow, one day after the Italian press publishes facts that turn out to be true, Owen publishes information that turns out to be completely false (if I understand your conclusion with regard to the existence of the bleach receipts accurately).

No, Richard Owen is a highly trained top drawer journalist, who writes accurately and objectively. In the UK we hold dear the freedom of the press. Unfortunately, Amanda's PR machine could not compromise the integrity of our best journalists.

So Richard Owen, the highly trained, top drawer journalist, was wrong and the Italian press was right?

But surely the highly trained, top drawer journalist, Owen, wouldn't make another major blunder? And presumably the source that had accidentally confused a pizza receipt with a bleach receipt wouldn't make another accidental blunder? So when Owen reported that the Harry Potter book Knox had claimed to be reading at Sollecito's apartment was found in Knox's apartment that must be true? This reliable source wouldn't completely confuse Sollecito's apartment with Knox's apartment?

OMG, there's video of the book being found in Sollecito's apartment where Knox said it was? What is happening here? The highly trained, top drawer journalist, Owen, reported a second completely false piece of information provided to him by an informant that accidentally made another mistake?

Surely after making these two major blunders (IMO he made more than two major blunders) Owen published a retraction, because wouldn't a highly trained, top drawer journalist do that when he has been shown to be unequivocally wrong? Did Owen write a retraction? Maybe he'll put it into the paperback that he should write?

 

[Antony]

...
IMHO Richard Owen reported entirely in good faith. The police, too, IMV, had genuine foundation for their belief, for example, a witness report or receipt/s, which they relayed to Owen, again in good faith, but subsequently turned out to be mistaken, a receipt for something else or a mistaken shopkeeper. I remain sceptical the information was imaginary or imparted in bad faith.

...

Why do You think that Richard Owen reported in good faith? Do you know him? You are familiar with how much back checking he does on his reports. You know that him
and the editorial staff at the Times have no interest in selling the advertising that comes with a salacious story.

As for policemen I think your perspective is way off base. One, you don't even know if Owen's source is a police officer. Two, the source isn't "framing" anyone since trials don't take place in the papers. Three, what does he care what Owen writes in an English language paper?

You act as if any of these people are actually held accountable for their inaccuracies.

Not only that, but Vixen has done more ducking-and-weaving over the bleach receipts. She originally cited the Richard Owen report as confirmation that AK and/or RS bought bleach after the murder, and by implication that it was used to clean up the crime scene.

Now having been shown that the bleach receipts never existed, and there is no evidence of any bleach ever being used, she turns it into a discussion on Richard Owen's integrity as a reporter, and the reasonableness of the police beliefs about what had happened following the murder.

Vixen, no bleach was ever used. However, this didn't stop the police and prosecution deliberately planting stories in the Italian and English press in order to create an atmosphere of guilt among the public. Richard Owen and others were all too eager to act as mouthpieces for these false stories, and you bringing them up now only shows the bankruptcy of your arguments. Live with it.

 

[Bill Williams]

IMHO Richard Owen reported entirely in good faith.

Why do You think that Richard Owen reported in good faith? Do you know him? You are familiar with how much back checking he does on his reports. You know that him
and the editorial staff at the Times have no interest in selling the advertising that comes with a salacious story.

As for policemen I think your perspective is way off base. One, you don't even know if Owen's source is a police officer. Two, the source isn't "framing" anyone since trials don't take place in the papers. Three, what does he care what Owen writes in an English language paper?

You act as if any of these people are actually held accountable for their inaccuracies.

Timothy Egan of the NY Times eventually got over to Perugia to report from a more main-line news-outlet, than those originals who were servicing the English tabloids.

Egan reported behaviours contrary to what Vixen holds as an opinion. Egan saw many third-level stringers in competition with one another for the tabloids attention, and paycheque.

Egan - like the story of the Winterbottom film - saw that there were two levels to this - the events of the horrid murder itself; but more profoundly for him as a main-stream journalist.....

...... the out-of-control tabloidization of the early coverage of the case around "Foxy Knoxy", whoever that caricature was. Egan reported that it was a simple matter for those third-level stringers: either lurid-up your report, or you don't get picked up that day.

Although the following is not part of Egan's reporting - connected to this is that factoid that somehow the US press - including the NYTimes, Egan, CNN, etc. - has been bought off by the PR machine from Seattle.

It's connected because eventually the tide DID turn - even Rolling Stone did an article on how ludicrous the prosecution's case against AK and RS was. Of course, what did guilters say? Rolling Stone had knuckled under to the PR supertanker from Seattle.

Ya, right.

The truth is that people like Andrea Vogt and Barbie Latza Nadeau saw their own opportunities dry up because they were, and are, part of the problem Egan detected. Nadeau doesn't have to worry, because of them all, she's by far been the most successful in monetizing her coverage.

To say, though, that Richard Owen, "reported entirely in good faith," is not a sentiment shared by many. Owen simply swallowed the prosecution case whole, without any reference at all to........

...... well, let's put it this way. With no reference to the facts that led to the complete exoneration of AK and RS within Italy's own courts.

The stunning thing is that there are still those who believe that (at least indirectly) the phantom-PR campaign from Seattle managed to spring two guilty people. Those numbers are few, and the hates websites which've been spreading that have either closed or are withering.....

 

[Samzilla]

I always laugh about the bleach. Consider the testimony of the police saying there was the smell of bleach at Raffaele's apartment. One, I use bleach all the time to clean countertops, rags and of course white clothes. Second, the smell of bleach doesn't last that long and Meredith was killed on the first and this was the fifth. Third, Raffaele hadn't been in his flat for about 12 hours. None of this is incriminating unless keeping clean is against the law.

Lastly, how can a jury consider as evidence what someone thought they smelled?

Personally, I think the cops just made up the smell story because it sounds incriminating. How does any defense attorney respond to that?

Regarding the bolded, I testified in a drunk driver case once (saw someone stuck on a median late at night, stopped to let him use my road-side assistance card thinking it was your average accident only to see he was stone cold drunk).

I was asked on the stand if I smelled alcohol. So I can see how a similar question could be asked in this case.

That being said, as others have pointed out, the bleach evidence is very weak in this case and hardly the smoking gun (it wasn't used at the murder scene to clean up, it's not on the knife, they didn't buy any the morning after, etc.).

 

[Desert Fox]

Why do You think that Richard Owen reported in good faith? Do you know him? You are familiar with how much back checking he does on his reports. You know that him
and the editorial staff at the Times have no interest in selling the advertising that comes with a salacious story.

As for policemen I think your perspective is way off base. One, you don't even know if Owen's source is a police officer. Two, the source isn't "framing" anyone since trials don't take place in the papers. Three, what does he care what Owen writes in an English language paper?

You act as if any of these people are actually held accountable for their inaccuracies.

With the West Memphis Three, Gary Gitchell paraded the West Memphis Three in front of the media, presented a whole lot of garbage in front of the media about cults. He said that the case against them was an "11" while it was below a 1 on a 1 to 10.

Cops lie.

 

[Kauffer]

Actually I don't have a clue about this. Still in the scheme of things the callunia conviction is a minor offense and the ECHR has a large backlog. I also think that they might not always want to be overturning different countries legal decisions. That there might be political ramifications I am unaware of.

There is a misunderstanding here. It is not the severity of the alleged offence, that leads to a conviction, which is relevant to the court, but the nature, severity and consequences of the alleged rights violations with respect to a conviction.

Indeed the leading case, which established the right of early assistance of a lawyer involved an applicant who had been convicted "merely" of participating in an illegal demonstration. Yet the ruling was devastating to the procedures and practices employed, apparently lawfully, by numerous Council of Europe member states and led to widespread changes in states' procedural law.

The ECHR does indeed have a large backlog and as such, prioritises cases so that those where there is a substantial risk to the life or health of an applicant are dealt with most urgently. (Rule 39). Amanda Knox's application is not in this category, but that is not to suggest the court regards it as relatively unimportant, merely that she is not in immediate danger.

If a case is admissible, the court is bound to hear it unless the parties to the case can agree a friendly settlement. Amanda's application, as we have often discussed here, meets the admissibility criteria. Interestingly, however, it would appear that Italy is not in a position to offer an annulment of her verdict as a settlement and so, if she wants an annulment (and the indications are that she does), then she will probably have to obtain a judgement in her favour that her trial was not fair. The court's jurisprudence supports her.

There really is no question of "political ramifications" affecting a judgement, which is unlikely to be forthcoming within the next eighteen months. Furthermore, the ECHR will not in any case over turn the verdict. But in supporting a claim of a violation of Amanda's Article 6 rights, the Italian courts, driven by Italy's own now convention compliant law on the subject, will move themselves to annul the verdict.

 

[sept79]

Actually I don't have a clue about this. Still in the scheme of things the callunia conviction is a minor offense and the ECHR has a large backlog. I also think that they might not always want to be overturning different countries legal decisions. That there might be political ramifications I am unaware of.

I believe that financially the callunia conviction is quite huge. Amanda Knox (and the Knox family) does not receive false imprisonment payments from Italy since she served four years for the callunia conviction. Also, how fair is it living one's life having been convicted of a felony for which four years were spent in incarceration?

 

[Desert Fox]

I believe that financially the callunia conviction is quite huge. Amanda Knox (and the Knox family) does not receive false imprisonment payments from Italy since she served four years for the callunia conviction. Also, how fair is it living one's life having been convicted of a felony for which four years were spent in incarceration?

I believe you can get something like twenty years in jail for callunia?
If so, it sounds like potentially an extremely serious charge.
Most of us her consider her to have been coerced into implicating Patrick so it is a very serious crime that the Italian police essentially used her to hide their own screw ups.

 

[acbytesla]

Regarding the bolded, I testified in a drunk driver case once (saw someone stuck on a median late at night, stopped to let him use my road-side assistance card thinking it was your average accident only to see he was stone cold drunk).

I was asked on the stand if I smelled alcohol. So I can see how a similar question could be asked in this case.
That being said, as others have pointed out, the bleach evidence is very weak in this case and hardly the smoking gun (it wasn't used at the murder scene to clean up, it's not on the knife, they didn't buy any the morning after, etc.).

I'm sure it can be asked. But I wouldn't feel comfortable giving that detail much consideration in convicting anyone of a crime. Even in a DUI case, I'd be hesitant to give that much weight even though I think it is far more probable that a patrolman would be very familiar with an alcohol smell.

 

[davefoc]

Could somebody help a bit with the Google translation of this sentence from the article Methos quoted from?
http://www.repubblica.it/2007/11/se...a3/fidanzato-meredith/fidanzato-meredith.html

Mentre la caccia al quarto uomo continua nel massimo riserbo, il giallo di Perugia perde uno dei tasselli che nelle ultime ore erano parsi risolutivi: nei verbali sulla perquisizione in casa di Raffaele Sollecito non ci sono scontrini datati 2 novembre, il giorno dopo l'assassinio della studentessa inglese Meredith Kercher

Google translates it as the yellow of Perugia

Giallo seems to be some sort of Italian slang but I couldn't figure out what it means after looking around the web a bit. In one place it was translated as murder. The title of the article is "Giallo Perugia, in casa di Sollecito nessuno scontrino del 2 novembre", Perugian murder sort of makes sense maybe. So perhaps the expression, il giallo di Perugia perde uno dei tasselli, means something like the murder case of Perugia lost a piece...?

The thing that got me going on this was that the translation contains the phrase, he had spoken of, and I tried to figure out who he referred to. Could anybody help with that as well?

...Of those two receipts he had spoken of as one of the clues to the heaviest load of the young man is in jail along with Amanda Knox and Patrick Diya Lumumba, a proof of purchase in a supermarket in Perugia two bottles of bleach used to any trace of the murder...

 

[acbytesla]

I believe that financially the callunia conviction is quite huge. Amanda Knox (and the Knox family) does not receive false imprisonment payments from Italy since she served four years for the callunia conviction. Also, how fair is it living one's life having been convicted of a felony for which four years were spent in incarceration?

I don't disagree at all, but compared to a murder charge it is small potatoes. I was just wildly speculating. I have no knowledge or any real understanding of the ECHR process or European politics. My sincere hope is that it is overturned and Italy writes a big check to both Knox and Sollecito.