Continuation Part 16: Amanda Knox/Raffaele Sollecito

[Grinder]

I think that people on both sides of the case debate have gotten the source of various things confused. There are a lot of things that were reported by the media that end up being attributed to Mignini, or other PLE members. It may be that people mix up the sources, or that they assume when the media reports something, it came from Mignini. Not sure.

I never remembered Mignini saying he had bleach receipts but more importantly Moore states that Mignini said this at the "case closed" presser. There is nothing I can find from that date or the next couple of dates of any mention of bleach receipts.

If something as open as statements at a press conference are incorrectly put forward by Moore then his statements that are completely unverifiable are of diminished if any value.

I show no favorites. When Vixen put forward the account of the maids, I pointed out how strange it is that the second maid said she never saw any bleach and had specifically been told not to use bleach. Was she also told not to use hydrochloric acid? Uranium?

 

[Grinder]

It would be better to say that a Nov. 1 visit by the police would have been motivated probably by the prank call (most likely not yet traced by the police, possibly not considered very important) and a new event that alarmed the Lana family, such as hearing or seeing something being thrown into the grounds of their residence. The police would not have known that the objects tossed in were phones; they could have been one or more dangerous objects related to the prank.

ETA: I am assuming for simplicity and relative sanity that the police were unaware that they were looking for cell phones on the evening of Nov. 1.

How about the call came the 31st and they called the PP who came out. The next was a holiday so they didn't bother to go in and file a report. Why they bother at all? Then on the 2nd they found the phone and called again and then brought the phone to the station.

I'm not adept at copying the PDF witness statements into a translate but I don't see her kids mentioning a specific date only times.

Even if the kid had his date wrong and the phone had it wrong and he called the 1st and the PP went there that night at about the time the phones were thrown, so what. They are inside the house or more likely hadn't arrived and two phones land in the yard. No one would notice. They weren't searching the whole house and grounds.

I just don't see anything in this of interest to the case unless returning phones is shown to be unusual.

 

[LondonJohn]

Maybe they didn't think it had anything to do with the murder which it didn't. The time/date according to posts here came from his phone which could have been wrong but I doubt it.



I find the diligence by Italians over lost phones baffling. Why would they have searched the yard at all. Wouldn't they have just checked the toilet if anything? If a crank call was reported here I doubt anything would be done at all.



If the call came in on the 31st and the police went there then, there would be nothing to find.

I would guess that perhaps one day passed between the call and the phones being found. Even if they went out at 10:30 and looked into the house for a bomb the phones could have been thrown while they were inside. At any rate they weren't looking for phones or anything outside so I don't see any embarrassment.

I haven't read the interviews so may change mind if there is something not covered by posters.

It appears that you're totally missing my supposition.

I am suggesting that the police DID visit Lana's house on the late evening of 1st November, but that it was in regard to a totally separate matter from the bomb hoax prank call from the previous evening.

I am suggesting that Lana might have called the police twice, once on the evening of 31st October in response to the hoax call, and again the following evening (1st November, the night of the murder). I suggest that this second call might have been prompted by Lana and her family hearing strange noises in the garden (which would have been caused by the two phones being thrown from some distance into the garden). If Lana was already on edge from the previous evening's bomb threat hoax call, then I can well imagine that hearing clatters and bangs out in or near her garden might have made her call the police again.

I suggest that the police came out on 1st November in response to that second call from Lana (it may be that the police didn't even come out the previous evening in response to the bomb threat hoax call). I suggest that the police conducted some sort of search of Lana's garden in the dark, but didn't find anything. This would explain why the garden was ever the focus of any attention at all (the bomb threat hoax was all about a bomb in the toilet), and it would also help to explain how and why Lana's family might have been looking in the garden themselves the following morning (2nd November), at which time they found the two phones - firstly the Italian phone which was laying in plain view on the grass, then later the UK phone which was concealed in shrubbery or longer grass, and which was discovered because it rang out.

And I'm suggesting that the reason why the police and PM - with the complicity (and/or probably coerced confusion) of Lana - decided to pretend that the bomb threat hoax had taken place on 1st November was that they could then plausibly assert that the responding officers were looking for evidence of a bomb in an inside toilet. Otherwise the police would have to explain how they had actually gone on 1st November to investigate noises coming from the area of the garden, had performed some sort of (probably inadequate) search of the garden, and had failed to find either phone - even the one that was laying out in the open.

 

[LondonJohn]

It would be better to say that a Nov. 1 visit by the police would have been motivated probably by the prank call (most likely not yet traced by the police, possibly not considered very important) and a new event that alarmed the Lana family, such as hearing or seeing something being thrown into the grounds of their residence. The police would not have known that the objects tossed in were phones; they could have been one or more dangerous objects related to the prank.

ETA: I am assuming for simplicity and relative sanity that the police were unaware that they were looking for cell phones on the evening of Nov. 1.

Yes, I agree entirely. But the important point is that it would be extremely unlikely for a police visit in the late evening of 1st November to have been purely in response to a bomb threat hoax call from over 24 hours earlier (which was also apparently reported over 24 hours earlier).

This is the very jist of my supposition. I am saying that there was some sort of second event which took place on the late evening of 1st November, which prompted Lana to call the police again. As you imply, she was probably still frightened by the previous night's prank call, and the police could easily have linked the two incidents together as you say.

And the critical point is that since this second event might very well (and logically) have been the noise made by Guede throwing the two phones from distance into Lana's garden, it's very likely that what Lana would have reported (in this second report) would have been strange and worrying noises coming from the area of the garden. And that's precisely why I'm suggesting that the police indeed came to Lana's house on the late evening of 1st November, but not so much to investigate the bomb threat from the previous night, but rather to investigate this new report of strange noises in the garden.

And that right there would explain why the police might have ended up lying about the order of events (and completely eliminating the second incident and Lana's second report): it would have come out that the police were specifically called to investigate noises in the garden, yet they'd failed to search properly enough to find either of the two phones which would have been laying there at that time - one of them out in the open. Instead, the police might have decided to pretend that they only ever attended Lana's house to investigate the bomb in the toilet, thereby excusing them for not finding the phones since they wouldn't have been at all focussed on the garden if it was only the toilet bomb they were investigating.

 

[Numbers]

Unfortunately I strongly suspect that this was one more case of the defence teams failing to nail down this matter properly before or during the Massei trial, or during the first appeals. They could easily have subpoenaed the phone records of this kid and discovered exactly when the call was placed. And then in court, the unified tale told by Lana and the police would have been immediately falsifiable, with obvious implications about the credibility of the police in particular.

In addition, the defence could have argued that either a) the police did not visit Lana's house on the night of the murder at all, or b) if the police did visit Lana's house on the night of the murder, something else must have caused their visit (why would the police visit the house over 24 hours after the hoax call was made and reported, and outside normal work hours at that?).

And lastly, the defence could have argued that had the police visited and searched Lana's house and garden on the night of the murder, and had they found the phones at that point, the investigation could (even would) have been very different, and there's even an outside possibility that Kercher's life might have been saved.

I suspect there were three problems with the defense going too deeply into this issue.

First, it was useful only as a possible limit to TOD and would required police records to find when the Lana family had called the police on Nov. 1 (assuming that is when they called, as was stated). The alleged TOD, IIUC, was changed to a later time during the trial to avoid the defendants' alibi.

Second, would anyone admit that the call was for something more than the Oct. 31 prank call? Filippo Bartolozzi, head of the communications police testified that Ms. Lana's concern was that the prank call was an attempt to get the family to leave their house so that it could be burglarized; he testified that thefts had occurred previously at their house. The police could claim Lana waited a day to call them. (But why would she have waited about 24 hours, to call at night, rather than calling during the day on Nov. 1, since she received the call at 9:48 pm on Oct. 31?)

Third, access to police records would have been needed to establish what had happened and when, and based on the experience with the Stefanoni lab records, I suspect that defense lawyers in Italy know better than to press for such records.

 

[Numbers]

Yes, I agree entirely. But the important point is that it would be extremely unlikely for a police visit in the late evening of 1st November to have been purely in response to a bomb threat hoax call from over 24 hours earlier (which was also apparently reported over 24 hours earlier).

This is the very jist of my supposition. I am saying that there was some sort of second event which took place on the late evening of 1st November, which prompted Lana to call the police again. As you imply, she was probably still frightened by the previous night's prank call, and the police could easily have linked the two incidents together as you say.

And the critical point is that since this second event might very well (and logically) have been the noise made by Guede throwing the two phones from distance into Lana's garden, it's very likely that what Lana would have reported (in this second report) would have been strange and worrying noises coming from the area of the garden. And that's precisely why I'm suggesting that the police indeed came to Lana's house on the late evening of 1st November, but not so much to investigate the bomb threat from the previous night, but rather to investigate this new report of strange noises in the garden.

And that right there would explain why the police might have ended up lying about the order of events (and completely eliminating the second incident and Lana's second report): it would have come out that the police were specifically called to investigate noises in the garden, yet they'd failed to search properly enough to find either of the two phones which would have been laying there at that time - one of them out in the open. Instead, the police might have decided to pretend that they only ever attended Lana's house to investigate the bomb in the toilet, thereby excusing them for not finding the phones since they wouldn't have been at all focussed on the garden if it was only the toilet bomb they were investigating.

Yes, I agree with this scenario as being likely based on the available information and its contradictions. I suggest that the police may have been looking for something like pipe bombs, other explosive devices, or even persons intruding into the garden.

In the US, "pranks" in which pipe bombs or similar devices are placed in mail boxes or elsewhere on a property are not unknown.

 

[davefoc]

Several posters and one or two recently have put forward the meme that the police stated early on that they had bleach receipts from the morning after. I searched and searched to no avail. Dan O.'s post indicated that the first account of this was from the 16th IIRC.

...

I thought I had followed the bleach receipt discussion and I hadn't noticed a post claiming that the police said they had recovered bleach receipts or that the prosecution said that bleach receipts existed.

One poster made the claim that bleach receipts existed, but that same poster made a post that described the fact that the police tried to find the source of the bleach in Sollecito's apartment by interviewing different merchants in town. This fact, by itself, would strongly suggest no bleach receipts ever existed because if they had the police would have gone immediately to the merchant where the bleach was purchased. Additional evidence with regard to the bleach receipts was put forth that for all practical purposes proved that no bleach receipts were ever found in Sollecito's apartment.

The important part of the bleach receipt story with regard to the Kercher murder case is solely to serve as one example of many that the press was disseminating false and damning evidence against AK/RS early on in this case.

Your comments about Steve Moore were interesting. As a PIP I tended to accept what Steve Moore said unskeptically, but when I heard his theory that there was an intentional knowing effort to wrongfully convict AK/RS for the purpose of hiding other malfeasance I became a little more skeptical of his claims since I didn't think evidence existed to prove such a claim. If "he claims Mignini at the presser says they have the receipts of Amanda buying bleach the next morning" that is more reason to suspect that Moore is not always a reliable source of information.

 

[davefoc]

General comment on the hoax call/police search issue.

The speculation and evidence put forward has been interesting, ingenious and tantalizing. More is knowable about that situation than I ever expected. But it appears now that all the theorizing and speculating has reached the limit of what it can achieve without an influx of additional data. This is one more of these little sub mysteries associated with the case that might be solvable if one had access to the appropriate information and witnesses. Barring that it looks like this will remain an annoying loose end.

ETA: One thing that would be nice to come out of the various posts above on this would be a summary of the issue including an overview of the evidence available and the theories associated with the issue.

 

[Grinder]

I thought I had followed the bleach receipt discussion and I hadn't noticed a post claiming that the police said they had recovered bleach receipts or that the prosecution said that bleach receipts existed.

One poster made the claim that bleach receipts existed, but that same poster made a post that described the fact that the police tried to find the source of the bleach in Sollecito's apartment by interviewing different merchants in town. This fact, by itself, would strongly suggest no bleach receipts ever existed because if they had the police would have gone immediately to the merchant where the bleach was purchased. Additional evidence with regard to the bleach receipts was put forth that for all practical purposes proved that no bleach receipts were ever found in Sollecito's apartment.

The important part of the bleach receipt story with regard to the Kercher murder case is solely to serve as one example of many that the press was disseminating false and damning evidence against AK/RS early on in this case.

Your comments about Steve Moore were interesting. As a PIP I tended to accept what Steve Moore said unskeptically, but when I heard his theory that there was an intentional knowing effort to wrongfully convict AK/RS for the purpose of hiding other malfeasance I became a little more skeptical of his claims since I didn't think evidence existed to prove such a claim. If "he claims Mignini at the presser says they have the receipts of Amanda buying bleach the next morning" that is more reason to suspect that Moore is not always a reliable source of information.

I gave the link and time marker - he says it clear as day.

here is one comment:

Originally Posted by Grinder View Post
Does anyone have evidence that the police officially claimed there were bleach receipts from the day after? I'm not referring to stories that tell of the receipts from police sources but actual quotes from the police or written record.

Carbonjam72 -Didn't they actually say this at their "case closed" conference? I thought Mignini was on record talking about bleach receipts?

A second poster said the same thing. Chinese whisper or telephone - Moore said it and it is repeated and repeated but it never happened.

The Moore videp was made in March of this year but he's been saying it for years.

ETA the second poster wasn't directly talking about the receipts but rather Moore's informer theory

I dont have the time either...but as I recall it was the ex-FBI guy, Moore, who had found this out through some connections in Italy.

 

[Grinder]

General comment on the hoax call/police search issue.

The speculation and evidence put forward has been interesting, ingenious and tantalizing. More is knowable about that situation than I ever expected. But it appears now that all the theorizing and speculating has reached the limit of what it can achieve without an influx of additional data. This is one more of these little sub mysteries associated with the case that might be solvable if one had access to the appropriate information and witnesses. Barring that it looks like this will remain an annoying loose end.

ETA: One thing that would be nice to come out of the various posts above on this would be a summary of the issue including an overview of the evidence available and the theories associated with the issue.

I'm surprised at some who are exploring this.

I don't see two small phones landing on grass or bushes making enough noise to alert someone inside. Were they watching TV or asleep or what? Maybe CBS can go to Lana's and do a sound test

I see no reason for the police not to be honest about the visits. If they were there when the phones landed and were inside so what?

Is there any information about pipe bombs in toilets?

 

[LondonJohn]

I'm surprised at some who are exploring this.

I don't see two small phones landing on grass or bushes making enough noise to alert someone inside. Were they watching TV or asleep or what? Maybe CBS can go to Lana's and do a sound test

I see no reason for the police not to be honest about the visits. If they were there when the phones landed and were inside so what?

Is there any information about pipe bombs in toilets?

You can't see how perhaps the phones might have fallen through the branches of trees on their way down, or even struck the roof or wall of the house and bounced back into the garden?


And once again, this is NOT about the police being there when the phones landed. Nobody - especially not me - is suggesting this.

This issue (once again) is this: If the bomb threat hoax call actually took place on the evening of 31st October, then why would the police have been at Lana's house in the late evening of the following day (1st November - a national holiday no less) to investigate this incident?

So.......... either there was a sole police visit which took place either on the evening of the prank call (31st October) or at the latest the following daytime........ or there was a sole police visit which took place on the evening of the murder (1st November), which almost certainly therefore must have been in relation to something other than the bomb hoax call, since it would have taken place far too long after the threat (made over 24 hours earlier) would have carried any significance..

Or there were two separate police visits: one on the evening of 31st October (or possibly the daytime of 1st November), in respect of the bomb threat hoax call, and the second one in the late evening of 1st November, in relation to a separate incident.

 

[Dan O.]

I never remembered Mignini saying he had bleach receipts but more importantly Moore states that Mignini said this at the "case closed" presser. There is nothing I can find from that date or the next couple of dates of any mention of bleach receipts.

If something as open as statements at a press conference are incorrectly put forward by Moore then his statements that are completely unverifiable are of diminished if any value.

I don't think you will get any more answers on that issue here. Except for the case for bleach being used in the hall of the cottage for which we have documentation from the police files, as of the time of the pressor, the police didn't have any trace or evidence of anything to do with bleach anywhere. Even the "smell's clean" didn't occur until the 8th. The best course may be to confront the author directly.

 

[Dougm]

I never remembered Mignini saying he had bleach receipts but more importantly Moore states that Mignini said this at the "case closed" presser. There is nothing I can find from that date or the next couple of dates of any mention of bleach receipts.

If something as open as statements at a press conference are incorrectly put forward by Moore then his statements that are completely unverifiable are of diminished if any value.

I show no favorites. When Vixen put forward the account of the maids, I pointed out how strange it is that the second maid said she never saw any bleach and had specifically been told not to use bleach. Was she also told not to use hydrochloric acid? Uranium?

Although I follow you, and agree everyone needs to be treated the same, I don't agree that someone making a mistake on one detail causes all of their statements to be of zero value. I don't take anyone's statements to be 100% true -- I look to see if what they say makes sense in the context of the known facts.

Steve Moore is a passionate guy who sincerely believes there was an injustice done, by police and prosecutors who know better. His main point has always been that the evidence, as presented by the prosecution, is bogus and basically proves that Amanda and Raffaele are innocent. He's right about that, even if he is not 100% correct on who said there were bleach receipts.

 

[Numbers]

I'm surprised at some who are exploring this.

I don't see two small phones landing on grass or bushes making enough noise to alert someone inside. Were they watching TV or asleep or what? Maybe CBS can go to Lana's and do a sound test

I see no reason for the police not to be honest about the visits. If they were there when the phones landed and were inside so what?

Is there any information about pipe bombs in toilets?

The exact source of the (hypothesized) disturbance that caused the Lana family's (hypothesized) alarm on Nov. 1 is unknown. In the witness statements and testimony, it is a prank call on Nov. 1. But the police records - a witness statement apparently based on phone records - show that a prank call to Ms. Lana's phone was made on Oct. 31 at 9:48 pm.

Maybe there was a second prank phone call on Nov. 1, from a different caller than Capasso, who had called on Oct. 31, that the police failed to track down. That could be another good explanation for the discrepancy in the police witness statements and testimony. Not every discrepancy in the case may be totally due to police incompetence or misconduct.

But the hypothesis that an event on Nov. 1, at about 10 pm or slightly later, distinct from the prank call but perhaps interpreted by the Lana family as related, alarmed the family, leading them to call the police, who then specifically searched the garden, seems viable. And it is likely that the phones were tossed into the garden at about 10 pm - 10:30 pm that evening. An interesting coincidence, with further evidence required to form a conclusion about the hypothesis.

 

[Grinder]

Although I follow you, and agree everyone needs to be treated the same, I don't agree that someone making a mistake on one detail causes all of their statements to be of zero value. I don't take anyone's statements to be 100% true -- I look to see if what they say makes sense in the context of the known facts.

Very reasonable. I don't think "all of their statements" are of zero value but when the sources were unnamed and vague then previous misstatement do color their value for me. CV there is no mention of having worked in Europe. His experience centered around terrorism both domestic and foreign. He was a pilot and sniper if memory serves.

There has been any credible information about the Perugians calling Milan or even that Perugia was called and the PLE told Milan to send him home. He was caught in a building without permission and possessing a minor amount of loot. They would PR the guy here and in fact wouldn't have to go to a real court. He would go to Community Court and receive a sentence of community service.

We've had a couple of mentions of some Milan cop that Nina dug up that told her the Perugian's called or some remark that meant wink, wink, the PLE sprung him.

Steve Moore is a passionate guy who sincerely believes there was an injustice done, by police and prosecutors who know better. His main point has always been that the evidence, as presented by the prosecution, is bogus and basically proves that Amanda and Raffaele are innocent. He's right about that, even if he is not 100% correct on who said there were bleach receipts.

Sure. But it's the hyperbole, that then spawns wild theories of informants , crime sprees and framing.

 

[Numbers]

Although I follow you, and agree everyone needs to be treated the same, I don't agree that someone making a mistake on one detail causes all of their statements to be of zero value. I don't take anyone's statements to be 100% true -- I look to see if what they say makes sense in the context of the known facts.

Steve Moore is a passionate guy who sincerely believes there was an injustice done, by police and prosecutors who know better. His main point has always been that the evidence, as presented by the prosecution, is bogus and basically proves that Amanda and Raffaele are innocent. He's right about that, even if he is not 100% correct on who said there were bleach receipts.

Didn't the media get the bogus information about receipts for bleach from the police and/or prosecution? Or did the media invent this story without assistance?

Similarly for the bathroom soaked in "blood" (actually most likely from a forensic test chemical that turns pinkish-red after reacting with the oxygen in air) photo - did the media invent this picture?

 

[Numbers]

....

Sure. But it's the hyperbole, that then spawns wild theories of informants , crime sprees and framing.

The police and prosecution misconduct that began as early as Nov. 5/6 with the interrogation is not a wild theory.

Police and/or prosecution violations of Italian procedural laws, and even, it is claimed, of Italian criminal law, occurred in this case.

That there was a claim by Amanda Knox that the Italian police violated Italian criminal law is demonstrated by her being charged with calunnia against the police. The prosecution of this criminal charge of calunnia is on-going. (A quick definition of calunnia: To falsely accuse, to Italian police or judicial authorities, someone of committing a crime.)

 

[davefoc]

I gave the link and time marker - he says it clear as day.

here is one comment:

Didn't they actually say this at their "case closed" conference? I thought Mignini was on record talking about bleach receipts?

A second poster said the same thing. Chinese whisper or telephone - Moore said it and it is repeated and repeated but it never happened.

The Moore videp was made in March of this year but he's been saying it for years.

ETA the second poster wasn't directly talking about the receipts but rather Moore's informer theory

I don't know about clear as day. My statement was that I hadn't noticed anybody making a post in this thread that the police or prosecution had claimed that they had found bleach receipts in Sollecito's apartment. You responded by quoting a question about the issue originally posted by Carbonjam72 and a reference to another post that, apparently, after considering it decided that it also did not include the claim.

This is a tiny issue, and your Carbonjam72 quote does support your notion that a false fact did become at least suspected of being true by some pro-innocence people. That was a point that I tried to agree with you on with my comments about Steve Moore. Sometimes, we all (perhaps excluding Grinder) can allow our confirmation biases to make it more likely that we assume facts to be true if they support our ideas.

However, before we reject Carbonjam72 completely as a credible source for all time now as the result of his transgression, I think, it is important to note that he couched his opinion on this in such a way as to make it "clear as day" that he wasn't certain and that he wasn't making a claim that the police or prosecution actually did claim to have recovered bleach receipts only that he thought it was possible or perhaps likely given the construction of the sentence you quoted.

 

[Grinder]

The exact source of the (hypothesized) disturbance that caused the Lana family's (hypothesized) alarm on Nov. 1 is unknown. In the witness statements and testimony, it is a prank call on Nov. 1. But the police records - a witness statement apparently based on phone records - show that a prank call to Ms. Lana's phone was made on Oct. 31 at 9:48 pm.

I believe more precisely the kid's phone showed that time for a call, but I believe it was made then.

Maybe there was a second prank phone call on Nov. 1, from a different caller than Capasso, who had called on Oct. 31, that the police failed to track down. That could be another good explanation for the discrepancy in the police witness statements and testimony. Not every discrepancy in the case may be totally due to police incompetence or misconduct.

Unless her number was on the wall of a toilet offering free sex I doubt it. Perhaps he called on the 31st and they put off filing a report until after Nov. 1st holiday. In the flurry of the investigation perhaps Lana spaced that there was a day between the call and the phones in the garden. As I said earlier I don't have the capability to copy and paste from image PDFs but I don't see any dates from the kids of Lana.

I'm still amazed that in Italy a prank call gets an immediate response. here cops don't even come to a car wreck unless injury or more damage than $1500 (?). Maybe they went the next night and were there as the place was carpet bombed by phones. If they were there at that time and talking they wouldn't hear the phones land.

But the hypothesis that an event on Nov. 1, at about 10 pm or slightly later, distinct from the prank call but perhaps interpreted by the Lana family as related, alarmed the family, leading them to call the police, who then specifically searched the garden, seems viable. And it is likely that the phones were tossed into the garden at about 10 pm - 10:30 pm that evening. An interesting coincidence, with further evidence required to form a conclusion about the hypothesis.

I've forgotten the sequence of tghe police Lana searches. If they did search the garden on the 1st I'm pretty sure their eyes were like this and they weren't really looking at all. Do you think they go out when a caller asks if their refrigerator is running? Yes. Well you better go and catch it.

 

[davefoc]

delete I think Grinder may have answered my questions above, but I need time to understand his answers.