Continuation Part 22: Amanda Knox/Raffaele Sollecito

[Stacyhs]

Strange, some cartoon character said this in a previous post:



Now, was the point of this post (I will assume you are the same Vixen) to tell everyone that when a judge finds a fact then a judge finds a fact? i.e. it was a completely redundant and tautological point?

So when you meant "it is settled" you didn't actually mean it is "true", you just meant that the judge said something?

Because if that was your point literally no one cares. As we have pointed out to you multiple times all of the science shows that Amanda and Raffaele could not have been there when Meredith was murdered. This has been confirmed over and over and over again by some of the top forensic scientists around, in books and papers. Papers published in the very top forensic science journal in the world. Therefore even though Massei and/or Nencini said some stuff, does not mean it was right. We all agree they said some stuff. And science proves it was wrong.

Understand now?

Not exactly. Evidence does not show that they were NOT there, but neither does it show that they WERE there. They "could" have been in the kitchen/living room where their DNA was found. I "could" have been there. So could anyone else who does not have proof of where they were that night. Hmmmm... what evidence does Vixen have that she was not at 7 Via della Pergola on Nov 1, 2007?

 

[Desert Fox]

I would argue that the evidence seems clear that they were NOT in Meredith's bedroom when the murder took place.

 

[acbytesla]

Pervy criminals often have a well-known and well-recognised sleazy look to their eyes.

???

Really? How do you tell the difference between a "pervy" and "damn, you ugly" look?

I find that really amusing since I grew up with that sweet boy next door look and parents absolutely loved me, and yet I was always trying to get into almost every girl's knickers. If mom and dad only knew, they wouldn't have let me anywhere near their daughters.

This idea that you really know what is going on in someone else's mind has no basis in reality. You might guess right on occasion, but you're just as likely to be wrong

 

[Welshman]

From shuffle-hop-step, Bill Williams has blossomed into a full-blown River Dance wanna be, as he flings himself across centre stage like a latter day Fred Astaire. Personally, I think the police and Massei's first hunches were correct; Amanda was insanely jealous of Mez and was determined to teach her a lesson.

The trial has nothing to do with Salem witch trials. It is an irrefutable fact that Raff's DNA was on Mez' bra clasp, and Mez DNA wa on his knife blade, with Amanda's on the hilt.

In a tv series about Albany jail, it followed this guy held for suspected second-degree homicide (the victim shot first). He swore blind he was innocent, and a screw quipped he'd never met a guilty remand prisoner yet.

Together with eye-witness accounts of the perp being very tall (like the defendant) and gunpowder residue on his sweatshirt - seen on the suspect in cctv footage at a store earlier - a police clip of the guy's interrogation nailed him. In this clip, the perp mutters, 'bang, bang, I run'. The police interpreted this as the perp 'reliving the incident'. He was found guilty.

We see the same reliving by Amanda, as she burbles on about meeting 'Patrick' (=Rudy) at the basketball court and took him back to the cottage for sex with Mez. She recounts Mez' piercing scream ( a scream corroborated by two other independent witnesses) and of seeing blood on Raff's hands. We hear lots about gallons of water in Raff's sink and in the shower that night. We hear about how at the questura Amanda yelled, 'of course she suffered, she had her <expletive deleted> throat cut.'

Try and shuffle your way out of that, Bill.

If as Vixen claims the knife/DNA evidence was so solid and irrefutable can Vixen address the numerous problems with the knife/DNA evidence detailed below. I have split my post into two parts because there are so many problems with the evidence
Problems with the knife/DNA part 1
• The circumstances surrounding the collection of the knife are highly suspect. Only one knife was taken from Raffaele’s kitchen and no other were taken from the cottage. How exactly were the police able to tell this knife was the murder weapon without collecting any knives? Is it credible the police take only one knife and this knife just happens to be the knife used in the murder?
• The knife does not match the wounds. The length of the fatal wound is 8 cm. Bruising at the point of entry shows the knife went all the way in. The length of Raffaele’s knife is 17.5 cm. The knife was too large to have caused the other two small wounds. The width of the kitchen knife is 3 cm with the two smaller wounds being is 1.4 cm and 1.5. The fact the knife did not match the wounds makes it physically impossible for the knife to have been used to stab Meredith.
• The knife did not match a bloody imprint on the bed.
• If Meredith’s DNA was on the knife, why did the results keep coming back too low when Stefanoni tested which indicates there was no DNA on the knife.
• There was no blood and when C&V tested the knife it was negative for the human species which makes it impossible for DNA to stay on the knife? In view of this how could Meredith’s DNA be on the knife?
• If there was a solid DNA profile how do you explain the massive level of misconduct surrounding the knife. If there was a solid profile on the knife, why did the prosecution have to resort to suppressing evidence on a massive scale, lying and using false documents?
http://www.amandaknoxcase.com/raffaeles-kitchen-knife/
http://www.amandaknoxcase.com/lab-data-suppression/
http://www.amandaknoxcase.com/contamination-labwork-coverup/
http://www.amandaknoxcase.com/meredith-kercher-perjury-corruption/
• If there was such a solid DNA profile, why is that Stefanoni could not ask a basic question such as how much DNA was on the knife when she was questioned? If the prosecution had such a strong case, why is that prosecution experts were evasive in court and unable to answer questions. If there was such a solid DNA profile on the knife, why is that Machiavelli eight years after Meredith’s murder was also unable to answer this question?
• Stefanoni used LCN. How can her work be regarded as valid if her lab did not have the facilities for LCN?

 

[Welshman]

Problems with the knife/DNA Part 2
• In the Nencini trial prosecutor Crini lied that the knife matched the bloody imprint a claim the prosecution had not made before. If the knife knife/DNA evidence was valid why is that six years after Meredith’s murder, the prosecution had to resort to lying to make the knife/DNA evidence appear valid? Does this not indicate the knife/DNA evidence had numerous flaws and no credibility and the only way the prosecution could make the appear valid was through lying.
• Vixen and Machiavelli have constantly described C&V as incompetent clueless buffoons with zero expertise in DNA. C&V ripped Stefanoni’s work to shreds. If the DNA on the knife was so solid and there was nothing wrong with Stefanoni’s work, how were a pair of idiots able to find so many faults in Stefanoni’s work?
• If Amanda and Raffaele had used the knife to kill Meredith, why did they have no objection to the knife being opened whilst the prosecution did not want the knife opened?
• Vixen lied in her post saying that there were 15 alleles on the knife which the prosecution have never said. Vixen also said there were 12 human specimens when in fact C&V found the knife was negative for the human species. The fake wiki murderofmeredithkercher.com repeats the lie the knife contained Meredith’s biological material. The section of the fake wiki on the knife contains numerous falsehoods which contradict what C&V wrote in their report. As can be seen from my post below, a PGP lied on Amazon reviews that the knife had Meredith’s blood. Wendy Murphy lied that the knife had been bleached and hidden away when this was not the case. If the knife/DNA was so solid, why do PGP have to resort to lying make the evidence appear valid?
http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=10485386#post10485386
• The fake wiki lied that Stefanoni handed in negative control tests and Machiavelli also repeated this lie. If the knife/DNA evidence was so solid, why do PGP have to resort to lying about the actions of the prosecution?

 

[Vixen]

Vixen - now that you are back and in a mood to tell us things, as per, "You have already been told....."

Upthread you told us that when Nencini told us in his motivations report that Raffaele's DNA had been found on the knife, that this was merely a typo. Really? A merits court, one that establishes judicial facts does typos? Are you sure then that when Nencini convicted the pair, that that wasn't a typo too, and that he'd really meant to acquit them?

Also, you wrongly and falsely blame Bongiorno for "wheeling in" Aviello into the Nencini trial. That's what you told us, anyway.

Do you now acknowledge your mistake? The mistake being that with regard to the Avielo issue, this was one of the reasons why the Chieffi ISC panel in 2013 annulled the Hellmann acquittals - because according to Chieffi Hellmann had not allowed Aviello to be wheeled into the courtroom?

Like the way you handled the Salem witch trials, my bet is that you're going to complain that no one is really "wheeled in" unless they're in a wheelchair.

'Wheeled in', in the sense of others willing him there. As you know, he wanted to hang onto the €100K bribe he claims Bongiorno gave him for his sex change (he is now called 'Lucy': you couldn't make this up!). Thus, he proceeded to be no help whatsoever to the Nencini court. For Marasca to tear strips off Nencini for a defence contempt of court, is excreble, and adds to the stench hovering over their report.

 

[Vixen]

Kokomani though he saw Knox months before she arrived in Italy!!!!!

But it is noted that you now ignore the bra clasp. I can understand why.

Kokomani was another witness who claimed to have been tampered with by Bongiorno and offered €100K to pervert his testimony.

We saw how he played the shuffling wreck at the trial, in heavy disguise.

 

[Vixen]

Were it that guilt could be seen in body language RS and AK wouldn't have been charged.

I've always found it strange that guilters find something sinister in the photographs of the two innocent parties' body language (in the days following the murder) in what I would consider reflects a normal post traumatic stress response.

There is a particularly poignant video of RS with AK, including a normal and comforting/caring kiss. How anybody normal cannot see the sadness and hurt in these two people is difficult to comprehend.

Perhaps the sinister side lies within those guilters who cannot separate their dark side from reality.

I see it now. We should get Amanda and Raff to play Ali McGraw and Ryan O'Neill's parts in a modern day 'Love Story'. Perhaps with Dustin Hoffman thrown in as the weird guy in 'Midnight Cowboy' to play Oscar Pistorius to vary the storyline a bit.

 

[Vixen]

Predominantly a chloride.


Corrected your typo.

The problem is there was contamination. DNA of other people was found on the bra strap. The ruling by the court just shows that they failed to understand the nature of DNA evidence and Steffanoni failed to adequately caution the court. This is not unique to her. See
https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21328475-000-how-dna-contamination-can-affect-court-cases/
Also see CPS guidance on LCN testing and the precautions needed.
https://www.cps.gov.uk/publications/prosecution/lcn_testing.html
DNA contamination is real. The responsibility of the processing laboratory is to take action to minimise risks. This case demonstrates contamination. The DNA of an innocent individual was found on the bra hook.




I have never argued this. I have argued they were incompetent, and (unconsciously) biased, working within a dysfunctional system. Well recognised cognitive biases were demonstrated leading to errors in conclusions.



The point being that the consequence is 'cell free' DNA, as the apocrine cells rupture.



There is no time stamp for DNA. It cannot be known when it was deposited. You seem to ignore all the movement that the clasp had undergone between discovery of the body, the moving, collection and clearing of material from the room, and its eventual discovery elsewhere. You ignore its being picked up handed round dropped back on the floor. You seem to have no criticism for the fact it was not collected initially. You seem to have no criticism for the fact it was not properly preserved so re testing was not possible. here just seems to be serial mismanagement around this bit of evidence. Not initially collected. When eventually collected, mishandled. When processed in the laboratory not properly stored.



You again assert latex is unfriendly to DNA whatever that means. Please reference some evidence. The alternative would be PVC gloves? The reference you give says nothing about decay of DNA. You say nothing about why DNA on a shiny (non porous) door handle is subject to decay but DNA on the clasp was not.

Latex is rubber and textured, is it not?

 

[Bill Williams]

The past is prologue

Problems with the knife/DNA Part 2
• In the Nencini trial prosecutor Crini lied that the knife matched the bloody imprint a claim the prosecution had not made before. If the knife knife/DNA evidence was valid why is that six years after Meredith’s murder, the prosecution had to resort to lying to make the knife/DNA evidence appear valid? Does this not indicate the knife/DNA evidence had numerous flaws and no credibility and the only way the prosecution could make the appear valid was through lying.

The past is prologue

During the Nencini trial in the Fall of 2013 I remember my jaw-dropping reading one of Machiavelli's posts in this very forum.

Out of the blue, Machiavelli said something akin, "I am now thinking that the kitchen knife from Raffaele's is a match for the bedsheet outline of a knife." I thought at the time that Machiavelli was grasping at straws and didn't bother to respond (IIRC).

Lo and behold a week later, dial-it-in prosecutor Crini made the same claim in court!!! At the time that seemed to confirm that Machiavelli was a somebody in this case, until Andrea Vogt called him an arm-chair detective.

But the post-war was on - a full six years past the horrible crime, suddenly a major piece of claimed-evidence, Raffaele's kitchen knife, was now (out of the blue) claimed to be a match for that blood-soaked outline on the bedsheet. If one called that into question, one was called a despicable shill for the defence, who would say anything to get the kids off. (!!)

The whole issue of one-knife, two-knives had gone full circle.

To echo Welshman's post, if the prosecution had such an open and such case - why'd they have to change motives like Imelda Marcos changes shoes, and why oh why oh why did they have to keep re-inventing the evidence about that ridiculous knife?

Not only was it ridiculous that they chose one, and one only, knife - this one from a remote location; one, just one and none other.....

Why'd Massei have to invent out of whole cloth a ridiculous claim that Knox had carried it for protection (thus preserving Massei's no prior-intent motive, but still getting the knife over to the cottage)....

Now, in 2013, they were cycling back to the "one knife theory", one that had to be abandoned back in 2009's trial because Raffaele's knife was so obviously not a match for the bed-sheet outline of a knife in blood!?

Welshman, you have provided a list of other extreme issues with that knife, if one wants to tie it to the crime somehow. What I've outlined is the problems associated with just one of those issues.

And they have the gall to say that the evidence against AK and RS is an open and shut case!!!

Finally, I remember finding a copy of Frank Sfarzo's earliest blog entries from the time, early on, when his trademark snark had been aimed at AK and RS whom he believed at the time to be obviously guilty.

In the blog entry, he recounted going down to the cottage, only to be kept at a distance because a cop was on duty. Passing the time, Sfarzo had asked the cop, "Have you searched the woods below the cottage for a knife?" The cop had replied, "Oh don't worry, we have the knife."

Sfarzo found out that there had been no search for a knife in those woods. Fourteen months later the trial had started, and Sfarzo then heard the prosecution's (then) theory of two knives, because the one from Raffaele's neither matched the wounds nor the bedsheet outline. He'd remembered, "They'd not even searched the woods for this mythical second knife!? They'd confiscated the knife Raffaele had had on him at the Questura during interrogation, and now that one is nowhere to be seen either."

This had convinced Sfarzo that the PLE were more stupid than anything, and that they had nothing, not really, to link RS and AK to the crime.

Then there was the link to Hallowe'en, then Mignini's plea to the court to see the motive as Knox's psychopathology. Even though Massei had dismissed both those motives, Massei had convicted anyway.

Which just proved to Sfarzo that the PLE from Napoleoni, to Ficarra, to Mignini, to Mattieni to Massei were really quite stupid.

Fast forward - because past is prologue. At the Nencini trial it was a completely different scenario..... with the need for two knives reduced to one, because after six years, all of a sudden Raffaele's knife was a match for the bedsheet outline/stain!

How do we know that is true? Machiavelli told us.

 

[Vixen]

You are allowed to think anything you want. Except you need to supply the proof that Judge Massei even had this as a "hunch". You never supply proof, so I am not going to hold my breath - you just keep spilling out these thoughts of your as if they have anything to do with the considerable public record.


Yet again you fail to understand the nature of NotEvenWrong's counter example to your claim that judicial truth's are infallible. Then again, it is also an irrefutable fact that three other male-DNA-profiles were on the bra-clasp, which speaks to contamination more than anything else. At best Mez's non-blood DNA was on the blade in a non-existent striation, a striation only Stefanoni ever saw and is, apparently, not on the knife now. This is before considering that non-blood material of Mez's also speaks to lab contamination rather than murder. Amanda's DNA on the hilt is forensically meaningless.


Ah, er, ok. I believe you.


No shuffle is necessary. The final court to deal with this found all that you say meaningless and irrelevant to the claimed timeline of the murder, a timeline filled with contradictions and investigative ineptitude. Add in judicial myopia.

Which is why the Marasca/Bruno court exonerated the pair. It is a judicial fact that they were exonerated, since that is the way Judge Boninsegna refers to the action in his own subsequent motivations report concerning Knox's acquittal on the calunnia against police.

No shuffle needed. Just a presentation of facts, rather than an endless series of evidenceless assertions.

But, but...your storyline is that the courts only found the kids guilty becuase they were beholden to the prosecutors and slavishly did as they beckoned.

Now you are saying Bonsegna and Marasca are showing independence of mind and crucifying their supposed puppetmasters.

Which is it Bill?

 

[Bill Williams]

Kokomani was another witness who claimed to have been tampered with by Bongiorno and offered €100K to pervert his testimony.

We saw how he played the shuffling wreck at the trial, in heavy disguise.

Wait a minute. Are you arguing that Kokomani offered testimony to convict the pair, or to acquit the pair? You first said he confirmed their guilt, now you're saying he was bribed to deny their guilt.

You will say anything, and invent anything, even on the heels of saying the opposite.

 

[Vixen]

Strange, some cartoon character said this in a previous post:



Now, was the point of this post (I will assume you are the same Vixen) to tell everyone that when a judge finds a fact then a judge finds a fact? i.e. it was a completely redundant and tautological point?

So when you meant "it is settled" you didn't actually mean it is "true", you just meant that the judge said something?

Because if that was your point literally no one cares. As we have pointed out to you multiple times all of the science shows that Amanda and Raffaele could not have been there when Meredith was murdered. This has been confirmed over and over and over again by some of the top forensic scientists around, in books and papers. Papers published in the very top forensic science journal in the world. Therefore even though Massei and/or Nencini said some stuff, does not mean it was right. We all agree they said some stuff. And science proves it was wrong.

Understand now?

Raff and Amanda have no alibi, so your claim, 'all of the science shows that Amanda and Raffaele could not have been there when Meredith was murdered.' is a massive whopper.

 

[Bill Williams]

But, but...your storyline is that the Massei and Nencini courts only find the kids guilty becuase they were beholden to the prosecutors and slavishly did as they beckoned.

Now you are saying Bonsegna and Marasca and Hellmann and Zanetti are showing independence of mind and crucifying their supposed puppetmasters.

Which is it Bill?

There, I fixed that for you.

 

[Vixen]

So does just about every teenage boy given the right situation.

I defer to your superior expertise in this.

 

[Vixen]

Not exactly. Evidence does not show that they were NOT there, but neither does it show that they WERE there. They "could" have been in the kitchen/living room where their DNA was found. I "could" have been there. So could anyone else who does not have proof of where they were that night. Hmmmm... what evidence does Vixen have that she was not at 7 Via della Pergola on Nov 1, 2007?

Er, you forgot the scientifically proven luminol and DNA evidence, not to mention the eye-witnesses.

 

[Vixen]

I would argue that the evidence seems clear that they were NOT in Meredith's bedroom when the murder took place.

Really?

 

[Vixen]

???

Really? How do you tell the difference between a "pervy" and "damn, you ugly" look?

I find that really amusing since I grew up with that sweet boy next door look and parents absolutely loved me, and yet I was always trying to get into almost every girl's knickers. If mom and dad only knew, they wouldn't have let me anywhere near their daughters.

This idea that you really know what is going on in someone else's mind has no basis in reality. You might guess right on occasion, but you're just as likely to be wrong

I didn't say I did. I am quoting US detectives who made the observation from having dealt with hundreds of sex criminals. As an example of this sleazy look, have a butchers at Ian Huntley of the Soham murders.

 

[Bill Williams]

Kokomani was another witness who claimed to have been tampered with by Bongiorno and offered €100K to pervert his testimony.

We saw how he played the shuffling wreck at the trial, in heavy disguise.

Ok - you've offered a ridiculous unproven claim to account for your ridiculous assertion that Bongiorno had had Aliessi "wheeled in" to give testimony to the Nencini trial.

What's your ridiculous accounting for what you say is "Nencini's typo" in saying that Raffaele's DNA had been found on the knife!? If you're going to cling to it being a typo, is it not equally possible that his conviction of the pair was also a typo?

In case you missed it, you are being ridiculed right now.

 

[Vixen]

If as Vixen claims the knife/DNA evidence was so solid and irrefutable can Vixen address the numerous problems with the knife/DNA evidence detailed below. I have split my post into two parts because there are so many problems with the evidence
Problems with the knife/DNA part 1
• The circumstances surrounding the collection of the knife are highly suspect. Only one knife was taken from Raffaele’s kitchen and no other were taken from the cottage. How exactly were the police able to tell this knife was the murder weapon without collecting any knives? Is it credible the police take only one knife and this knife just happens to be the knife used in the murder?

The detective leading the search was briefed on the size of the knife used to kill Mez. It's called 'communication.'

• The knife does not match the wounds. The length of the fatal wound is 8 cm. Bruising at the point of entry shows the knife went all the way in. The length of Raffaele’s knife is 17.5 cm. The knife was too large to have caused the other two small wounds. The width of the kitchen knife is 3 cm with the two smaller wounds being is 1.4 cm and 1.5. The fact the knife did not match the wounds makes it physically impossible for the knife to have been used to stab Meredith.

A popular PIP misrepresentation. The knife had to be at least 9cm to have breached the hyoid bone. The bruising around the wound were elegantly shown by a forensic pathologist to be the same curved moon shape of a thumb nail, and was proportional to the other finger mark bruises found around Mez' lower face and nostrils.

• The knife did not match a bloody imprint on the bed.

It did indeed match - see 'www.themurderofmeredithkercher.com' for a detailed analysis.

• If Meredith’s DNA was on the knife, why did the results keep coming back too low when Stefanoni tested which indicates there was no DNA on the knife.

It came back as low copy number (LCN) - probably thanks to vigorous scrubbing of the knife - Stefanoni found that when she amplified the LCN sample enough times (i.e., a chemical reaction which causes the DNA string to replicate itself over and over again, a well-established and weel-used technique in the medical world of research, [e.g., cancer research]) the machine showed a DNA reading of the loci as billions to one against it was anyone's other than Mez. This reading is done by a machine and cannot be faked. Raff's expert forensic defense representative was there as a witness and did not complain of any issues. All parties agree it is indeed Mez' DNA.

• There was no blood and when C&V tested the knife it was negative for the human species which makes it impossible for DNA to stay on the knife? In view of this how could Meredith’s DNA be on the knife?

Mez is not of 'the human species'? Obviously, it will be body tissue in the form of skin, fat layers and other tissue. Blood is not the only source of DNA. Blood washes off easily if rinsed straight away. Stefanoni assess initially that the blood drips in the bathroom were compatible with pure blood (cotton bud box) and more and more diluted blood as it got to the sink and bidet. Mixed Amanda and Mez DNA. This is a scientific fact.

• If there was a solid DNA profile how do you explain the massive level of misconduct surrounding the knife. If there was a solid profile on the knife, why did the prosecution have to resort to suppressing evidence on a massive scale, lying and using false documents?
http://www.amandaknoxcase.com/raffaeles-kitchen-knife/
http://www.amandaknoxcase.com/lab-data-suppression/
http://www.amandaknoxcase.com/contamination-labwork-coverup/
http://www.amandaknoxcase.com/meredith-kercher-perjury-corruption/

Both merits courts found it a fact there was no contamination.

• If there was such a solid DNA profile, why is that Stefanoni could not ask a basic question such as how much DNA was on the knife when she was questioned? If the prosecution had such a strong case, why is that prosecution experts were evasive in court and unable to answer questions. If there was such a solid DNA profile on the knife, why is that Machiavelli eight years after Meredith’s murder was also unable to answer this question?

How long is a piece of string?

• Stefanoni used LCN. How can her work be regarded as valid if her lab did not have the facilities for LCN?

It obviously did, as Mez' DNA showed up.