The Trials of Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito: Part 24

[Numbers]

Merriam-Webster is not a legal dictionary. Once again you are using vernacular and mistaking it for a legal term.

I looked up 'hypothesis' (and related variations) on the first six Legal Dictionaries that came up on Google search. None - [ETA] bar one which gives an example of its use in a trial court - define it as a legal term.

One gives a common dictionary definition of, 'Unproven theory'.

As a law court deals with facts - ipso facto proven - then it would be an oxymoron for a supreme court judge to promulgate 'unproven facts'.

Bearing in mind that a key function of a merits trial is to determine the facts. The Supreme Court is no longer at trial stage.

Its Section 9 are the facts, as set out by Marasca. Section 10 is a reiteration of the verdict, as set out at the start.

Where does that leave you and your Merriam-Webster dictionary?

Continuing to find your posts full of absurdities.

Too bad you didn't list quotes from your legal dictionary sources.

Here's some information:

"Hypothesis

An assumption or theory.

During a criminal trial, a hypothesis is a theory set forth by either the prosecution or the defense for the purpose of explaining the facts in evidence. It also serves to set up a ground for an inference of guilt or innocence, or a showing of the most probable motive for a criminal offense."

Source: http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/hypothesis

"What is HYPOTHESIS?

A supposition, assumption, or theory; a theory set up by the prosecution,on a criminal trial, or by the defense, as an explanation of the facts in evidence,and a ground for inferring guilt or innocence, as the case may be, or as indicating a probable or possible motive for the crime."

Law Dictionary: What is HYPOTHESIS? definition of HYPOTHESIS (Black's Law Dictionary)
Source: helawdictionary.org/hypothesis/

Another absurdity - wonderfully entertaining - in your post is your implication that a word used by a court must necessarily be a "legal" term. If that were true, words such as "and", "the", and "but" would need to be "legally" defined. Courts use the language of their country - and the format of a judgment (motivation report) is specified in CPP Article 546; there is no statement in that procedural law that only "legal" terminology must be used.

And yet another absurdity in your post is that a court may only write of "facts". Of course, this is not true; a court could, for example, prove a hypothesis through contradiction.

 

[Stacyhs]

Whatever. Pranking is not a very nice thing to do when it damages other people's property or causes them distress 'for a laugh'. So much for acbytesla's claim 'Amanda was a nice person'.


So she goes to parties where people inject themselves. Lovely.

No property damage was done in the prank. Teenagers, which Amanda was at the time, often do stupid or silly things without thinking. That does not make them bad or insensitive people. It makes them immature. Amanda had many friends, classmates, and teachers in Seattle who said she was a "nice person".

Um...no. She doesn't go to parties where people inject themselves. She wrote about a party where there were drug addicts injecting themselves. I suppose you think Bram Stoker drank blood, Margaret Mitchell owned slaves , and Dan Brown saved the world from a deadly plague?

By the way, you still have not presented any evidence that Amanda washed Meredith's blood from her hands. Because the judge said so is not evidence.

 

[Numbers]

....

Marasca is not a trial court. The fact have been established, and it summarises them in Section 9 of its written reasons.

LOL. Very amusing post.

Your post twists words absurdly. The Marasca CSC panel was an appeal court which conducted an appeal trial in accordance with Italian procedural law. The CSC (Corte Suprema di Cassazione = Supreme Court of Cassation; it is the highest court of appeals in Italy) and tries cases following the procedures in CPP Articles 610 - 614.

The Marasca CSC panel annulled the Nencini court verdict and demolished the Nencini court's reasoning (the Nencini motivation report). Section 9 and its subsections are part of the demolition of the Nencini court's reasoning by the Marasca CSC panel.

To help anyone who wishes to understand this, here are the beginning paragraphs of Sections 9, 9.1, and 9.2 of the Marasca CSC panel motivation report:

9. The ascertained errores in iudicando [errors in judgment] and the logical inconsistencies pointed out invalidate the appealed verdict {of the Nencini court} from the funditus [foundations], hence it deserves to be annulled.
The aforementioned reasons for annulling {the Nencini court verdict} can be summarised in the inability to present an evidentiary framework that can really be considered suitable to support a pronouncement of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, as required by Article 533 of the Italian Code of Criminal Procedure in the text renewed by Article 5 of the law n. 46/2006....

9.1 The intrinsically contradictory ensemble of the body of evidence, whose objective uncertainty is already emphasised by the previously highlighted wavering progress of the proceedings, does not therefore allow [us] to be satisfied {with the Nencini court verdict} to the standard of [beyond a] reasonable doubt, ....

9.2 The aspects of the objectively contradictory nature [of evidence] can be, as shown below, illustrated for each defendant, in a synoptic presentation of the elements favourable to the hypothesis of guilt and of the elements against it, as they are shown, of course, by the text of the challenged ruling {that is, the Nencini court verdict} and of the previous ones.

 

[TruthCalls]

No, no, no, I did not say 'it might not be true', I said even if not true in purest reality, if a law court rules it to be a fact then the law court is sovereign.


It rules as a fact Amanda was at the murder scene, washed off Mez' blood (pause and think about this: imagine YOU were washing off the blood of someone just murdered, seriously? You are not going to report it? Why would that be? Oh, we see: you did it!) and covered up for Rudy, who by your own account is a low-life drifter, petty thief, burglar, rapist, murderer (What's that you say? You wouldn't cover up for someone like that? Why not? We see: he's your co-criminal!).

Anyone have any other explanation to offer, that doesn't involve 'student high jinks'?

Yeah - the court did not rule Amanda was at the scene (it couldn't as there is no evidence to indicate that), it did not rule Amanda washed blood from her hands (it couldn't as there is no evidence to indicate that) and she did not cover up for Guede (that's just a PGP fantasy).

If it makes you somehow feel better thinking otherwise then by all mean, go for it. At the end of the day they were both exonerated and the case is closed. Deal with it.

 

[RoseMontague]

Oh yes, we are talking about social media, because that single comment on that "The Stranger" comments section is the source for the "Ski mask/rape prank" or whatever you want to call it. There is not even a hint about it in the case documents, so "somenoone in Washington reported the incident to the investigators at an early stage."


Amanda Knox only mentioned it as an anwer to a comment on her own site on January 7th, 2014 more than six years after the original comment, so the above makes no sense...


For someone claiming that "gossip" is "nothing that interests me", you are coming up with gossip quite often it seems. No matter, your reasoning doesn't make sense either way. The "ferocity of the attack" (whatever that means) doesn't necessarily point to a "person enraged with jealousy and resentment" (one alternative would be a burglar who just realised that the woman he intended to rape has recognised him...). Neither does it make the story of "Amanda was getting revenge in being dumped in favour of this girl" more credible. That's just another good example for circular reasoning.



No, the short story does not "indisputably refer to the victim as having been 'pierced'". The sentence in question is:
"In quel momento non capii niente e soltanto quando fui fuori dalla casa ricordai che con te c’erano altre persone che fumavano, che si bucavano."

Do you speak Italian? Me neither, but I have friends who do. This is what my friend had to say about it:

"Si bucavano is colloquial for they injected themselves (with drugs)"
"It literally means they put holes in themselves. Which translates to taking drugs through injection."
"Well, anyone who translates "si bucavano" into anything related to stabbing, should be severely reprimanded!"

So itl looks like the story is not "about the victim being stabbed by several people" or "about a bunch of junkies all coming at the victim with their needles". It looks like "the victim" as you like to call her, was in the same smoke filled room with "bunch of junkies" who were "putting holes in themselves"...

Thank you, I was wondering why that quote made no sense whatsoever. Mystery solved.

 

[Matthew Best]

It might not be true, but it is a legal fact. And that is what matters.

On the contrary, it might be a legal fact, but it's not true. And that is what matters.

 

[Bill Williams]

LOL. Very amusing post.

Your post twists words absurdly. The Marasca CSC panel was an appeal court which conducted an appeal trial in accordance with Italian procedural law. The CSC (Corte Suprema di Cassazione = Supreme Court of Cassation; it is the highest court of appeals in Italy) and tries cases following the procedures in CPP Articles 610 - 614.

The Marasca CSC panel annulled the Nencini court verdict and demolished the Nencini court's reasoning (the Nencini motivation report). Section 9 and its subsections are part of the demolition of the Nencini court's reasoning by the Marasca CSC panel.

To help anyone who wishes to understand this, here are the beginning paragraphs of Sections 9, 9.1, and 9.2 of the Marasca CSC panel motivation report:

9. The ascertained errores in iudicando [errors in judgment] and the logical inconsistencies pointed out invalidate the appealed verdict {of the Nencini court} from the funditus [foundations], hence it deserves to be annulled.

The aforementioned reasons for annulling {the Nencini court verdict} can be summarised in the inability to present an evidentiary framework that can really be considered suitable to support a pronouncement of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, as required by Article 533 of the Italian Code of Criminal Procedure in the text renewed by Article 5 of the law n. 46/2006....

9.1 The intrinsically contradictory ensemble of the body of evidence, whose objective uncertainty is already emphasised by the previously highlighted wavering progress of the proceedings, does not therefore allow [us] to be satisfied {with the Nencini court verdict} to the standard of [beyond a] reasonable doubt, ....

9.2 The aspects of the objectively contradictory nature [of evidence] can be, as shown below, illustrated for each defendant, in a synoptic presentation of the elements favourable to the hypothesis of guilt and of the elements against it, as they are shown, of course, by the text of the challenged ruling {that is, the Nencini court verdict} and of the previous ones.

No wonder Vixen reads her stuff out of context. I mean, just how blatant does Marasca/Bruno have to be to set-up what is to come?

It's almost as if Vixen had wilfully ignored such statements as....

The intrinsically contradictory ensemble of the body of evidence, whose objective uncertainty is already emphasised by the previously highlighted wavering progress of the proceedings​

.........so that she can bend subsequent statements to some other conclusion.

Vixen wants it to be like this - M/B simply summarized unassailable facts as found at the lower court, agreed with them, listed them, but reversed the Nencini finding anyways.

Which part of "intrinsically contradictory ensemble of the body of evidence", or "whose objective uncertainty", or "is already emphasised by the previously highlighted wavering progress of the proceedings" is difficult to understand?

 

[acbytesla]

Yeah - the court did not rule Amanda was at the scene (it couldn't as there is no evidence to indicate that), it did not rule Amanda washed blood from her hands (it couldn't as there is no evidence to indicate that) and she did not cover up for Guede (that's just a PGP fantasy).

If it makes you somehow feel better thinking otherwise then by all mean, go for it. At the end of the day they were both exonerated and the case is closed. Deal with it.

Amen brother.

 

[NotEvenWrong]

Whatever. Pranking is not a very nice thing to do when it damages other people's property or causes them distress 'for a laugh'. So much for acbytesla's claim 'Amanda was a nice person'.


So she goes to parties where people inject themselves. Lovely.

[Method provides irrefutable proof that Vixen's fantasy narrative is completely inaccurate based on actual translations from Italian.]

Vixen's response:

WHATEVS. AMANDA IS STILL A POOPY HEAD NEENER NEENER.

Always good to have ol' Vixen around for intellectual discourse and honest discussion.

 

[Stacyhs]

[Method provides irrefutable proof that Vixen's fantasy narrative is completely inaccurate based on actual translations from Italian.]

Vixen's response:

WHATEVS. AMANDA IS STILL A POOPY HEAD NEENER NEENER.

Always good to have ol' Vixen around for intellectual discourse and honest discussion.

I was reading an article yesterday about why seemingly intelligent people can do and believe...ahem..."unintelligent" things. This paragraph explains why so many PGP insist TMB negative tests still mean blood is present, a size 37 female shoe print exists, a bloody knife outline matches a knife that is far too big, Guede could not have scaled the wall, that Meredith's DNA was on the kitchen knife, MY LOVE was about a stabbing, Amanda trashed the room of a girl who had slept with her boyfriend, Amanda covered up for Guede, etc.:

"The Duning-Kruger effect represents a cognitive bias in people who are doubly incompetent – sure of themselves even when they are wrong and unable to recognize their own cluelessness. This may be due to selective exposure to facts that support their pre-conceived notions while disregarding contrary information. One might conclude that critical thinking is not their forte." (Psychology Today)

 

[Stacyhs]

Vixen, what evidence is there that Amanda washed her hands of Meredith's blood?

I'm beginning to think you're avoiding answering this question. Why is that?

 

[TruthCalls]

I was reading an article yesterday about why seemingly intelligent people can do and believe...ahem..."unintelligent" things. This paragraph explains why so many PGP insist TMB negative tests still mean blood is present, a size 37 female shoe print exists, a bloody knife outline matches a knife that is far too big, Guede could not have scaled the wall, that Meredith's DNA was on the kitchen knife, MY LOVE was about a stabbing, Amanda trashed the room of a girl who had slept with her boyfriend, Amanda covered up for Guede, etc.:

"The Duning-Kruger effect represents a cognitive bias in people who are doubly incompetent – sure of themselves even when they are wrong and unable to recognize their own cluelessness. This may be due to selective exposure to facts that support their pre-conceived notions while disregarding contrary information. One might conclude that critical thinking is not their forte." (Psychology Today)

How true!

 

[TruthCalls]

Vixen, what evidence is there that Amanda washed her hands of Meredith's blood?

I'm beginning to think you're avoiding answering this question. Why is that?

That's one of the 'big three' I've been asking Vixen to answer for a while now. Never going to happen though it would be nice to see her be honest enough to admit there is none.

 

[Planigale]

Vixen, what evidence is there that Amanda washed her hands of Meredith's blood?

I'm beginning to think you're avoiding answering this question. Why is that?

Please remember when answering this that Steffanoni specifically said to the court in her testimony 'the source of DNA cannot be known'. There is no expert testimony claiming mixed blood.

 

[Bill Williams]

Vixen, what evidence is there that Amanda washed her hands of Meredith's blood?

I'm beginning to think you're avoiding answering this question. Why is that?

That's one of the 'big three' I've been asking Vixen to answer for a while now. Never going to happen though it would be nice to see her be honest enough to admit there is none.

Vixen has recently admitted that she simply made up a statement, claimed to be from Postal Office Battistelli. That one was good to see, that Vixen would admit that she just made it up.

 

[Stacyhs]

Vixen has recently admitted that she simply made up a statement, claimed to be from Postal Office Battistelli. That one was good to see, that Vixen would admit that she just made it up.

Baby steps, Bill. Baby steps.


Edit: Bill, I'm not so sure Vixen did admit she made up a statement. She said "OK, even if he didn't say it". That's not quite the same thing as admitting it. But, at least she's admitting there's a possibility he didn't say it, which is a baby step forward.

 

[Vixen]

He did not "believe Meredith lay hurt behind it". All he knew is that the house had been broken into, there was a small amount of blood in the bathroom, feces in the toilet, and that they couldn't get ahold of Meredith by phone. If he knew she lay dead behind the door and what police would find, then common sense says they would have played up their concern for the police's benefit. They didn't.

Nor did he have to tell them to come quickly. He told them what he'd seen, his concerns and they said they would "send a patrol car now". They were coming quickly or do you think sirens blaring was required for a burglary?

If guilty and they realized they'd left Amanda's lamp in the room, he'd have definitely broken down the door before the police got there. They'd also have removed or washed the bath mat, washed the hallway of "bloody" footprints, and any blood in the bathroom if it could possibly have been theirs.

In court Amanda was asked why she banged on Mez' door, and she replied, she was worried she was in there, hurt. (This implies Raff had the same view as he claimed to have tried to break the door down [and it was splintered]).

Massei, astutely pointed out, 'If I find a locked door, then I assume nobody's home'.

If Amanda thought Mez had come to harm as she claimed in her email to the world and to Filomena, what took her so long to get back to the cottage with Raff. No sign of any urge to investigate. Took them another TWENTY MINUTES to walk the five minutes to the cottage - so concerned were they, they later claimed they had been banging on the door and calling her name frantically and climbing over the balcony to get to her window sill, and Raff was trying out a kick and a shoulder to the door, they claimed.

So why not tell the police to come quickly, instead of reassuring them, 'nothing's been stolen'.

We note Raff refused to testify, so we have no explanation from him about his actions and his attitude.

 

[Vixen]

Continuing to find your posts full of absurdities.

Too bad you didn't list quotes from your legal dictionary sources.

Here's some information:

"Hypothesis

An assumption or theory.

During a criminal trial, a hypothesis is a theory set forth by either the prosecution or the defense for the purpose of explaining the facts in evidence. It also serves to set up a ground for an inference of guilt or innocence, or a showing of the most probable motive for a criminal offense."

Source: http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/hypothesis

"What is HYPOTHESIS?

A supposition, assumption, or theory; a theory set up by the prosecution,on a criminal trial, or by the defense, as an explanation of the facts in evidence,and a ground for inferring guilt or innocence, as the case may be, or as indicating a probable or possible motive for the crime."

Law Dictionary: What is HYPOTHESIS? definition of HYPOTHESIS (Black's Law Dictionary)
Source: helawdictionary.org/hypothesis/

Another absurdity - wonderfully entertaining - in your post is your implication that a word used by a court must necessarily be a "legal" term. If that were true, words such as "and", "the", and "but" would need to be "legally" defined. Courts use the language of their country - and the format of a judgment (motivation report) is specified in CPP Article 546; there is no statement in that procedural law that only "legal" terminology must be used.

And yet another absurdity in your post is that a court may only write of "facts". Of course, this is not true; a court could, for example, prove a hypothesis through contradiction.

Section 9 is a summary of the facts. Section 10 reiterates the court's verdict.


No rational person finishes a report on a hypothesis. The hypothesis needs to be discussed in the main body, and indeed it is. Marasca goes through each party's appeal points in section 4 onwards in the main body of the report. Section 9 effectively are the conclusions of that discussion and a clarification of what the facts are, having heard all of the points of appeal.

 

[Vixen]

No property damage was done in the prank. Teenagers, which Amanda was at the time, often do stupid or silly things without thinking. That does not make them bad or insensitive people. It makes them immature. Amanda had many friends, classmates, and teachers in Seattle who said she was a "nice person".

Um...no. She doesn't go to parties where people inject themselves. She wrote about a party where there were drug addicts injecting themselves. I suppose you think Bram Stoker drank blood, Margaret Mitchell owned slaves , and Dan Brown saved the world from a deadly plague?

By the way, you still have not presented any evidence that Amanda washed Meredith's blood from her hands. Because the judge said so is not evidence.

You have not presented any evidence you were born when your birth certificates says you were. Just because you have a birth certificate, that's not evidence, is your logic.

 

[Vixen]

Yeah - the court did not rule Amanda was at the scene (it couldn't as there is no evidence to indicate that), it did not rule Amanda washed blood from her hands (it couldn't as there is no evidence to indicate that) and she did not cover up for Guede (that's just a PGP fantasy).

If it makes you somehow feel better thinking otherwise then by all mean, go for it. At the end of the day they were both exonerated and the case is closed. Deal with it.

It did. You are in denial. Deal with it.