Amanda Knox guilty - all because of a cartwheel

[Alt+F4]

THE LAB WORK DOESN'T MATTER

Sollecito admitted that Meredith's DNA, blood specifically, was to be expected on the knife. The question, therefore, is how it got there NOT whether it's there or not.

And his admission came freely, not as a result of police interrogation. As far as I know when he was informed of the DNA test results (by his lawyers or family?) he made up the story of the dinner knife-pricking incident and wrote it in his prison diary. This I believe happened in November 2007.

 

[Fulcanelli]

And his admission came freely, not as a result of police interrogation. As far as I know when he was informed of the DNA test results (by his lawyers or family?) he made up the story of the dinner knife-pricking incident and wrote it in his prison diary. This I believe happened in November 2007.

Yes, after having seen the knife had been found on TV.

 

[Alt+F4]

Yes, after having seen the knife had been found on TV.

Ah indeed. So he invented the story even before the knife was tested. Well I don't this would fall under even the broadest definition of "false memory syndrome".

 

[Fulcanelli]

Ah indeed. So he invented the story even before the knife was tested. Well I don't this would fall under even the broadest definition of "false memory syndrome".

No, it was reported by the media Meredith's DNA had been found on the blade and Raffaele saw that on TV. Then he wrote his diary entry on it with the story of pricking Meredith while she was round his place and they were cooking a meal.

 

[Alt+F4]

No, it was reported by the media Meredith's DNA had been found on the blade and Raffaele saw that on TV. Then he wrote his diary entry on it with the story of pricking Meredith while she was round his place and they were cooking a meal.

Ah, ok. Thank you for the clairfication.

 

[Fiona]

Ok, who was it said we would back to the dna shortly? I suggest you claim your million now: there may not be a better chance!!

 

[shuttlt]

OK. I don't want to be dogmatic about the DNA on the knife. My problem with the arguments against it is that, as has been said before, they seem kind of generic. There are the warnings about how you have to store it or it degrades into worthless crap. But the DNA wasn't a worthless bag of crap.

Then there are the warnings about LCN being less certain than conventional profiling, false peaks etc. I can understand those criticisms if one of two things were the case:

1. We were comparing the profile against a large database.
2. We really were picking some peaks and discarding others based on whether on not they match the reference sample as has been claimed elsewhere. There is surely a clear dividing line between the profile and the noise. It may not be quite as wide a gap as we'd like, but it isn't ambiguous.

Are there any specific warnings about using LCN to match a specific individual, or a small number of specific individuals? Surely the confidence a lab would have in a result if they were comparing it to a single individual would be very much higher than if they were comparing it to a database of 1,000,000 people? It seems bizarre to me that the same thresholds should apply (do they?). I'd like to see some talk about what the odds are of falsely matching a specific individual given an LCN profile with the noise we're dealing with. Presumably it must be in principle possible to calculate, even if only roughly?

Then of course we have the issue of the independently witnessed controls coming back clean. To me that kind of makes it look like the lab isn't the source of the DNA on the knife. So then we have somebody elses DNA getting turned into Merediths in the LCN profile, what are the odds? Or Merediths DNA getting onto a knife inside a plastic bag inside a box.

Could somebody point out where I'm going wrong with my thinking here? Perhaps all of this has been explained already and I've skimmed past it.

 

[quadraginta]

Ok, who was it said we would back to the dna shortly? I suggest you claim your million now: there may not be a better chance!!

That would be me.

Psychic abilities were not required, though.

Sadly. I sure could use the cash.

 

[shuttlt]

Out of curiosity, these labs in the US doing LCN testing that have these strict limits we've been hearing about... given that the claim is that LCN profiles aren't admissable in US courts, what work are these labs doing? Is it used by for police even though it's not admissable? There can't be much paternity testing that requires this kind of technique, particularly if it's not admissable in court.

 

[stilicho]

Stilicho was implying that in defending Knox and Sollecito, we have set the bar so high that no one would ever be convicted of anything. My response was an empirical refutation.

It was a hand-wave, not an empirical refutation.

Information gleaned from questioning, voluntary written notes, phone conversations, prison diaries, 112 call recordings, and AK's own court testimony have all been declared inadmissible by you and others. Forensic evidence has also been declared to be inadmissible.

What does that leave for an investigator to use in a case? And, if you're making an exception in the case of RG, then why? Try to apply the same methods and principles to the others accused, including the original charges against Mr Lumumba. What is so special about RG that he is the exception to your rules?

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@Alt+F4: I recommend that participants in this thread bookmark this link:

http://perugiamurderfile.org/viewforum.php?f=8&sid=0c51e03859f5fc8519b4d1d99b156208

That's the "In Their Own Words" portion of the PMF site. It has a wealth of information on what the principals in the case had to say. Here is RS (18 NOV 2007) explaining why Meredith's DNA would be expected to be found on a knife in his kitchen drawer:

The fact that there is Meredith's DNA on the kitchen is because
once while cooking together, I shifted myself in the house handling
the knife, I had the point on her hand, and immediately after I
apologized but she had nothing done to her. So the only real
explanation of the kitchen knife is this.

(Source: http://perugiamurderfile.org/viewtopic.php?p=666#p666 )

It's a Google translation from Italian so there are some curious turns of the phrase. This is RS's alibi and refutes all the testimony from our resident JREF 'experts' claiming that Meredith's DNA could not possibly have been found on the knife. RS disagrees with Dan O, Kestrel, and halides1.

 

[stilicho]

Confusing stuff. That's certainly not the way it sounds when FOA discuss it. Still, in the interests of balance and fairness I'd like to be relying on sombody other than Mignini for an explanation of the charges he faced/faces.

I agree it's confusing. It does sound like a serious charge and it certainly has some impact on the expected appeals on behalf of AK and RS. But Mignini himself is allowed appeals, too, so it's arguable how great the impact will be.

What is clear is that Mignini has become a lightning rod for the Perugia murder and was one of the very logical reasons that Comodi was made an important part of the prosecution team. I've mentioned before that AK's most vigorous defenders dwell inordinately on the reputation and style of Mignini because those of Comodi, Massei, and Micheli are beyond reproach.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

Knife on TV

Ah indeed. So he invented the story even before the knife was tested. Well I don't this would fall under even the broadest definition of "false memory syndrome".

From Sollecito's prison diary:

He wrote: "The fact there is Meredith's DNA on the kitchen knife is because once when we were all cooking together I accidentally pricked her hand. I apologised immediately and she said it was not a problem."

Snip

Sollecito added: "When I saw the knife on TV that was in my kitchen and on which they found traces of Amanda and Meredith, my heart jumped into my throat.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...-DNA-knife-pricked-cooking.html#ixzz0dxVNgRex

Do you have a cite which says his story about cooking together predated his knowledge about the test results?

 

[Fiona]

http://www.seattlepi.com/local/414529_knox22.html

There are some inaccuracies in this report but Vogt is generally quite good at sticking to the facts

 

[Fiona]

From Sollecito's prison diary:

He wrote: "The fact there is Meredith's DNA on the kitchen knife is because once when we were all cooking together I accidentally pricked her hand. I apologised immediately and she said it was not a problem."

Snip

Sollecito added: "When I saw the knife on TV that was in my kitchen and on which they found traces of Amanda and Meredith, my heart jumped into my throat.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...-DNA-knife-pricked-cooking.html#ixzz0dxVNgRex

Do you have a cite which says his story about cooking together predated his knowledge about the test results?

Since nobody has claimed that it is a bit unlikely: See Fulcanelli's reply to the question

 

[tsig]

Her so called "pioneering technique" consisted of operating a device beyond it's scientifically established limits without doing any studies to determine reliability of the readings so obtained. It's a classic problem of results oriented "forensic science", where the overriding goal is to produce evidence supporting the prosecution.

Except in those cases where they don't.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

Micheli and the presumption of innocence

I've mentioned before that AK's most vigorous defenders dwell inordinately on the reputation and style of Mignini because those of Comodi, Massei, and Micheli are beyond reproach.

With respect to the KS case “Judge Paolo Michelli, during the pretrial, took the conspiracy for granted. He boasted that he began his reasoning with all three suspects in the murder room. So much for innocent until proven guilty (http://blog.seattlepi.com/dempsey/archives/179047.asp).”

 

[Kestrel]

From Sollecito's prison diary:

He wrote: "The fact there is Meredith's DNA on the kitchen knife is because once when we were all cooking together I accidentally pricked her hand. I apologised immediately and she said it was not a problem."

Snip

Sollecito added: "When I saw the knife on TV that was in my kitchen and on which they found traces of Amanda and Meredith, my heart jumped into my throat.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...-DNA-knife-pricked-cooking.html#ixzz0dxVNgRex

Do you have a cite which says his story about cooking together predated his knowledge about the test results?

The problem with this bit of evidence is that 50 picograms of DNA is less than a dozen cells. Below the threshold for LCN DNA even when done under proper circumstances. That is in a separate facility with a positive air pressure system and filtration to keep any microscopic particles floating around the room out of the equipment. It was instead processed in the same lab and prepared on the same work surfaces used to process dozens of other samples containing Meredith's DNA. All it takes is a dust spec to contaminate the sample.

So what do you expect Sollecito to do when he hears about this evidence? If he and Amanda are innocent, would you expect him to simply state he had no idea how the DNA got on that knife? After all, from this thread it's clear that few people believe that DNA contamination exists. Most people seem to think it works just like it does on CSI. Where DNA is never present unless it came from a criminal or victim and it's always traceable to a crime.

 

[Fiona]

With respect to the KS case “Judge Paolo Michelli, during the pretrial, took the conspiracy for granted. He boasted that he began his reasoning with all three suspects in the murder room. So much for innocent until proven guilty (http://blog.seattlepi.com/dempsey/archives/179047.asp).”

Page not found, for me

 

[Chris_Halkides]

Alt+F4 and the knife

Since nobody has claimed that it is a bit unlikely: See Fulcanelli's reply to the question

In comment #2501 Alt+F4 wrote, “And his admission came freely, not as a result of police interrogation. As far as I know when he was informed of the DNA test results (by his lawyers or family?) he made up the story of the dinner knife-pricking incident and wrote it in his prison diary. This I believe happened in November 2007.”

Fulcanelli replied (#2502), “Yes, after having seen the knife had been found on TV.”

Alt+F4 responded (#2503), “Ah indeed. So he invented the story even before the knife was tested. Well I don't this would fall under even the broadest definition of ‘false memory syndrome’.” (emphasis added)

Alt+F4 does appear to be making this claim.

 

[stilicho]

With respect to the KS case “Judge Paolo Michelli, during the pretrial, took the conspiracy for granted. He boasted that he began his reasoning with all three suspects in the murder room. So much for innocent until proven guilty http://blog.seattlepi.com/dempsey/archives/179047.asp

Fixed your link first of all. Second, it might help if your source spelled the judge's name correctly. Third: Where is the cite? Did Micheli really take the conspiracy for granted? Finally, it may help for you to locate original quotes rather than the opinion of a columnist who is joined at the hip with the FOA/Marriott PR machine.