Amanda Knox guilty - all because of a cartwheel

[Mary_H]

There is a valid reason to discuss Amanda's sexuality. Given the posing of the scene and that there is/was suspected to be a sexual element to the attack, Amanda's sexuality was necessarily involved. You may try to decry it all you wish, but Amanda brought all this pain and suffering on herself.

Uh huh, yeah.

No, that certainly appears to be your belief. Or is it only the Perugian Judiciary that is corrupt? Or just in this one case? Do you have any actual evidence of corruption?

I didn't even mention the word corruption, knucklehead. A system can be in need of an overhaul without being corrupt.

 

[Charlie Wilkes]

Alternate scenarios have been presented. You choose not to accept them based on the premise that Amanda is innocent regardless of whether the entirety of the evidence agrees with you or not.

What alternative scenario has been proposed with regard to the footprint in the bathroom - i.e., how it was made, rather than who made it?

 

[Sherlock Holmes]

even if she were guilty, think how many people would pay (and have paid) to read her story. I think it's an ideal way to pay the settlements and bills that directly resulted from her arrest and conviction.

I agree with this 100% - as long as the money goes to the Kerchers Patrick, how would Amanda ever pay that off anyway without something like this, make a movie if that helps.
If Amanda give an interview, I can see one of 4 things happening;

1) She confesses and tell us what really happened that night

2) The Kerchers and Patrick get some of the $$ she owes them

3) She doesn't confess, but we learn something new at least

4) Her parents get all the money and use it towards her defence and get themselves out of debt

Now I really can't see #1 happening and I don't agree with #4 happening until #2 is taken care of --- I'm still for it.

 

[Dan O.]

Didn't Rudy say that his pants were soaked in Meredith's blood? He would have been kneeling on the floor in the pool of blood. While he is standing up washing the blood off his hands, the blood on the front of his pants would flow down onto his sock and into his shoe. The imprint is made when he takes the shoe off to wash it out. Note that there is no blood on the outside or sole of the shoe at this time so no tracks into and out of the bath.

 

[Sherlock Holmes]

Edited to add: it's not quite true I have no horse in the race. I do mostly lean toward guilty but have listened and tried to see the merit in arguments from Bruce and Charlie. They simply have so much evidence in their possession that it only makes sense to try to glean something from it. Bruce made very good points with regard to the broken window and the glass dispersal and I spent a lot of time looking at his photos. Charlie also offered a while back to make some stuff he has available and although we haven't seen it yet, I really would like to.
I can't subscribe to the face saving and railroading theory though, its utterly too ludicrous for me.

I believe thats the way I feel too, if I had to give a percentage though, I'ld say I'm 70 percent sure she's guilty, but this number changes up and down slightly. Those bedroom pictures by Bruce moved me from 80 to 70, but I still don't believe Rudy came in through a window, because he didn't lock Merediths door.

 

[Dan O.]

What alternative scenario has been proposed with regard to the footprint in the bathroom - i.e., how it was made, rather than who made it?

Don't you remember the gymnastic duo hopping backwards on one foot?

 

[Sherlock Holmes]

What alternative scenario has been proposed with regard to the footprint in the bathroom - i.e., how it was made, rather than who made it?

I think the footprint is actually Amanda's, she said she used the mat to hop on to get to her room after her shower, why? I don't know, but the partial print which seems larger than her print, is due to the pulling and hopping motion.

 

[Dan O.]

I believe thats the way I feel too, if I had to give a percentage though, I'ld say I'm 70 percent sure she's guilty, but this number changes up and down slightly. Those bedroom pictures by Bruce moved me from 80 to 70, but I still don't believe Rudy came in through a window, because he didn't lock Merediths door.

Are you still stuck on Rudy not being able to pull the door closed because his hands are soaked in Meredith's blood and there is no blood on the outside handle of Meredith's door? Remember that there is no blood on the cottage door where Rudy had to exit either. This indicates that Rudy had covered his hands before leaving. He could have put his gloves on before returning to Meredith's room to search for the key to let himself out. There is no blood on the gloves because he would have taken them off earlier to go to the bathroom so there would be no blood transfer to any of the objects he handled later like the outside door, Meredith's door handle, the contents of her purse or her cell phones.

 

[Mary_H]

Are you still stuck on Rudy not being able to pull the door closed because his hands are soaked in Meredith's blood and there is no blood on the outside handle of Meredith's door? Remember that there is no blood on the cottage door where Rudy had to exit either. This indicates that Rudy had covered his hands before leaving. He could have put his gloves on before returning to Meredith's room to search for the key to let himself out. There is no blood on the gloves because he would have taken them off earlier to go to the bathroom so there would be no blood transfer to any of the objects he handled later like the outside door, Meredith's door handle, the contents of her purse or her cell phones.

From a very early report:

"Blood-soaked pieces of paper were also found in the bedroom and a bloodstained tissue or handkerchief was discovered near a wire fence backing onto Kercher’s home."

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/crime/article2801150.ece

 

[BobTheDonkey]

Are you still stuck on Rudy not being able to pull the door closed because his hands are soaked in Meredith's blood and there is no blood on the outside handle of Meredith's door? Remember that there is no blood on the cottage door where Rudy had to exit either. This indicates that Rudy had covered his hands before leaving. He could have put his gloves on before returning to Meredith's room to search for the key to let himself out. There is no blood on the gloves because he would have taken them off earlier to go to the bathroom so there would be no blood transfer to any of the objects he handled later like the outside door, Meredith's door handle, the contents of her purse or her cell phones.

No, it's not because of the lack of blood on the handle - besides, that could easily have been wiped off.

I don't believe Rudy locked the door because nothing in his shoeprints indicates a pause, of any kind, on his way out the front door.

 

[Sherlock Holmes]

Are you still stuck on Rudy not being able to pull the door closed because his hands are soaked in Meredith's blood and there is no blood on the outside handle of Meredith's door?.

Thats not me that said that, I say Rudy didn't lock the door because his footsteps leading from the room to out the front door, don't point at Meredith's door. I also don't buy Mary's swivel move either, sorry Mary.

 

[BobTheDonkey]

What alternative scenario has been proposed with regard to the footprint in the bathroom - i.e., how it was made, rather than who made it?

Ahh, but the thing is...the alternate scenario is based, in part, on a different theory about who made the print.

Take Sherlock Holmes' new theory regarding Amanda hopping around on the bathmat (why, oh why, would someone do this anyway? Why not just walk to your bedroom, get a towel, dry off, then mop up the water in the hallway - she definitely had a mop, and she definitely knew how to use it - by her own testimony, no less ).

Or perhaps the theory that she and Raffaele were setting the scene in Meredith's bedroom. One or the other of the duo stepped in the blood while still wet, so off he or she went, hopping to the bathroom to clean it off. Once in the bathroom, he/she lost his or her balance while attempting to clean up, stepping down on the bathmat. That, in no way, defies any laws of physics, nor of common sense.


BTW, Dan O...a bloody sock doesn't leave the same kind of outline as a bloody footprint

 

[tsig]

The defense has done this. But the prosecution has never woven the evidence into a narrative that makes the least bit of sense.

For example, the prosecution says Amanda's DNA mixed with Meredith's blood is significant. But they don't explain why all of these samples were found in places where Amanda's DNA might naturally be present, while none were found in the room where Meredith was killed.

They say the luminol footprints were made by Amanda and Raffaele tracking Meredith's blood into the corridor. But they don't explain why there are only three of these footprints, why they form no trail or pattern, and why DNA tests came up negative on all of them.

They say the footprint on the bathmat was made by Sollecito, but they don't explain how he made it, or why he left it there for the police to find and examine. Nor do they explain why the big toe of this footprint looks nothing like the big toe of Sollecito's reference footprint but looks very much like the big toe of Guede's reference footprint.

They say Raffaele's DNA on the bra fastener proves he staged the crime to look like a sexual assault, but they don't explain why Guede's DNA was found inside Meredith's body if the sexual assault was staged by Amanda and Raffaele. Nor do they explain why this single DNA trace is the only physical evidence from the murder room that can be linked to Amanda or Raffaele.

They say the knife from Raffaele's kitchen is the murder weapon, but they are forced to add a second murder weapon to explain some of the wounds, and they can't come up with any plausible reason why Amanda or Raffaele would convey this knife to a place that was already equipped with similar utensils.

The defense can address all of this: The bra fastener is a fluke that happened because of poor handling of evidence, which real-world criminal investigators know is possible. The mixed DNA only proves that Amanda lived there. The luminol footprints are unrelated to the crime. The print on the mat was made by Guede when he cleaned up. The knife was never removed from Raffaele's apartment, and the putative match on the blade was an artifact caused by trace contamination in the lab, which again is a well-documented fact of criminal investigations.

Moreover, the defense can present a plausible scenario that explains all of the evidence. Guede broke in through Filomena's window. He was on the toilet when Meredith arrived home, which is why he didn't flush. He blitzed her and killed her with a small knife in the corner of her room, moved her body, removed most of her clothing, and sexually assaulted her. He cleaned up in the bathroom, and while doing so he removed his right shoe to rinse it off under the bidet, leaving a ring of blood around the drain of the bidet and drops of diluted blood in the basin. While his shoe was off, he put his foot down on the mat and left the print. He put his show on, went back into Meredith's room, spread the quilt over her body, and sat on the edge of the bed with the bloody knife at his side while he went through her purse. He took her money and cell phones, and he exited the room, locking the door behind him and leaving a trail of bloody shoe prints running down the corridor.

Where was Amanda when the murder took place?

 

[Mary_H]

Thats not me that said that, I say Rudy didn't lock the door because his footsteps leading from the room to out the front door, don't point at Meredith's door. I also don't buy Mary's swivel move either, sorry Mary.

That's okay, Sherlock. That was when I was still buying Fulcanelli's claim that there were no other footprints in front of Meredith's door, but of course, there were; they had just been cleaned up.

 

[BobTheDonkey]

That's okay, Sherlock. That was when I was still buying Fulcanelli's claim that there were no other footprints in front of Meredith's door, but of course, there were; they had just been cleaned up.

Wait, cleaned up by whom?

 

[Mary_H]

Wait, cleaned up by whom?

The police. Hence, the discovery, under luminol, of only one footprint, instead of those of all the people who had stood in the hallway and in the doorway of the room that day.

 

[Bruce Fischer]

Where was Amanda when the murder took place?

Amanda was with Raffaele at his apartment.

 

[tsig]

Amanda was with Raffaele at his apartment.

Then why did she place herself in the cottage when the murder took place?

 

[Mary_H]

There is a valid reason to discuss Amanda's sexuality. Given the posing of the scene and that there is/was suspected to be a sexual element to the attack, Amanda's sexuality was necessarily involved.

Does anyone know whether it was ever made clear why Dr. Luca Lalli, the original medical examiner, was eventually fired from the case? Looking over many of the early news reports, we see that as early as November 6th, the day Amanda was arrested, theories of the crime had already been worked out and were being announced to the press, but that Dr. Lalli essentially disagreed with them:

"[Chief of Police] Mr De Felice said that the three had “tried to overpower her sexually” but Miss Kercher had resisted. He added that the student had been “morally upright”, and that no traces of drugs had been found in her blood.

"Giuliano Amato, the Italian interior minister, told a news conference: “It’s an ugly story in which people which this girl had in her home, friends, tried to force her into relations which she didn’t want.”

"The Italian media has speculated that two men may have been involved in the killing, with one holding her down while the other killed her. One theory is that Ms Kercher, from Coulsdon, South London, met the man, or men, for sex last Thursday night but that the encounter turned nasty."

In the same reports, we find several mentions of Dr. Lalli's opinion of the assault, which was that there were signs of secual activity, but it could possibly have been consensual:

"Luca Lalli, the pathologist in the case, insisted that she had not been raped, although he said that there were bruises and lesions on her body consistent with a struggle."

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article2816366.ece

So, what do we (and what did the police) have? During her interrogation, Amanda said Patrick took Meredith in the bedroom, but that she didn't witness what happened in there. The pathologist said Meredith had sex, but he couldn't say for sure she had been raped.

Based exclusively on those two pieces of information the prosecution, the chief of police and the interior minister (?) hold a press conference characterizing the murder as involving three attackers with a sexual motive.

How, pray tell, did they come to their conclusion?

 

[Bruce Fischer]

Then why did she place herself in the cottage when the murder took place?

Yes, I knew you were going to go back to the information obtained from the interrogation. The information that we know was not reliable due to the methods used to obtain it.

Why ask the question to begin with? You know the answer?

Let's continue to go in circles.