Continuation - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case

[piktor]

Piktor

Apols - I see you quoted me yesterday/day before and I never responded so I'll jump in here.
This is the point I was making with my 'tenuous comparison' [ me, me ,me ] - evasion, meandering, obfuscation & forgetfulness simply doesn't fly, not in a courtroom or interview room at any rate.

As regards whether it works elsewhere - YMMV.

If this was just 1 instance* AK might be excused but as part of a pattern the court will draw an inference.
Comodi is not on trial - AK is, and as the records are available to the court the argument over timing is moot.


For some reason AK's response when caught out on a mistake re the Nov 5th issue "Ha they were pressuring me too" comes to mind. That might work in the movies but not in real life.


* If one was being very charitable it could be said that the mother had more reason to remember the call than AK given the circumstances.

Platonov,

No apologies needed. I am sure I am guilty of missing replies myself.

Knox decided to play the ingenue schtick because if she played it straight it would have been a fast track trial- and a shorter sentence.

Comodi has the right to use all kinds of tactics to find truth and justice for the victim, her family and society at large. Judge Massei also took part in the exchange.

Mrs. Mellas came across as forthright and believable. She had nothing to hide. Knox would just not follow her mom's lead.

 

[SomeAlibi]

It wouldn't be my choice of words, thus I hope he continues to spell it out in all the garish detail. The last couple clips I've seen of him he stopped using 'beaten,' though obviously I'm not seeing everything in chronological order coming so late to this debate. If he backslid, I hope your efforts are successful as he's a more impressive advocate when he doesn't use that shorthand. However to a pendant, two smacks in the back of the head do constitute 'beating,' however I would chose another description as I find pedantry unbecoming.
.
You seem like a nice enough fellow, but if only you and yours could see how you come across. One trip to that website of yours is cause for anyone with an open mind to back away slowly...

Well Kaosium, I'm here so you can talk to me directly so I'll only come across how I do. PMF is a passionate site but it's equally matched by IIP. That seems pretty squared up to me. I was actually given a pretty tough ride when I joined PMF because I was checking some facts out.

The case for the defence is highly developed these days. A huge huge effort has been put into explaining nearly (but crucially not like the events of the 2nd) everything. The gaps are the devastating holes.

It's very easy to make a passionate case for *anything* if you state it long enough and hard enough. I don't need to cite any number of conspiracy theories or social / political / religious movements to show this as true. In this case, as with all my clients' families, I wouldn't expect Edda, Curt, Chris or Deanna to believe in anything less than 100% of Amanda's innocence. However I have been there so many times when that equivalent family's world fell apart when they realised that their family member was actually involved. It is a terrible experience I can tell you. It often takes many months of typically years and no, they cannot believe it either.

This case is about drugs and the kids being completely out of their heads. They literally can't remember what they did but they clearly were there and they know. I believe Guede was dealing / facilitating for them that night. What happened escalated too far until something terrible happened because "they had no way out". Both Amanda and Raffale both said *independently* in their diaries that they would never touch drugs again ever - see the expressions in their diaries - they are so enormously heartfelt. Amanda would seek to have you believe she smoked a single joint on that evening (her court testimony). It's patently untrue. She clearly lied about this because how could someone get that confused, that utterly unequivocally regretful from a single joint?

As you learn in criminal cases: where there's untruth, there's the beginning of truth.

 

[Dan O.]

Guys, I didn't raise Comodi - you seem to have had some sort of pre-existing thread on it. All that matters about Amanda's first call in terms of timing is the objective cellphone records. Nothing else matters as to timing.

As to the existence of the call, her mother says it happened and she explained at length what happened in the call. Amanda says she can't recall it.

What else is there as objective evidence? I don't actually care what Comodi says if i) timing and ii) fact is established. What would opinion add after that? I'm totally confused.

Welcome to JREF SomeAlibi. You are quite right that we have discussed this topic before. This mole has been whacked. Then it was staked out and flattened with a steam roller. But it appears to have popped up once more.


The timing is absolutely critical to establish which phone call is being referenced. Amanda first called her mother at 12:47. Less than 45 minutes later at 13:24 she called again. Comodi is bringing up a non-existent phone call 45 minutes earlier "before anything happened" and is asking Amanda if she remembers calling her mom at that time.

By this time in the trial, everybody should know what the hard timeline is. This was no innocent mistake by Comodi. It was a deliberate ploy to discredit Amanda in the eyes of the jury. The only question is: when did Comodi initiate this plan?

Where does Amanda's mother come up with the details to interrogate her daughter about this bogus call at noon? No lawyer would want their client talking about the case in prison where it could be recorded and twisted to be used against them. ILE most likely acquired the phone records in the early evening of Nov. 2nd shortly after the last entries on those records. Before seeing her daughter in prison, Mrs Knox would have gone through screening. And during this screening process some innocent sounding seeds for the upcoming conversation could have been dropped. It may have been explicitly like: "What bothers me is why did your daughter call you the first time at Noon before anything happened".

Did Comodi plant that seed hopping something would grow out of it?

 

[Kestrel]

Ok Kestrel, so if that screenshot is correct, then what is the question? If the testimony of a third party was incorrect then it is still utterly secondary to the primary evidence: the timing is what it is, and Edda and Amanda's inability to agree is still inexplicable.

The image I posted clearly shows Amanda made the call to her mother at 12:47. After she had talked multiple times with Filomena and tried both of Meredith's phones. The issue is the prosecution claim that this call was before anything had happened.

The Massei report, has the same times for these phone calls. So why the implication that this data might be fake?

Anyone familiar with the science of human memory will understand why eyewitness accounts often differ. Contradictory testimony on minor points is not an indication of guilt, but an indication that the witnesses are Unfortunately, the general public still seems to think we all have TIVO machines inside our heads that give us perfect recall. Or perhaps they believe that Jesus comes down from heaven to help the innocent get everything correct.

 

[SomeAlibi]

The image I posted clearly shows Amanda made the call to her mother at 12:47. After she had talked multiple times with Filomena and tried both of Meredith's phones. The issue is the prosecution claim that this call was before anything had happened.

The Massei report, has the same times for these phone calls. So why the implication that this data might be fake?

Anyone familiar with the science of human memory will understand why eyewitness accounts often differ. Contradictory testimony on minor points is not an indication of guilt, but an indication that the witnesses are Unfortunately, the general public still seems to think we all have TIVO machines inside our heads that give us perfect recall. Or perhaps they believe that Jesus comes down from heaven to help the innocent get everything correct.

Well I keep on saying this about objective time records but the point isn't coming through: if that is the verified time then it's a point the appeal will make easily.

The importance of this point is another issue. I'd rate the original idea as probably a 1/10 contributory to the guilty verdict. There's a theory on the prosecution side about why she lied about it and her own mother contradicts her. Whatever the timing, you keep on ducking the point that Amanda says that there was no "first" phonecall and that Edda is extremely detailed on it. But whatever, it's relatively less important.

Now, could someone help me understand the morning of the 2nd? If you can do that - no joke - you could convert me.

 

[Kestrel]

Platonov,

No apologies needed. I am sure I am guilty of missing replies myself.

Knox decided to play the ingenue schtick because if she played it straight it would have been a fast track trial- and a shorter sentence.

Comodi has the right to use all kinds of tactics to find truth and justice for the victim, her family and society at large. Judge Massei also took part in the exchange.

The defendant is assumed to be guilty, therefore the prosecution should be given a free hand to assure a guilty verdict. A classic bit of authoritarian logic.

Do you also approve of torture? After all, it can produce a confession quickly so we can get on with protecting the public by burning the witch at the stake.

 

[Ampulla of Vater]

PDi - I personally think Quintavalle is the sort of witness you have to put down to court-experience. The reasons for him being credible are argued, the reasons for him not being credible are argued. In real life criminal trials, a huge amount of the jury's feel about a witness is as to how they come across. Quintavalle is a classic example of this and I think it's impossible to judge outside of that context. I do think that arguing the toss about Quintavalle is one of the less productive online conversations about this case: either side could be true - it's up the jury about who they believe.

I agree about arguing about his credibility being non-productive; I wasn't really intending to argue about it. I asked for 2 reasons:

1) Because you deal with witnesses routinely and thus are more familiar with the credibility of such, and

2) Because you stated the knife DNA and the bathroom DNA had issues of weakness. Since the bathmat print is Rafaelle's, that is useless as evidence to place Amanda at the scene of the crime, at the time of the crime.

Pretty much all that's left is witness testimony (since you cannot convict someone just because s/he is a liar and/or cannot remember.) While it is up to the jury about who they believe, this jury was unusual in the sense that it was made up of judges and people who are not exactly what I would call Amanda's peers. Quintavalle's testimony is one of the few eyewitness statements dealing directly with Amanda. I guess I should have just asked you if you have ever called a witness in a defense case who knew about the crime at the time it occurred but did not realize they directly witnessed something until a year later.

 

[Kestrel]

Now, could someone help me understand the morning of the 2nd? If you can do that - no joke - you could convert me.

If Raffaele woke up, picked up his phone to check the time and then went back to sleep, doesn't that still count as sleeping in?

 

[Kaosium]

Well Kaosium, I'm here so you can talk to me directly so I'll only come across how I do. PMF is a passionate site but it's equally matched by IIP. That seems pretty squared up to me. I was actually given a pretty tough ride when I joined PMF because I was checking some facts out.

I know it wasn't always like that, I spent some time reading there last summer when I looked into it the first time. I also know what you mean about other sites, I couldn't help but roll my eyes sometimes thinking 'C'mon people, this is Italy we're talking about, not North Korea.'

As you learn in criminal cases: where there's untruth, there's the beginning of truth.

However it's evidence which trumps everything. Real evidence, like all the DNA of Rudy found at the site of Meredith's death. The knife and the clasp come across more as evidence against the prosecution than either of the two in jail, and the fact that's all they found of them is even more definite evidence they didn't do it. Amanda and Raffaele can be 'guilty' of everything else, but unless it can be explained how the actual site of death contains nothing but Rudy and an extra footprint that's probably his, all the rest comes to naught in my mind.

Americans are kind of immunized against smear campaigns, in a sense that's all our politics are these days. I understand it is different in the UK, you aren't bombarded with negative campaign commercials for months every two years. Oftentimes we look to whose doing the smearing and why, and that reflects back onto the party responsible. Martyring Steve Moore because he exposes the massive holes in the forensic evidence doesn't strike me as a wise idea, and I know I sure as hell wouldn't participate in harassing a former FBI agent, but you play your own cards.

 

[SomeAlibi]

I agree about arguing about his credibility being non-productive; I wasn't really intending to argue about it. I asked for 2 reasons:

1) Because you deal with witnesses routinely and thus are more familiar with the credibility of such, and

2) Because you stated the knife DNA and the bathroom DNA had issues of weakness. Since the bathmat print is Rafaelle's, that is useless as evidence to place Amanda at the scene of the crime, at the time of the crime.

Pretty much all that's left is witness testimony (since you cannot convict someone just because s/he is a liar and/or cannot remember.) While it is up to the jury about who they believe, this jury was unusual in the sense that it was made up of judges and people who are not exactly what I would call Amanda's peers. Quintavalle's testimony is one of the few eyewitness statements dealing directly with Amanda. I guess I should have just asked you if you have ever called a witness in a defense case who knew about the crime at the time it occurred but did not realize they directly witnessed something until a year later.

Well no, don't misinterpret what I said: the DNA evidence will be determined by the court based on a huge set of precedent and expert witness. That is not me saying that there is "weakness" at all, I am merely saying that it is the obvious angle to pursue. If the argument is not made out then clearly you can ignore the rest of the evidence because they will be going down for the rest of their term there and then. Game over.

Your comment "While it is up to the jury about who they believe, this jury was unusual in the sense that it was made up of judges and people who are not exactly what I would call Amanda's peers" is not something that easy to understand. She was convicted by a jury of citizens of the state prosecuting. The "peers" concept I don't think I understand - no state has a requirement of peer-relevance for the defendants.

As to your question about people coming forward later, yes it does happen from time to time without overstretching the point . The critical components of a crime can happen in front of others in tiny parts of the whole such that they are unclear but later become evident. At that time you can get people coming forward. Happens relatively regularly if less frequently.

 

[SomeAlibi]

If Raffaele woke up, picked up his phone to check the time and then went back to sleep, doesn't that still count as sleeping in?

But Kestrel that's so very far from the totality of the evidence of that morning. You actually make me think you don't know what it is!

 

[SomeAlibi]

I know it wasn't always like that, I spent some time reading there last summer when I looked into it the first time. I also know what you mean about other sites, I couldn't help but roll my eyes sometimes thinking 'C'mon people, this is Italy we're talking about, not North Korea.'



However it's evidence which trumps everything. Real evidence, like all the DNA of Rudy found at the site of Meredith's death. The knife and the clasp come across more as evidence against the prosecution than either of the two in jail, and the fact that's all they found of them is even more definite evidence they didn't do it. Amanda and Raffaele can be 'guilty' of everything else, but unless it can be explained how the actual site of death contains nothing but Rudy and an extra footprint that's probably his, all the rest comes to naught in my mind.

Americans are kind of immunized against smear campaigns, in a sense that's all our politics are these days. I understand it is different in the UK, you aren't bombarded with negative campaign commercials for months every two years. Oftentimes we look to whose doing the smearing and why, and that reflects back onto the party responsible. Martyring Steve Moore because he exposes the massive holes in the forensic evidence doesn't strike me as a wise idea, and I know I sure as hell wouldn't participate in harassing a former FBI agent, but you play your own cards.

OK lets not offend each other with words like "smear campaign" because I believe in Sollecito, Guede and Knox's guilt and you don't. Lets have a debate without using such terms.

Second lets not bring "Americans" or anyone else into this. We are individuals with opinions. Our nationalities add or detract nothing from the exercise of that. If I accuse you of bias because you are American or you accuse me of it because I am British, we are foolish. There are Americans who believe in the guilt of Amanda Knox and there are British subjects who believe in her innocence. So lets drop that rubbish.

Third, I can't possibly "martyr" Steve Moore. What I am doing is making sure that Pepperdine are aware of every single print and tv appearance he's made and illustrating the massive overstatement of his case. I'm doing that with Moore's own words and nothing else. So lets get grown up about our debate: it's impossible that that is "harassing" someone. An ex-police officer is a citizen like anyone else. What they say is subject to the same laws as anyone else and capable of examination and criticism. Moore's a tough guy, he can take being quizzed on what *he* has said.

So you should please retract this suggestion of "harassment" as it is plainly wrong. I trust you do so by reply?

 

[Fine]

fuzzy wuzzy wasn't fuzzy wuzzy

Welcome to JREF SomeAlibi. You are quite right that we have discussed this topic before. This mole has been whacked. Then it was staked out and flattened with a steam roller. But it appears to have popped up once more.


The timing is absolutely critical to establish which phone call is being referenced. Amanda first called her mother at 12:47. Less than 45 minutes later at 13:24 she called again. Comodi is bringing up a non-existent phone call 45 minutes earlier "before anything happened" and is asking Amanda if she remembers calling her mom at that time.

By this time in the trial, everybody should know what the hard timeline is. This was no innocent mistake by Comodi. It was a deliberate ploy to discredit Amanda in the eyes of the jury. The only question is: when did Comodi initiate this plan?

Where does Amanda's mother come up with the details to interrogate her daughter about this bogus call at noon? No lawyer would want their client talking about the case in prison where it could be recorded and twisted to be used against them. ILE most likely acquired the phone records in the early evening of Nov. 2nd shortly after the last entries on those records. Before seeing her daughter in prison, Mrs Knox would have gone through screening. And during this screening process some innocent sounding seeds for the upcoming conversation could have been dropped. It may have been explicitly like: "What bothers me is why did your daughter call you the first time at Noon before anything happened".

Did Comodi plant that seed hopping something would grow out of it?

______________

A tiny quibble Dan. Mrs. Knox is not Mrs. Knox. She's married to Chris Mellas, so she's Mrs. Mellas.

///

 

[Kaosium]

So you should please retract this suggestion of "harassment" as it is plainly wrong. I trust you do so by reply?

Fair enough, let me re-state: If there was a campaign of harassment going on against a former FBI agent I would not be the one to call his old employer and offer to keep track of everything he said about a certain issue. As you note, that in and of itself would not constitute harassment necessarily, however I just wouldn't be the one to do it lest someone else come to a different conclusion.

Plus it looks weird.

I did mean that as a friendly heads up and not an accusation, thus the smiley. My real point was that his argument was compelling and it wouldn't be derailed by ad-hominem attacks or semantics. Sure, in my mind saying 'beaten' is an overstatement, but it doesn't engage his points. No one that I've seen on your side of the issue ever does, no matter how many times I've witnessed it being asked. So one more time:

How do you explain the lack of forensic evidence of Amanda and Raffaele in Meridith's room, while Rudy's is all over it?

 

[platonov]

...........................

Your comment "While it is up to the jury about who they believe, this jury was unusual in the sense that it was made up of judges and people who are not exactly what I would call Amanda's peers" is not something that easy to understand. She was convicted by a jury of citizens of the state prosecuting. The "peers" concept I don't think I understand - no state has a requirement of peer-relevance for the defendants.

...........................

Kaosium

Its not my place to speak for Some Alibi (he/she seems more than capable) or any poster but if I may be allowed to 'dumb it down' this seems reminiscent of the old schoolboy joke where the accused exclaims

"Jury of my peers - Hardly ! there's not a car thief among them "

Perhaps 'equivalence' [or 'peer-relevance'] or is more elegant.

 

[Kestrel]

But Kestrel that's so very far from the totality of the evidence of that morning. You actually make me think you don't know what it is!

I long ago concluded that Quntavalle's testimony was bunk. He was asked directly by a police officer about RS and AK shortly after the crime and said nothing. A year later he comes up with the story of seeing Amanda waiting outside his store the morning after the murder.

To go back to my earlier comment. Since when is answering a cell phone proof that you even got out of bed?

 

[LashL]

Hello, SomeAlibi, and welcome to the JREF forum.

I am interested in your posts because you say that you are a lawyer and you are clearly advocating the "Ms. Knox and Mr. Sollecito are guilty" position, but as a lawyer myself, I do not find the evidence against Ms. Knox and Mr. Sollecito compelling enough to warrant convictions beyond reasonable doubt.

I'd like to discuss this further with you, from one lawyer to another. And I'd like to start with this: What is it from the evidence adduced at trial that convinces you of their guilt?

 

[platonov]

I long ago concluded that Quntavalle's testimony was bunk. He was asked directly by a police officer about RS and AK shortly after the crime and said nothing. A year later he comes up with the story of seeing Amanda waiting outside his store the morning after the murder.

To go back to my earlier comment. Since when is answering a cell phone proof that you even got out of bed?

While the lawyers debate [ that blue type frightens me ]
was there not also computer activity ??

 

[Kevin_Lowe]

The good news for people that agree with the prosecution is that the state used first-hand information.

The people that agree with innocence are using third-rate information.

Yet you keep presenting your own opinions on matters pertaining to the case... why? If you genuinely believe that there is nothing to be said by those who were not present, because only first-hand experience of the courtroom events gives you any ability to make informed judgments, why do you comment on the case at all?

Courts do unjustly convict people sometimes. We have proven that several times over. So perhaps they are innocent despite their conviction, and you (not having been there) certainly have no more basis to proclaim certainty about their conviction than anyone else has a basis to proclaim that their conviction was unsafe, if people who were not there don't get to have an opinion.

Yet you keep sharing your opinion on the case. I find that inconsistent.

I maintain my previous statement that guilters only try out the "no one who wasn't there gets an opinion!" line selectively, when they run into evidence they cannot otherwise explain away. It's a replacement for the "Massei had access to secret evidence!" chestnut, which was the last line of defence before the Massei report was optimistically translated and turned out to be indefensible. Now the line is "Massei might have had access to super-secret evidence which he left out of the report for some reason, you can't prove he didn't!".

 

[Chris C]

I asked you to ask a direct question. This answer doesn't do that. If you wish to ask me a direct question, please do and I'll answer.

How is Knox not considered a suspect if they are wiretapping her phone?