Continuation - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case

[SomeAlibi]

SomeAlibi wrote, “The cellphone data places Amanda right by where Rudy was by his own diary at about 8.30pm - between "Kebap" and the basketball court.”

Amanda was at Raffaele’s flat near 8:45 and spoke with Ms. Popovic, who did not notice anything out of the ordinary in her behavior. Taking your comments about the cell phone as a given, SA, my interpretation of the two events is that she went out briefly and came back.

SomeAlibi wrote, “Both the defendant's diaries make clear their profound regret for their drug use. Why, since they only have ‘one joint’?”

My explanation for their words is that they were writing these works while in custody and consider that their smoking a joint is one of the reasons why they are there (meaning that smoking it was one reason why they have imperfect memories of the evening). I would feel the same way in their position.

Chris, do you believe that one joint smoked in the afternoon (according to Amanda's testimony) would cause memory loss of the events over the evening?

 

[Kaosium]

According to the prosecution theory, Amanda and Raff could not have slept in because they had to be at the cottage removing the trace evidence in Meredith's room that links them to the murder.

There is no evidence that trace evidence was removed in Meredith's room, but that doesn't seem to bother the prosecution. They had already declared the case as solved when the lack of physical evidence became apparent. So they invented a magical clean up that left no traces of cleaning. Where somehow the defendants were able to recognize their own trace DNA and remove it from the murder room while leaving the DNA pointing to Rudy.

This isn't the first time the ego of prosecutor Mignini has led to injustice. He imprisoned innocent people in the Monster of Florence case. Even after the courts declared his theory of that crime to be nonsense, Mignini stuck to his guns. Claiming that the crime was too complex for the judges to understand.

Thanks for the info, I read about the phantom clean-up but thought that theory evaporated with the bleach receipt. I've read that excerpt from "The Monster of Florence" and with other things I've read I suspect his epitaph will begin "Whom Gods Destroy..."

 

[SomeAlibi]

It is exactly those cardiac arrests, or rather the threat of them, that forced me to come to my senses and stop all recreational use.

It is, without a doubt, my favorite drug. That said, I am a parent and a business owner with dozens of employees and even more physicians who depend upon me so I no longer have the luxury of putting my life at risk.

Coccaine does not 1) make you forget or 2) make you violent.

Now crack, I hear, is a whole other story. But there is no evidence or even mention of crack problems in Perugia.

It doesn't make you forget but I have done a number of assault cases where hyperactive and aggressive behaviour was attributed to cocaine use. As I said above, I believe they were on a mix of stimulants but I don't know what they were.

 

[SomeAlibi]

I don't understand, of what possible consequence is what they were doing the next day after the murder? So one of them got up and putzed around on the computer awhile and went back to sleep. Hours later Raffaele talked to his dad, perhaps in bed, so what? Who needs an alibi for the next day of a murder anyway?

Is it really a 'lie' for them to say they slept in until 10 or so if all they did beside that is answer a phone call and play a track on the computer in the middle of the night? What happens if all this amounts to is them forgetting about this or not thinking it relevant the first time they were asked and then not wanting to look like 'liars' when the 'a-ha!' moment comes?

In the scenario where Amanda and Raffaele committed the crime, distancing themselves from the cottage for as long as possible on the morning of the 2nd was important because it gave them an alibi against the remainder of the clean-up done at the cottage that morning. The mop is the clue here. They were at pains to mention multiple times where the mop was in the closet (this is a type of over-detailing common in alibis). Amanda said she needed the mop because they couldn't clean up the spill in Raffaele's kitchen the night before with the 8 cloths, sponges and rags under the sink (see video of Raffaele's appartment) nor any of the towels in the apartment. So that must have been a really significant amount of water. Yet Amanda then said that when they finally got back to the apartment they didn't have to clean up the water because it had evaporated (see court testimony). This is really patent nonsense. It doesn't take any of the scientists here to smell a rat about this piece of testimony. Amanda and Raffaele are not street hardened or cunning people: the holes in their alibis are the sorts of mistakes made by the guilty but inexperienced under pressure. Large and profound.

 

[Kaosium]

But Piktor states with certainty that the appeal court will find them guilty! Isn't that something! If I had that sort of power, I'd make a fortune betting on horses......

I don't think this will ever end until they are free. In a very real sense this is just the end of the beginning. "Here comes the story of the Hurricane..." and odds are Rubin Carter was guilty.

The movies are already starting, and Amanda Knox is a more compelling character and the setting more interesting.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

leaky pipe

Chris, do you believe that one joint smoked in the afternoon (according to Amanda's testimony) would cause memory loss of the events over the evening?

No, but neither do I believe that the defendants' asserted a complete blackout. For example, Raffaele discussed the leaky pipe in his appearance before Judge Matteini. I am agnostic on the question of how many joints they smoked. I was under the impression that they smoked in the evening, but I have not looked carefully into this question.

 

[Katody Matrass]

katy_did I don't believe Comodi was trying to give the jury a bad impression. "12" or "midday" was the general time frame of the phone call.
Comodi makes reference to the records for the information, so I assume those were readily available to the jurors.

So you believe that jurors were aware that "12:00" really meant 12:47 and "nothing happened yet" really meant everything happened except from the body discovery. I think such a belief is very optimistic
Comodi asked for the reason of the call. It is a very dumb question when you know that a call was made after discovering a break-in, blood, feces, and that a friend is missing. But it is a clever dirty trick when you imply that none of it yet had happened.

During this line of questioning I didn't see where Amanda's attorneys had objected to the time of the call (unless they clarified the time later during her questioning). Perhaps those in attendance understood what Comodi meant?

They should have objected immediately. It's very obvious from the transcript. Instead they let Comodi play her lie for question after question:

MC: But from the records, we see that you called your mother -- not only from the records but also the pings [?] that you first called your mother at 12. At midday. lie

MC: What time is it at midday? What time is it in Seattle, if in Perugia it is midday?

MC: Three o'clock at night? lie

MC: But at 12:00 nothing had happened yet. That's what your mother also said-- lie

MC: -- during the conversation you had with her in prison. Even your mother was amazed that you called her at midday, which was three or four o'clock at night, to tell her that nothing had happened. another lie​

finally as you call it, a clarification:

MC: But at midday nothing had happened yet in the sense that the door had not been broken down yet.​

and again

MC: But if you called her before, why did you do it? Comodi playing dumb​

MC: At three o'clock at night. lie repeated again​

sorry, christianahannah but it's obvious that Comodi didn't simply forget or made a simplification. The initial lie of 12:00 allowed her to derive the impressive 3:00 am in Seattle (which btw is also strangely inaccurate), and she repeats many times the lie that "nothing happened yet" without any clarification. To believe that jury wouldn't fall for it is naive.

That the defense didn't react is another story and a big failure.

 

[SomeAlibi]

Maybe at the same time we can get rid of this ridiculous myth that the bathmat partial print matched Sollecito's with "millimetre accuracy". This is extreme nonsense. The print was made with a dilute blood/water mixture onto an absorbent cotton towelling bathmat with a ridged pattern. Thus, the print would have spread after contact, and the ridges would have further distorted the print. The very suggestion that this print was measurable with millimetre accuracy is risible. And so is the prosecution "expert's" analysis of it.

You offer a theory as to why there may have been some sort of size creep due to wetness. The court gives another suggesting it is in fact highly reliable. My views it that the bathmat is not blotting paper - when you press down on it, the mark that is left is the mark that is left. There are individual fibres on that matt and thick rope-like aggregations of fibres. Moisture does not jump from one of those rope-like clumps or spread like ink on blotting paper. Believe what you will, but this is a very difficult piece of evidence for the defence and you get little credit for trying to poo-poo it wtih calling it risible, especially when you have not dealt with the *proportion* of width and length on the footprint which means it absolutely can't be Guede's. If one accepts the creep, it *still* cannot be his. So whose is it? The fact it does match Raffaele's smaller foot so precisely is rather telling. For you to make that Guede's it has to actually physically shrink not grow.

Impossible, see? So whose print is it?

 

[Katody Matrass]

We see nothing but evasive actions on that issue, even from the colpevolisti that raised it recently( piktor, SomeAlibi). What is so problematic about it?

Maybe that single Comodi's dirty lie:

Even your mother was amazed that you called her at midday, which was three or four o'clock at night, to tell her that nothing had happened.

 

[SomeAlibi]

You must realize this is speculation. You are "convinced that Guede was facilitating or dealing directly for them that night," but there is no evidence of that. Nor is there any evidence that they used any drugs other than cannabis. Their dazed appearance in photos can easily be explained as shock and distress after learning of the murder. Did anyone - Filomena, the police, anyone else - say that Amanda and Raffaele seemed to be "bombed out" on drugs? We have all listened to Raffaele's call to the emergency number. Did he sound like he was "bombed out" on drugs?

I understand that extreme intoxication is the only conceivable way to explain why two people like Amanda and Raffaele would collaborate with Guede on a murder, but the need for such an explanation does not make it factually true.

No, it doesn't make it factually true and it is certainly conjecture as I flagged. It would explain a lot however, as you say in your last paragraph while saying that you don't believe it to be true. We'll never know, as I said in my first.

 

[SomeAlibi]

That's interesting. I see that listed in the Massei report but in Raffaele's cell phone record only the third call is listed.

Yes, we suffer from not being able to see the entire evidential bible for the case on which Massei is based. Yet it must be based on records or it would be an absolute killer weapon for the defence in the appeal and of course it's not challenged. Therefore it clearly must be correct or they would have capitalised on the point.

 

[colonelhall]

With reference to the drug question: the pair may have smoked just the one joint, drank themselves silly or taken crack cocaine. Who knows?

However, by their own admission they suffered almost total memory loss. I say "almost" because they seem to have remembered certain details such as those surrounding the mop.

On the other hand, they could have been lying about the drugs. Either way, this would not have impressed an Italian jury, nor an American one for that matter.

 

[SomeAlibi]

My recollection is that they said 10-10:30. The elder Mr. Sollecito's call is past 9, a difference of less than an hour from 10. Comodi says noon when she means 12:47, a difference of less than an hour. I do not see why one difference is significant and the other is not.

With respect to Amanda's email of the 4th, I believe she was told to avoid speaking of the crime itself. That may explain which topics she chose to emphasize.

No, Chris, that doesn't work at all. Amanda herself says that the content of her email is what she has been told not to speak about and that she swears the recipients to silence about it:

"This is an email for everyone, because id like to get it all out and
not have to repeat myself a hundred times like ive been having to do
at the police station. some of you already know some things, some of
you know nothing. what im about to say i cant say to journalists or
newspapers, and i require that of anone receiving this information as
well. this is m account of how i found my roommate murdered the
morning of friday, november 2nd"

 

[LondonJohn]

In the scenario where Amanda and Raffaele committed the crime, distancing themselves from the cottage for as long as possible on the morning of the 2nd was important because it gave them an alibi against the remainder of the clean-up done at the cottage that morning. The mop is the clue here. They were at pains to mention multiple times where the mop was in the closet (this is a type of over-detailing common in alibis). Amanda said she needed the mop because they couldn't clean up the spill in Raffaele's kitchen the night before with the 8 cloths, sponges and rags under the sink (see video of Raffaele's appartment) nor any of the towels in the apartment. So that must have been a really significant amount of water. Yet Amanda then said that when they finally got back to the apartment they didn't have to clean up the water because it had evaporated (see court testimony). This is really patent nonsense. It doesn't take any of the scientists here to smell a rat about this piece of testimony. Amanda and Raffaele are not street hardened or cunning people: the holes in their alibis are the sorts of mistakes made by the guilty but inexperienced under pressure. Large and profound.

Extraneous details such as SPECIFICALLY mentioning the brand of mop, eh?

And if they needed to establish their presence at Sollecito's apartment for as long as possible on the morning of the 2nd, wouldn't evidence of computer usage at 5.30am, and phone calls received at 9.30am - both at Sollecito's apartment - be to their very positive advantage........?

 

[SomeAlibi]

We see nothing but evasive actions on that issue, even from the colpevolisti that raised it recently( piktor, SomeAlibi). What is so problematic about it?

Maybe that single Comodi's dirty lie:

We're back to treating each other like grown ups. There's nothing evasive about the way in which I'm answering your questions. Comodi was imprecise in her response and she would wish she hadn't been but it doesn't amount to a hill of beans as to the verdict. It really is immaterial.

 

[LondonJohn]

Yes, we suffer from not being able to see the entire evidential bible for the case on which Massei is based. Yet it must be based on records or it would be an absolute killer weapon for the defence in the appeal and of course it's not challenged. Therefore it clearly must be correct or they would have capitalised on the point.

If it was incriminating evidence that helped to convince the court of Knox and Sollecito's guilt, then wouldn't it be extremely remiss of Massei not to mention it in the sentencing report?

 

[Katody Matrass]

No, it doesn't make it factually true and it is certainly conjecture as I flagged. It would explain a lot however, as you say in your last paragraph while saying that you don't believe it to be true. We'll never know, as I said in my first.

The more conjecture you use to shoehorn that incredible 4 way drug murderous orgy theory into existing scarce evidence, the more implausible it gets. No amount of conjecture and hand waving will help when all the existing evidence clearly points to Guede and Guede alone as the burglar and murderer.

 

[LondonJohn]

You offer a theory as to why there may have been some sort of size creep due to wetness. The court gives another suggesting it is in fact highly reliable. My views it that the bathmat is not blotting paper - when you press down on it, the mark that is left is the mark that is left. There are individual fibres on that matt and thick rope-like aggregations of fibres. Moisture does not jump from one of those rope-like clumps or spread like ink on blotting paper. Believe what you will, but this is a very difficult piece of evidence for the defence and you get little credit for trying to poo-poo it wtih calling it risible, especially when you have not dealt with the *proportion* of width and length on the footprint which means it absolutely can't be Guede's. If one accepts the creep, it *still* cannot be his. So whose is it? The fact it does match Raffaele's smaller foot so precisely is rather telling. For you to make that Guede's it has to actually physically shrink not grow.

Impossible, see? So whose print is it?

I believe it's probably Guede's.

Their feet were only 3mm different in size, and the mark next to the big toe impression is compatible with Guede's foot, not Sollecito's. I believe that the prosecution's "expert" (the same one who couldn't count or measure concentric circles in a shoe print) made mistakes in his analysis of the footprint. I actually believe that it's impossible to say with any certainty whatsoever whose print it was. Foot print testimony has been widely discredited over the past decade - it's bogus science, outside of an analysis of the actual creases and characteristics of an extremely detailed footprint.

 

[SomeAlibi]

Extraneous details such as SPECIFICALLY mentioning the brand of mop, eh?

And if they needed to establish their presence at Sollecito's apartment for as long as possible on the morning of the 2nd, wouldn't evidence of computer usage at 5.30am, and phone calls received at 9.30am - both at Sollecito's apartment - be to their very positive advantage........?

I didn't use the phrase "extraneous" so not sure what you're getting at if you could clarify, about the make of mop.

On your second point, it's not a well thought out alibi at all - that's rather the point. Mistakes in alibis are incredibly human and innumerable cases have been settled on them. They went for a blanket coverage of "didn't do anything at all" on the morning of the 2nd and the evidence shows that to be untrue. Mainly they were trying to cover for Amanda not having been at the corner-shop or going to the flat earlier but it's ill thought through. You have to remember that they were already under enormous pressure about alibis and the idea that they could just cater for the entire first part of the morning of the 2nd with "we were asleep" was very attractive. Get rid of 5 hours worth of conduct and capacity for contradiction with one blanket statement. They had no appreciation of the eventuality of computer of cell-phone records: in this respect they were just young kids with really no clue.

I am interested to hear your idea about how such an abundance of water, such that it couldn't be cleared up with cloths, sponges, rags and towels and required the fetching of a mop managed to evaporate in the space of about half a day?

 

[Katody Matrass]

We're back to treating each other like grown ups. There's nothing evasive about the way in which I'm answering your questions.

It's all there above for everyone to see

Comodi was imprecise in her response and she would wish she hadn't been but it doesn't amount to a hill of beans as to the verdict. It really is immaterial.

Calling home to tell that there was a burglary, someone's blood and a friend is missing becomes according to Comodi a strange middle of the night call to tell that nothing had happened.

Imprecise.

OK.