Continuation - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case

[shuttlt]

Here is the quote regarding what was recorded and what was not.

Thanks!

 

[moodstream]

How to the detriment of Knox/Sollicito. The worst that anybody has claimed is that some pictures of Amanda and Meredith at a Chocolate Festival may have been lost.

Do you think the people who fried those drives knew that?

I didn't sound like they went to much trouble. In any case, why destroy the hard drives containing the Chocolate Festival pictures but keep the one that might possibly provide an alibi?

IIRC, the hard drives were removed from the computers and hooked up to voltage that fried the drives, one after the other. That’s a little trouble. It’s unimportant why, if the purpose was to tamper with evidence. I can speculate why as easily as you can deny the speculation. If I speculate reasonably, will you accept it?

It seems like a trivial thing to fake, and to fake so badly in a way so easily discovered. Why, given that everybody was pulling together to provide evidence that helped the prosecution and destroy everything that hindered the defence was the contradictory nature of the blood sample allowed to surface?

I see the police, the prosecution, and the judges believing firmly in the guilt of Knox, primarily, and Sollecito and even Guede as accomplices. At the early stages, they are sure once enough evidence comes to light one of them will break and confirm their guilt. But the actual evidence did not help them.

What matters in the report to the preliminary hearing about the blood alcohol level of the victim is that it supports the theory that the killers forced her to drink to the point she could not resist, because that is what will turn out to be true, once the killers give up trying to lie their way out, in the minds of the police

The evidence does not have to hold up in court, because by then the killers will have confessed.

For the computers, why give Sollecito the chance to escape this way. In the similar sense to the way I know Sollecito is innocent, even though his DNA may be on the bra clasp, the police know he is guilty, even if the computer may show otherwise.The police do not want to give Sollecito the chance to wiggle out of it because of doubts raised by whatever may be on his computer.

 

[Kaosium]

shuttlt,

Plenty of other people have known her, some for far longer than Patrick. A number of us have produced examples of their testimonials on this thread. However, since I wrote the comment to which you replied, I have learned or been reminded that its source was the Daily Mail article that is questionable in other ways. For example, it reports that Patrick either fired or (arguably) demoted Amanda, and this is not true: Amanda unexpectedly met Patrick on the 5th, and that is when she told him that she could no longer work at night, owing to her fear. LondonJohn thinks otherwise (if I understand his argument correctly), but I do not have 100% confidence in any fact found in this article, including the no-soul comment.

post script
One of the accounts of Amanda's character that I provided came from a former employer. It is difficult to see what his motivation for lying would be.

Did I miss a post? I didn't see one from LondonJohn on this and can't find it going back.

I'm sure it's flawed, but did the writer make up the quotes? Sleaze merchants fish for confirmations, they exaggerate far beyond reality, but do they actually invent things and put them in quotations? Isn't that actionable in the UK? Since Patrick is suing everyone else and is obviously aware of the article...

 

[shuttlt]

Do you think the people who fried those drives knew that?

So they fried all but the crucial one by chance? In the conspiracy version, wouldn't they have checked what was on them first, or broken them all?

IIRC, the hard drives were removed from the computers and hooked up to voltage that fried the drives, one after the other. That’s a little trouble. It’s unimportant why, if the purpose was to tamper with evidence. I can speculate why as easily as you can deny the speculation. If I speculate reasonably, will you accept it?

How else should they extract the data? I guess you could boot them off a CD and so on, but it doesn't seem like a particularly unreasonable method to plug the drives directly into some other device. Again, you wouldn't necessarily know you'd broken anything, just that the drives didn't seem to be working.

For the computers, why give Sollecito the chance to escape this way. In the similar sense to the way I know Sollecito is innocent, even though his DNA may be on the bra clasp, the police know he is guilty, even if the computer may show otherwise.The police do not want to give Sollecito the chance to wiggle out of it because of doubts raised by whatever may be on his computer.

So why didn't the fry his hard drive?

 

[shuttlt]

Amanda unexpectedly met Patrick on the 5th, and that is when she told him that she could no longer work at night, owing to her fear.

Has patrick confirmed this?

 

[Kaosium]

I believe Justinian claimed that indicator of a frame up was that the evidence wasn't incontestable so that it could be denied if it all went bad. He seemed to feel that police never frame people in the obvious way you seem to believe.

That's in the US which I have come to believe has stricter penalties and oversight for the police. I am unaware of much of anything in this regard in Italy. Certainly I saw no penalties for the frying of the computers, the leaking of the diary, the thrown out 'confessions,' the bizarre collection methods of the forensic investigators, the arrest of Patrick...or anything at all. They all got medals for doing such a fantastic job.

Thus I would think they could have done just about anything, what leads you to believe there would have been consequences?

Do you think there will be consequences for the bra clasp and 'murder knife?'

 

[Chris C]

So they fried all but the crucial one by chance? In the conspiracy version, wouldn't they have checked what was on them first, or broken them all?


How else should they extract the data? I guess you could boot them off a CD and so on, but it doesn't seem like a particularly unreasonable method to plug the drives directly into some other device. Again, you wouldn't necessarily know you'd broken anything, just that the drives didn't seem to be working.


So why didn't the fry his hard drive?

They did check whats on them first. They watched Sollecito's movies, surfed the internet and then damage all of them. Some got damaged worse than others.

 

[Fine]

* * *

Except it wasn't. I didn't believe a top policeman would ever say on TV that they didn't need evidence to tell guilt, that they could just study behavior and that they tacked up a picture of Amanda Knox next to convicted mafioso--a year before they even charged her with a crime. I'd seen a short youtube clip but I figured it had to be out of context, and thus a detriment to making an argument for innocence. I was kinda flabbergasted to find out that really happened.
* * *

____________________

Umm, maybe the cops in Rome have a sense of humor, Kaosium. Here's that silly photograph again.....

A clear allusion the biblical scene in which the adolescent Jesus lectured to the high priests in the Temple (Luke 2:40-50): "And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers."

///

 

[moodstream]

So they fried all but the crucial one by chance? In the conspiracy version, wouldn't they have checked what was on them first, or broken them all?

That's *your* conspiracy theory. Why bother to take the time?

How else should they extract the data? I guess you could boot them off a CD and so on, but it doesn't seem like a particularly unreasonable method to plug the drives directly into some other device. Again, you wouldn't necessarily know you'd broken anything, just that the drives didn't seem to be working.

Oh yeah.. they hooked them up to another computer, and fried them, one after the other, so bad no one is even sure if the manufacturer can find a way retrieve the data.You act like it's okay ( let alone possible) for the police looking into the hard drive contents to have no experience and be unable to foretell the consequences of their action. Do you believe that?

So why didn't they fry his hard drive?

Interesting you should bring that up. Here is a quote from a CNN article from 11/22/07 that may explain it:

Wednesday, Maori said the defense team had examined a clone of Sollecito's hard drive that showed he was in his house and using the computer from 8:30 p.m. on November 1 to 1:33 a.m. on November 2. http://articles.cnn.com/2007-11-22/...-italian-judge-raffaele-sollecito?_s=PM:WORLD

 

[Chris_Halkides]

UK laws

Did I miss a post? I didn't see one from LondonJohn on this and can't find it going back.

I'm sure it's flawed, but did the writer make up the quotes? Sleaze merchants fish for confirmations, they exaggerate far beyond reality, but do they actually invent things and put them in quotations? Isn't that actionable in the UK? Since Patrick is suing everyone else and is obviously aware of the article...

kaosium,

No, you did not miss a post. I based my comment on things LondonJohn has said before with reference to the same article. He thought, given the UK laws, that the quotes were probably things Patrick really said. Otherwise he could sue the paper for having made them up.

 

[Mary_H]

Ahem, unconscionable lies? I think that is indeed again a matter of perspective.
What besides Amanda's testimony implicated him directly in the murder case? It seems pretty reasonable that he feels betrayed by her.
It seems to me someone is indulging is in what I consider highly annoying through the whole case discussion(also including discussions of Amanda and Raffaele that is): speculating about the mental conditions of people. That is problematic even for skilled therapists and psychologists with direct access to the person in question.
Unless you had an idea how fragile Patrick was before he was falsely accused and imprisoned I'd rather suggest to refrain from suggesting anything. It's pretty easy for some people to lose their sense of security over minor issues while others are able to endure a lot of abuse. The slight suggestion he might just be in it for the money (which he, unless I am mistaken, somehow does not deserve because it's more than he should gotten through "honest work") is... well, let's just call it not very nice.
Tarnishing Patrick does not help Amanda and Raffaele in the least in my book.

And as for no evidence left: we shall see. I'm pretty curious of what the judge makes of the different interpretations of the objects in question.

I think you make a good point. Not only that, but Patrick is basically benighted. Something horrible happened to him and probably every time he has tried to deal with it since it happened, every person he has spoken to has supported him and said, "Yes, you're right; Amanda should not have done that." The momentum of the movement against Amanda in Perugia had to have been very powerful for at least the first two years.

Add to that the inbred Perugian legal system, hand in hand with the local media, and for three years Patrick probably has not heard anybody in Perugia defend Amanda, so he continues to believe the only information he has been given. He could look everything up on the internet and read the books, but he won't; he's too upset. That was strongly apparent in the TV interview he gave recently.

I have always doubted the Daily Mail interview. In addition to the falsehoods it contains, Patrick couldn't speak English at that time; I don't know if he can now.

The whole idea that Amanda is in any way responsible for the police arresting Patrick must be a cultural one. Machiavelli has a lot of ideas about personal responsibility that my American sensibility finds highly objectionable. I know it isn't relevant to compare cultures, but I think it would be unheard of in the United States for the police to arrest a suspect based ONLY on the word of another suspect, with no additional investigation, and then blame the suspect who gave the name.

 

[Mary_H]

My, what a long article. OK. Read it. The former boss says nice things. I'm sure the PR wouldn't have put the journalist in touch if she was going to say anything nasty. Neither employer is exactly a virgin source, untouched by people related to the case. Some people say nice things about Amanda, some people say nasty things about her. I don't know her and I don't know what she's like.

Reporters came to Seattle after the arrest to try and dig the dirt. They couldn't find anybody to say anything bad about Amanda.

 

[Mary_H]

I think I recall someone mentioning rats, but that could have been me, hard to remember exactly.

I was skimming the page and I thought you had written, "I remember someone mentoring rats."

 

[Chris_Halkides]

Patrick's meeting with Amanda

Has patrick confirmed this?

shuttlt,

I think all of it is in his trial testimony. You can check pp. 134-135 in Murder in Italy, which is based on this.

 

[Kaosium]

People with something to hide do sometimes turn up to the crimescene, contact police and so on. I don't see that them calling the police is important, the shower perhaps more so. The traditional PMF explanation would be in order to control the crime scene and make sure to be the first ones to tell the police what was out of place. Also, presumably being there would be good from a forensic point of view.

I think they'd have been better off if they'd just gone away for the day like they'd planned, it sure didn't hurt the others who were gone.

However, if they were guilty why not clean up the bathroom at the very least, so there wouldn't be any traces of Amanda to mix in when Rudy washed up there? They called the police before they had a chance to do any clean up, and I recall one juror saying in something Fine posted about a month ago that the DNA traces mixing in the sink were something that convinced her of guilt, and she'd thought they it was the blood of both of them.

And say what? Admitting to having been there and seen Patrick commit the murder got her locked up, would saying "actually I've been protecting Rudy" have gotten her off? Would she be believed? If you mean blame Rudy immediately, perhaps she hoped she wouldn't have to admit to anything at all, and then each moment they didn't tell the truth made it harder to do so.

Why would she want to protect Rudy at all? Who would have blamed her if she just said she was scared and hid from him? They'd have never even looked for that knife, they'd have been looking for Rudy straight away.

Presumably she didn't want to admit to having been there. When she was forced to she went with the story that took the least input from her and the minumum of dealing with the real events.

Isn't that interesting?

At any rate, if she's going to 'admit' she was there, at that point why not just say Rudy threatened to kill her and/or Raffaele, and no one could 'protect' her forever? As far as she would 'know' Rudy disappeared.

If this could have worked, why couldn't he have done it anyway and walked? Amanda and Raffaele were already in trouble by the time he had to commit himself to a story.

That's my point: why didn't he? He's seen the news reports, he knows they arrested Raffaele and Amanda, when he tells his story about being on the crapper why not have Amanda and Raffaele be doing the killing instead of the left-handed stranger? In reality (my opinion) Rudy knew they didn't have anything to do with it, but made up a one attacker scenario because he probably figured that's what the police would have evidence of, just as the original coroner said before he got sacked.

If guilty he'd 'know' they were guilty of something and might not have the teeniest bit of conscious which apparently caused him to avoid implicating them in the (my opinion) real circumstance where they're innocent and he came back with a story about a left-handed stranger, and never actually went the whole way and definitively accused them even when it was definitely in his benefit to do so. In the guilt scenario he'd figure they'd leave something at the scene, even if it's just because Amanda and/or Raffaele went to Meredith's room afterward to see what happened.

I greatly appreciate you engaging with this.

Oh, dear, am I walking into something?

 

[Kaosium]

____________________

Umm, maybe the cops in Rome have a sense of humor, Kaosium. Here's that silly photograph again.....

[qimg]http://truejustice.org/ee/images/perugia/frontpage92/9211.jpg[/qimg]

A clear allusion the biblical scene in which the adolescent Jesus lectured to the high priests in the Temple (Luke 2:40-50): "And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers."

///

LOL! That would be truly an ironic sense of humor!

Thanks for the nice pic and Happy New Year, Fine!

 

[Dan O.]

What is the purpose of knowing this if we know also that there are simple, innocent ways of disabling the screensaver?

You need to pay attention to the details. Enabling and disabling the screen saver also requires human interaction. If the screensaver activated 5 times through the night as the defense appeal claims, there are at least 5 times that we know somebody was interacting personally with that computer.

 

[Dan O.]

I must have missed a point here. What was the prosecution's excuse for how the bra clasp moved across the floor? Ater all it was a sealed crime scene correct?

The Italians have a strange interpretation of what "sealed" means.

Barbie Nadu arrived in Perugia and visited the girls cottage on the morning of November 14th. She took a few personal photos and posted them on her publishers photo blog on the 17th. If you have a good monitor or the capability of pushing the exposure, you can see details in the hall behind this open door.
http://lastrada.blogspot.com/2007/11/perugia-crime-scene-14-november-2007-as.html

 

[RWVBWL]

Moss,

Frank Sfarzo reported on this. He noted that "As we know, indeed, the troubles of Amanda started with the fact that she went to the police station when the call was only for Raffaele. According to Rita, according to Monica, according to Lorena Zugarini." Dr. Giobbi contradicted this testimony by saying that he gave the order to bring them in together.

About the interrogation he wrote, "Giobbi would never take part on the interviews. He was hidden in the director's room, together with the SCO chief Profazio, and he could hear Amanda screaming."

Without a recording, we will not know exactly what happened. But the police officers such as Rita Ficarra and Monica Napoleoni claimed to treat Amanda well. Someone should ask them why she screamed.

Hi Halides1,
Since Mignini was at home sleeping, I believe in his bed(?), does that mean that Dr. Giobbi, who was in the director's room, is the person responsible for not ordering any audio or video recording done of this questioning of Amanda Knox the night before her Mother came to town?

For some reason I wonder if an audio/video tech tried to do their job,
but was then told by the boss that this was not necessary.
Hmmm...
RWVBWL

PS-I've mentioned before that I use a Sony micro-cassette audio recorder almost daily while working on a Great White Shark research project.
This helps me to accurately remember the facts as I see them occur.

While reading English+Italian speaking Barbie Nadeau's book Angel Face,
I noticed that on page xiv of the chapter A Note on Sources, even B. Nadeau uses video recording in her journalistic work:
"I interviewed the principal players in both cases several times and often videotaped the interviews, which resulted in more than 20 hours of exclusive footage pertinent to the case."

Excuse me, but after reading this I just have to ask this question:
Wasn't the Nov. 5/6 2007 police interview undertaken before Amanda Knox's Mother arrived in Perugia pertinent to this brutal murder case too?
With 3 previous days of questioning under their belt, how did the investigators come to believe that Amanda Knox was sufficently fluent in her mastery of the Italian language to have been able to speak her thoughts clearly and coherently enough so that the police interogators could understand her 100%? and so they therefore did not need to audio or video record this important night of questioning at any time thru out the night?

For some reason, I bet Barbie Nadeau would have video recorded this night of questioning...

 

[Mary_H]

____________________

Umm, maybe the cops in Rome have a sense of humor, Kaosium. Here's that silly photograph again.....

[qimg]http://truejustice.org/ee/images/perugia/frontpage92/9211.jpg[/qimg]

A clear allusion the biblical scene in which the adolescent Jesus lectured to the high priests in the Temple (Luke 2:40-50): "And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers."

///

It does look like that.

What I want to know is why Jean Reno was working as a cop in Perugia in 2007.