Continuation - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case

[treehorn]

Okay, two or three times, fair enough.

Now are you going to respond to anything else that has been directed at you, or just try to skate away from it all and pretend it never happened?



Considering your recent record of factually false claims, is the claim above really reconcilable with the implied claim that you actually have a job?

Me, skate away?

No.

You're the one that's trying to skate away from that massive blunder.

What "factually false claims" are you referring to? Are you trying to divert attention away from that fact that you just fell apart.

You're the only one caught (red-handed, no less) in a "factually false claim", Kevin.

It seems you couldn't be bothered to understand the report before you disparaged it, how is that 'rational'?

(I actually feel embarrassed for you. After all of your claims about "trained thinking" and your powers of rational analysis...)

 

[christianahannah]

Prior to her last call she didn't know her window and her room was broken into and Maredith's room was locked.

So was it the last call that Filomena asked Amanda to call the police, which Amanda (or Raffaele) did shortly after and Filomena then made her way to the cottage?

There is no record of any incoming call on Meredith's phones between 12:35 and the discovery of the crime.

According to page 315 of the motivations there is a 12:43 p.m. call mentioned which is not attributed to anyone. It is possible this is an error in translation. If not an error this could be the call from Filomena. The motivations does state Filomena made a call to Meredith's phone on November 2 but does not give the time the call was made.

 

[LondonJohn]

Me, skate away?

No.

You're the one that's trying to skate away from that massive blunder.

What "factually false claims" are you referring to? Are you trying to divert attention away from that fact that you just fell apart.

You're the only one caught (red-handed, no less) in a "factually false claim", Kevin.

It seems you could be bothered to understand the report before you disparaged it, how is that 'rational'?

(I actually feel embarrassed for you. After all of your claims about "trained thinking" and your powers of rational analysis...)

Far be it for me to suggest corrections to you, but did you mean to write "couldn't" rather than "could" in the penultimate paragraph of your post?

 

[treehorn]

PS Since you haven't read the judgement carefully, a little FYI: Marco is NOT one of "the boys from the cottage below". He's a basketball-playing acquaintance of Guede's, who testified that he (Marco) had visited the boys' cottage at the same time as Guede.

PPS How embarrassing.

Page 41:

Giacomo...had always lived...on the lower floor. He was living in this apartment with Stefano Bonassi, Marco Marzan and Riccardo Luciani.

So YOU haven't read the Court's judgment either!

How astoundingly embarrassing!

 

[quadraginta]

Hang on a minute. Before we get to that, do you now believe that there is evidence to support the claim that " "Rudy and Amanda smoked dope together on several occasions", or do you believe that there is not evidence to support this claim?

If you believe there is evidence, what is it?

If you do not, can you at least acknowledge that on this one point we were right, you were wrong, the text you claimed as evidence was not in fact evidence, and that "the citation game" you dismiss has a vital role in keeping people honest?



"Know" is not the most precise word in the English language, but it implies a degree of familiarity. If you have only ever met Andy Smith once very briefly at a party you wouldn't say "I know Andy Smith". Amanda was introduced to Rudy once at a party, and that's as far as the evidence goes. Many people I have been introduced to at parties I would not say I know. Despite there being obvious media interest and police interest in the topic no further evidence of familiarity between Rudy and Amanda has ever emerged - the boys from the cottage below have not claimed Amanda knew Rudy, for example, and you would think they would know.

I think the likelihood that there is sooper sekrit evidence proving Amanda knew Rudy is about the same as the likelihood of the other sooper sekrit evidence known only to those present in court on the day proving Amanda was guilty existing. Which is to say, I think it's very highly unlikely and I put the idea down to wishful thinking.

I wouldn't have the least hesitation in saying , "Sure. I know Andy Smith. I met him at that party." Nor would I look askance at any other native English speaker who said something similar.

Now what? I understand that there are differences between American and Australian English, but I don't think that this is among them.

If it turned out that I could also add, "Yeah, I've run into him down at the bar I work at, and seen him around the basketball courts." then the usage is even less questionable. Not that there is any real question to begin with.

If you want to probe more deeply into how well I might know him then that might be a different and more extended conversation.

One could just as easily be asked, "Do you know that chick at the supermarket check-out with the Farrah Fawcett hairdo and the gazumbas out to here!?" The response might be, "Yeah! She's hawt, isn't she?", or maybe, "No, but I sure would like to!", which would also indicate familiarity.

You might want to pow-wow with Mary_H about the pedantry thing. This usage of 'to know' is quite common, completely acceptable, and indicates that someone is familiar with the individual in question.

This is in contrast to the statement, "I don't know him", which in common parlance suggests that the respondent would not recognize such an individual out of a group.

We usually don't assume that it is meant in the 'biblical' sense, or even kissin' cousins.

 

[LondonJohn]

Page 41:

Giacomo...had always lived...on the lower floor. He was living in this apartment with Stefano Bonassi, Marco Marzan and Riccardo Luciani.

So YOU haven't read the Court's judgment either!

How astoundingly embarrassing!

Page 40, but yes, you're right and I'm wrong. I apologise.

But at least you'll concede that the Massei report is either badly written or badly translated, when it says

"Visiting the house in Via della Pergola, he had seen Rudy there two or three times, and on these occasions Amanda and Meredith were also there;"

The subject of this sentence is clearly Marco, so the sub-clause "visiting the house in Via della Pergola" should apply to Marco too - and not Guede. It was that which led to my embarrassing mistake

Still, actus non facit reum nisi mens sit rea, eh?

 

[quadraginta]

I have not followed the Casey Anthony case very closely. From what little I know about it, though, I know there is much less reasonable doubt surrounding the question of her guilt than there is surrounding the question of Amanda's.

This is the sort of area where the term "reasonable doubt" seems to develop a certain elasticity.

The suspicions against Anthony began as a result of some inconsistencies in her story, and hugely negative perceptions about her subsequent actions and demeanor. There are some remarkable similarities in this regard.

There is no single item of evidence implicating her which cannot, in isolation, be explained away with some possible (if not plausible) exercise of imagination.

Sound at all familiar?

 

[christianahannah]

I apologize. My problem is that I have gotten close to the people in this case, the real live human beings. These people have become my friends, and I am proud to have them as friends. They invited me to their Thanksgiving dinner, their low-key New Years Eve party where we all sat around the kitchen and had a warm, friendly discussion while a small tribe of children ran circles through the house and played themselves to exhaustion. Then I get on the Internet and I see not just Amanda but her entire family pilloried, day in and day out, by people who have not the first clue what or who they are talking about. It makes me seethe with anger. It is so utterly contemptible and unfair.

Charlie I do agree with the sentiment in your post. One thing that has bothered me greatly about this case is the family members on both sides who have been the target of unfair criticism and derision. Meredith's, Amanda's and Raffaele's families and friends love them and are fighting to see justice done. I don't know why anyone should think they would do anything less to support the person they love.

If Amanda and Raffaele are wrongly convicted how can anyone support keeping them in prison and not look to how they ended up there? And if they are not wrongly convicted, it is a truly sad situation and not one in which to heap even more pain upon their family and friends.

It is good to look at the evidence, the actions of the authorities and judiciary, and the defendants in this case and to do so in a sobering, objective manner. Criticizing and mocking the actions of family and friends do nothing to see if an injustice has or has not occurred.

 

[Mary_H]

I wouldn't have the least hesitation in saying , "Sure. I know Andy Smith. I met him at that party." Nor would I look askance at any other native English speaker who said something similar.

Now what? I understand that there are differences between American and Australian English, but I don't think that this is among them.

If it turned out that I could also add, "Yeah, I've run into him down at the bar I work at, and seen him around the basketball courts." then the usage is even less questionable. Not that there is any real question to begin with.

If you want to probe more deeply into how well I might know him then that might be a different and more extended conversation.

One could just as easily be asked, "Do you know that chick at the supermarket check-out with the Farrah Fawcett hairdo and the gazumbas out to here!?" The response might be, "Yeah! She's hawt, isn't she?", or maybe, "No, but I sure would like to!", which would also indicate familiarity.

You might want to pow-wow with Mary_H about the pedantry thing. This usage of 'to know' is quite common, completely acceptable, and indicates that someone is familiar with the individual in question.

This is in contrast to the statement, "I don't know him", which in common parlance suggests that the respondent would not recognize such an individual out of a group.

We usually don't assume that it is meant in the 'biblical' sense, or even kissin' cousins.

This whole discussion deserves to be abandoned, because it is based on treehorn's erroneous assumption that Kevin was literally claiming that Amanda did not know Rudy.

By the way, Amanda herself never stated she did not know Rudy. Paul Ciolino was the one who made that claim, I believe, and it was in error.

 

[LondonJohn]

This is the sort of area where the term "reasonable doubt" seems to develop a certain elasticity.

The suspicions against Anthony began as a result of some inconsistencies in her story, and hugely negative perceptions about her subsequent actions and demeanor. There are some remarkable similarities in this regard.

There is no single item of evidence implicating her which cannot, in isolation, be explained away with some possible (if not plausible) exercise of imagination.

Sound at all familiar?

One of the most important points is that SOMEONE killed Casey Anthony's child, just as somebody (or some people) killed Meredith Kercher. In Casey Anthony's case, it's as important that nobody else was ever implicated in the crime as it is that Casey Anthony herself acted suspiciously and told a number of wholesale lies to police investigators.

In Meredith's case, we have an identified culprit - Rudy Guede. He had the means and opportunity to kill Meredith, and it's provable beyond a reasonable doubt that he was in the girls' cottage at or shortly after the time when Meredith was murdered. It's also a proven fact that he went out dancing within hours of Meredith's murder, and that he fled to Germany within 48 hours. Furthermore, he only "remembered" the presence of Knox and Sollecito some months after his arrest - his initial version of events placed only one strange man in the cottage as the murderer.

 

[Mary_H]

This is the sort of area where the term "reasonable doubt" seems to develop a certain elasticity.

The suspicions against Anthony began as a result of some inconsistencies in her story, and hugely negative perceptions about her subsequent actions and demeanor. There are some remarkable similarities in this regard.

There is no single item of evidence implicating her which cannot, in isolation, be explained away with some possible (if not plausible) exercise of imagination.

Sound at all familiar?

The suspicions against Amanda did not begin as a result of some inconsistencies in her story. Amanda was suspected based on the instincts of a police investigator. Nothing in Amanda's story was inconsistent until she was subjected to a coercive interrogation.

Casey appears to have had a motive, while Amanda does not. Casey made up the name of a babysitter who does not exist; Amanda didn't make up any non-existent characters. The trunk of Casey's car smelled like decomp; no comparable evidence exists implicating Amanda.

I will look into Casey's background and see if hers is so similar to Amanda's that the suggestion she committed such a serious crime is as unlikely as in Amanda's case..

 

[nopoirot]

I've often seen it written, by legal authorities, that every layman has the right to express an opinion about the law. It has also been written, many times, that findings of fact are the province of jurors, not lawyers. In the exercise of my lay prerogatives, I have found that neither the prosecution nor the defense has offered an explanation for Amanda's "confessions" that makes any sense.

It has been suggested that the police knew about the telephonic contacts between Amanda and Lumumba before the final round of questioning. In her trial testimony, however, Amanda says that the police began "leaning" on her only when she surrendered her cell phone, and the exchange with Lumumba was discovered. Her first "confession" came at 1:45. Her last, hours after the questioning had ended, and she had been transferred to prison. We can't attribute the latest statements to brute intimidation, because they muddied the waters by qualifying, and partially retracting, the statement which gave the police (or so they thought) a basis on which to arrest Lumumba. So why did not Amanda, as soon as she had had an interval in which to recover her composure, flatly and unequivocally recant her earlier "confessions"? Enter IFMS (Internalized False Memory Syndrome)--an odd, misshapen creature, if you ask me. How long did the police have to conjure it into existence? Which is to say, how much time elapsed between the discovery of the message to Lumumba and the first "confession," reduced to writing by 1:45? An hour and a half, maybe? Believe it who will. And as for the suggestion that Amanda arrived at the station in a demoralized, exhausted, submissive state, let's not forget the late dinner, the cartwheels, and the fact that she was accustomed to working until 2:00 am.

 

[quadraginta]

<snip>
Your comment about reporters pushing what they think the public wants to hear is very insightful. It is often difficult to tease out the few fragments of fact that the body of many stories is built around. Often a single and unintentional mistake is amplified by incessant repetition simply because those reporters don't question their own sources with any greater diligence than their viewers question them. They hear what they want to hear, and select the content which seems to back that up. Finding out the entire body of detail behind any case is more work than they are usually willing to devote, and they rest easy in the justifiable belief that most of their listeners will not be any more diligent than they have been.

I am sure you are correct. Your last paragraph also applies well to non-reporters who have not familiarized themselves enough with the details of this case.

You mean like in that part I highlighted?

 

[Justinian2]

This a perfect example of your penchant for over-simplification in defiance of both rationality and common sense:

1) Sollecito has, in point of fact, a documented, pre-homicide history of "antisocial behavior" per the Court's judgment (starting at page 61):

- Police Station Commander testified that Sollecito was, in 2003, found in possession of 2.67 grams of an illicit narcotic

- Sollecito had history of drug abuse including the use of cocaine and LSD (per Mignini's closing argument)

- tutors at Sollecito's college instituted "an active monitoring" on the "taciturn, shy, introverted" loner because of his interest in "hard-core" animal porn

- Sollcito, despite pleadings from his own father, insisted on collecting and wearing flick knives

2) Knox, too, has a documented, pre-homicide history of "antisocial behavior":

- Municipal Court of Seattle "finding" that Knox "committed" the civil infraction/ quasi-criminal "offense" of "residential deisturbance" in connection with a rock-throwing incident/ complaints from frightened neighbors

- Knox has admitted to using illicit narcotics (to the point of memory loss on the night of the murder)

- Knox taunted a Jewish coworker about "her people" (of German ancestry) "killing his people" (the story has never been retracted)

- Knox posted the 'stranger on a train incident' where her family could see it (to their dismay/ disgust)

3) per the Court's judgment: Amanda knew Rudy, and Rudy knew Amanda

- Looking at Knox's 6 weeks in Perugia, she knew Rudy longer than she knew Raffaele (just 8 days or so)

- Rudy let everyone in the cottage know he was interested in Amanda/ he was infatuated

- Rudy and Amanda smoked dope together on several occasions

- Indeed, ab initio Amanda began downplaying these facts using measures that included an expensive PR campaign that represented to CBS News that she'd "never laid eyes on Rudy"

- to dismiss Rudy as nothing more than a "crook" elides the fact that he moved in the same Perugian milieu as Knox did: he was a friend/ basketball pal of the boys that shared the downstairs of Knox's cottage; a repeat visitor to the cottage; and a regular in the basketball court next to the cottage




PS That some DNA labs, somewhere in the world, at some point in time, have made errors is in no way proof that this particular DNA lab made an error in this particular case.

PPS Why are you continuing to struggle with the notion that the correct application of the RD standard to the totality of the evidence is nothing more than a question of statistics and probability theory? Shall we dispense with courts and juries and replace them with statisticians?

Profiling has NO place in a court. Profiling is even less significant that hearsay evidence, or perhaps is hearsay.

Courts should consider only what is seen or heard.

Profiling has a place in marketing, Scientology (tone scale), the FBI, and Psychiatry (DSM IV). Profiling is a great tool, but subject to mistake and misuse. Profiling has no place in the court where guilt beyond a reasonable doubt is required. All profiling techniques leave a reasonable doubt especially when one profiling datum contradicts another, as they always do.

Fingerprints and DNA can reveal where a person has been. Bloody fingerprints (or bloody palm prints) in the case of Guede, put the suspect at the murder scene shortly after the murder. Some evidence is very damming.

Partial fingerprints and partial DNA need other supportive real evidence to overcome reasonable doubt.

Guede's semen, confession, bloody palm prints and bloody footprints tell the whole story; the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

 

[shuttlt]

Guede's semen, confession, bloody palm prints and bloody footprints tell the whole story; the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

Guede's semen?

 

[LondonJohn]

Have you not read the Court's judgment?!

Page 41:

"Visiting the house...[Marco Marzan]...had seen Rudy there two or three times and on these occasions Amanda and Meredith were also there, Rudy was talking to both of them and on one occasion he confided in them that he liked Amanda."



PS Since you haven't read the judgment carefully, a little FYI: Marco is one of "the boys from the cottage below" (as you put it).


PPS How embarrassing.

In my world, you do THAT in front of a jury and you're out of a job, Kevin.

Oh, now, here's an interesting thing:

You claimed in this post that it was Marco Marzan who was the person who was the subject of the quote - as evidenced by your substitution of his name in place of the word "he" in the original quote.

But this quote didn't refer to Marzan at all. Here it is in full, from Massei, together with the paragraph before:

Rudy had made a particular friendship with Marco Marzan and with him, "because playing basketball together every day we had developed this friendship, and then he was present also sometimes at the guys’ house".

Visiting the house in Via della Pergola, he had seen Rudy there two or three times, and on these occasions Amanda and Meredith were also there; Rudy was talking to both of them and on one occasion he confided in them that he liked Amanda.

The "him" and "he" being referred to here are not Marco Marzan: they refer to Giorgio Cocciaretto, who was indeed not a resident of the boys' cottage but merely a friend and occasional visitor.

It was therefore your erroneous belief that Marco was the person who'd "seen Rudy there two or three times" etc - when in fact it was Giorgio Cocciaretto who was making these claims. And when you erroneously substituted Marco's name into the Massei quote you provided, I'll admit that I wasn't sharp enough to realise that you'd put in the wrong name.

So we'll call it 15-all in your game shall we, and you can stop crowing about your "victory", when it was you who made the initial error.

Si peccasse negamus fallimur et nulla est in nobis veritas.........

 

[Mary_H]

The suspicions against Amanda did not begin as a result of some inconsistencies in her story. Amanda was suspected based on the instincts of a police investigator. Nothing in Amanda's story was inconsistent until she was subjected to a coercive interrogation.

Casey appears to have had a motive, while Amanda does not. Casey made up the name of a babysitter who does not exist; Amanda didn't make up any non-existent characters. The trunk of Casey's car smelled like decomp; no comparable evidence exists implicating Amanda.

I will look into Casey's background and see if hers is so similar to Amanda's that the suggestion she committed such a serious crime is as unlikely as in Amanda's case..

Well, there's too much online about Casey Anthony to be able to sort out an efficient biography. I did find another major difference between the two defendants -- Casey did not report her daughter missing for a month, whereas Amanda reported Meredith missing to Filomena within the hour.

 

[Mary_H]

You mean like in that part I highlighted?

"Often a single and unintentional mistake is amplified by incessant repetition simply because those reporters don't question their own sources with any greater diligence than their viewers question them."

Yes. I would assign the role of the viewers to the followers of TJMK and PMF.

 

[Justinian2]

Guede's semen?

True, tis a logical conclusion and not data that is the result of a laboratory test. What is the prosecution waiting for?

If it is semen deposited by Guede after the murder, it would seem to close the door on motivation(s).

 

[LondonJohn]

Well, there's too much online about Casey Anthony to be able to sort out an efficient biography. I did find another major difference between the two defendants -- Casey did not report her daughter missing for a month, whereas Amanda reported Meredith missing to Filomena within the hour.

Yes - a mother who does not report her two-year-old child missing to the police for a month is not doing herself many favours at all. It's simply not something that a mother would do (or fail to do) if she was entirely innocent of anything related to the death of that child. Any jury anywhere in the world would have no problem recognising that.