Continuation Part 2 - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case

[bucketoftea]

Also, I think the 2 knife theory is absurd. I mean seriously. They want you to believe knox is carrying around that machette of a kitchen knife in her purse without leaving a trace of blood in her purse, tearing up her purse or anyone seeing her carrying it. Plus to top it off, the dna results can't be reproduced, there was no blood on the knife, it wasn't even sealed to avoid contamination, it doesn't match the knife wounds, and it wasn't cleaned with bleach or washed off in either Sollecito's sink or Meredith's. Yet its claimed to be the murder weapon.

Don't you think Knox is smart enough to wrap something around the blade before she put it in her bag? Please don't exaggerate. It wasn't a machete.

The DNA tests can't be repeated, but the defenders of AK turned down the opportunity to have someone present to observe. I know the excuse is that they had short notice to be in Rome on time, but:
1. I haven't seen a cite for the 2-hour claim

2. Laboratories are very busy and couldn't possibly accommodate the convenience of all observers eg, to manage workload and resources not all tests are necessarily run every day.

3. It's common practice to send an agent if one can't and/or one doesn't possess the knowledge and expertise to make any judgement about what one is watching.

4. There were representatives of other parties there, so they got here somehow, but not AK's.

5. It's also common practice for defenders to decline to attend just so that they can try to dispute it afterwards. Cheesy.

6. It's up to the court to decide how to regard the knife DNA evidence, and they're taking further advice from the two from Rome.

7. The knife is only one bit of the evidence.


How can you possibly assert that the knife wasn't cleaned at either the cottage or RS's flat?

 

[snook1]

Actually, I'd love to see mignini try to bring some ridiculous trumped up charges against George Clooney. Wonder how the rest of the world would react to that.

Who wouldn't!?

 

[Draca]

In your opinion. Not in the court's.

Oops, sorry, I'm not supposed to talk about what was decided in the trial, sorry.

I don't understand why you continue to have faith in the police and courts in this case considering the video of how they handled things.

Examples:

They left the jacket MK was wearing when attacked in a laundry hamper for 6weeks without testing it.

They swabbed both sides of a collection swab.

They wrapped a mop in gift wrapping paper and walked into MK's bedroom with it without changing their booties.


Where did your faith in police and courts against all evidence come from? It's not like mistakes and corruption haven't both taken place world wide. This is a particularly egregious example of it.

 

[el buscador]

Don't you think Knox is smart enough to wrap something around the blade before she put it in her bag? Please don't exaggerate. It wasn't a machete.

The DNA tests can't be repeated, but the defenders of AK turned down the opportunity to have someone present to observe. I know the excuse is that they had short notice to be in Rome on time, but:
1. I haven't seen a cite for the 2-hour claim

2. Laboratories are very busy and couldn't possibly accommodate the convenience of all observers eg, to manage workload and resources not all tests are necessarily run every day.

3. It's common practice to send an agent if one can't and/or one doesn't possess the knowledge and expertise to make any judgement about what one is watching.

4. There were representatives of other parties there, so they got here somehow, but not AK's.

5. It's also common practice for defenders to decline to attend just so that they can try to dispute it afterwards. Cheesy.

6. It's up to the court to decide how to regard the knife DNA evidence, and they're taking further advice from the two from Rome.

7. The knife is only one bit of the evidence.


How can you possibly assert that the knife wasn't cleaned at either the cottage or RS's flat?

So, bucketoftea, you would send someone to prison for 26 years because her lawyers who had very little notice that the test were being preformed couldn't make it? I know it's Italian law, however, is it morally correct?

 

[Chris_Halkides]

DNA misunderstandings

Don't you think Knox is smart enough to wrap something around the blade before she put it in her bag? Please don't exaggerate. It wasn't a machete.

The DNA tests can't be repeated, but the defenders of AK turned down the opportunity to have someone present to observe. I know the excuse is that they had short notice to be in Rome on time, but:
1. I haven't seen a cite for the 2-hour claim

2. Laboratories are very busy and couldn't possibly accommodate the convenience of all observers eg, to manage workload and resources not all tests are necessarily run every day.

3. It's common practice to send an agent if one can't and/or one doesn't possess the knowledge and expertise to make any judgement about what one is watching.

4. There were representatives of other parties there, so they got here somehow, but not AK's.

5. It's also common practice for defenders to decline to attend just so that they can try to dispute it afterwards. Cheesy.

6. It's up to the court to decide how to regard the knife DNA evidence, and they're taking further advice from the two from Rome.

7. The knife is only one bit of the evidence.


How can you possibly assert that the knife wasn't cleaned at either the cottage or RS's flat?

Bucketoftee,

The objections to your arguments have been raised so many times and over the course of so many months that I am forced to wonder why you continue to ignore them them. In brief they are:

1. Meredith’s putative profile is well into the low template number range of analysis. The standard method of dealing with the problems of drop-in and drop-out is to run the analysis at least twice and to take only those alleles that show up in both runs. Some recommend saving back a third portion to allow the defense to test it. Observing the testing or not has strictly nothing to do with failing to meet this aspect of low template DNA analysis.

2. In response to a question of mine over this topic, Professor Dan Krane was unequivocal. Observing the testing is of marginal value at best, whereas having the electronic data files of the results was critically important. Yet after three years the defense is still waiting for the files.

3. IIRC Chris Mellas discussed the same-day notification in a thread at Perugia-Shock.

The more I examine your claims, the more problematic they look. Can you document the claim you made in your point (5)? Could anyone have stopped Dr. Stefanoni when her quantitation results were “too low?” Could they have stopped the testing because the knife had been removed from its bag and repackaged? If not, then being there sounds pretty toothless.

PM Mignini named the knife, the clasp, and the mixed DNA as the most important pieces of biological evidence. Suppose that the knife is disassembled and no blood is found. What would you conclude?

 

[snook1]

I don't understand why you continue to have faith in the police and courts in this case considering the video of how they handled things.

Examples:

They left the jacket MK was wearing when attacked in a laundry hamper for 6weeks without testing it.

They swabbed both sides of a collection swab.

They wrapped a mop in gift wrapping paper and walked into MK's bedroom with it without changing their booties.


Where did your faith in police and courts against all evidence come from? It's not like mistakes and corruption haven't both taken place world wide. This is a particularly egregious example of it.

That is shocking. Was it even mentioned in the court by the defense? There's alot of things that multiple boards discuss about police being sloppy but I haven't found any transcripts that the defense in fact complained about it that much. Did they? I know that there are several points in defense's case that the poilice mishandled evidence, but are they aware of the facts like you just mentioned?

 

[tsig]

How about this straightforward event...

Man with criminal past breaks into a cottage and murders someone while in the midst of a robbery....then flees the country. There's been lots of contortions trying to figure out this simple one.

Lady who lives in house accuses her boss of the murder There's been lots of contortions trying to figure out this simple one.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

the bra clasp mixture

To all,

Analysis of the bra clasp DNA is very difficult using only a paper electropherogram. In message 22123, I noted that there is a 10 allele in the D7S820 locus. This allele is not part of Meredith’s, Raffaele’s, or Amanda’s profile, but it is conceivable that it is a stutter peak. Stutter peaks are a type of artifact. However, there are other small peaks in several of the loci, especially D19S433 and vWA, and it is difficult for me to believe that all of them are stutters. In other words, there is probably DNA on the clasp that belongs to someone else. As long as one acknowledges that this DNA was deposited innocently, how can one be sure that Sollecito’s DNA was not also deposited innocently? The towels and (from what I can gather of the recent discussion) the mop head are a couple of potential sources of DNA. If Raffaele had used the same towel prior to cooking, as Guede brought into Meredith’s room, then the towels could be source of DNA on the clasp by secondary or tertiary transfer.

One general point and DNA mixtures is worth reiterating. Analyses of DNA mixtures are somewhat subjective. Chris Smith reported: “Mixed samples are another flashpoint in the DNA wars. It can be exceedingly difficult to separate one person’s DNA from another’s, especially in a degraded sample like this, and there is no universally accepted way to interpret the resulting profile. As the eminent British researcher Peter Gill told a conference of his fellow forensic scientists in 2005, ‘If you show 10 colleagues a mixture, you will probably end up with 10 different answers.’ Even Cheng’s supervisor, a combative man named Matt Gabriel, reluctantly admits on the stand that there is no agreed-on protocol for handling mixed samples.”

With respect to the Puckett case Michael Bobelaian quoted Professor Dan Krane: “’There is a public perception that DNA profiles are black and white,’ he told me. ‘The reality is that easily in half of all cases—namely, those where the samples are mixed or degraded—there is the potential for subjectivity.’”

 

[komponisto]

The DNA tests can't be repeated, but the defenders of AK turned down the opportunity to have someone present to observe. I know the excuse is that they had short notice to be in Rome on time, but:

1. I haven't seen a cite for the 2-hour claim

http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&e...6Oi7ChABaVHqXq5XQDA&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=wl

5. It's also common practice for defenders to decline to attend just so that they can try to dispute it afterwards. Cheesy.

Citation needed.

What about Halides' point about access to the electronic data files being much more important than presence during the test?

7. The knife is only one bit of the evidence.

Every other piece of evidence has its own, separate, problems. There is a pattern here; notice it.

 

[christianahannah]

To all,

Analysis of the bra clasp DNA is very difficult using only a paper electropherogram. In message 22123, I noted that there is a 10 allele in the D7S820 locus. This allele is not part of Meredith’s, Raffaele’s, or Amanda’s profile, but it is conceivable that it is a stutter peak. Stutter peaks are a type of artifact. However, there are other small peaks in several of the loci, especially D19S433 and vWA, and it is difficult for me to believe that all of them are stutters. In other words, there is probably DNA on the clasp that belongs to someone else. As long as one acknowledges that this DNA was deposited innocently, how can one be sure that Sollecito’s DNA was not also deposited innocently? The towels and (from what I can gather of the recent discussion) the mop head are a couple of potential sources of DNA. If Raffaele had used the same towel prior to cooking, as Guede brought into Meredith’s room, then the towels could be source of DNA on the clasp by secondary or tertiary transfer.

One general point and DNA mixtures is worth reiterating. Analyses of DNA mixtures are somewhat subjective. Chris Smith reported: “Mixed samples are another flashpoint in the DNA wars. It can be exceedingly difficult to separate one person’s DNA from another’s, especially in a degraded sample like this, and there is no universally accepted way to interpret the resulting profile. As the eminent British researcher Peter Gill told a conference of his fellow forensic scientists in 2005, ‘If you show 10 colleagues a mixture, you will probably end up with 10 different answers.’ Even Cheng’s supervisor, a combative man named Matt Gabriel, reluctantly admits on the stand that there is no agreed-on protocol for handling mixed samples.”

With respect to the Puckett case Michael Bobelaian quoted Professor Dan Krane: “’There is a public perception that DNA profiles are black and white,’ he told me. ‘The reality is that easily in half of all cases—namely, those where the samples are mixed or degraded—there is the potential for subjectivity.’”

Is that not the reason why Stefanoni did the Y-chromosome testing on the bra clasp, because the mixture can mask another profile if it is from a male?

If I remember correctly, the bra clasp, a vaginal swab, the cuff on the jacket, trace B from the bra, and the brown purse, were further tested for the Y-chromosome because of the mixtures. The results were the Y-haplotype of Raffaele's for the clasp, the remaining four samples were the Y-haplotype of Rudy.

 

[loverofzion]

You actually believe that multiple wounds is evidence to the contrary? I'd love to see the treatise that says a single assailant can't inflict multiple wounds and bruises. And then I would burn it.

While forcibly restraining the victim and using at least 2 different knives?

 

[s_pepys]

hey all

with regard to the dispute over multiple bruises and injuries showing or not showing evidence of multiple attackers. it has been mentioned by some that multiple injuries can come from a lone attacker, which is quite true. the issue for me is that it wasnt just multiple injuries but injuries consistent with restraint by multiple attackers. certain places on the arms for example. is this right? it is almost certainly more complex than the "one bruise or many bruises" choice being laid out at any rate.

lxxx

 

[komponisto]

Lady who lives in house accuses her boss of the murder There's been lots of contortions trying to figure out this simple one.

Answer here, here, and no doubt at numerous times and places on this very forum. Are you uninformed, or just forgetful?

 

[Matthew Best]

While forcibly restraining the victim and using at least 2 different knives?

At least 2??

How many knives are you prepared to believe were used?

 

[loverofzion]

Oh a conspiracy then. Good to know.

Interesting that right from the get go the prosecution, police, jury and defense witnesses- all, with no attendant preconception- displayed consummate cooperation in conspiring against the pair.

 

[loverofzion]

So, are you saying that the independent review wont help them at all?

More conspiracy in the pipeline, perhaps?

 

[Matthew Best]

Interesting that right from the get go the prosecution, police, jury and defense witnesses- all, with no attendant preconception- displayed consummate cooperation in conspiring against the pair.

Interesting that you insist on arguing against a version of the facts that no proponent of Knox & Sollecito's innocence has put forward. It's almost as though you have no arguments against the version that they actually do put forward!

 

[loverofzion]

'Never ascribe to conspiracy that which can be explained by sheer incompetence.'

No second knife, in fact the court forgot to introduce the concept of the actual murder weapon, they were so busy trying to pretend the one that never left Raffaele's drawer was there. That's actually part of the appeal!

No evidence of a faked break in either, no evidence of anyone besides Rudy. If there was actually evidence of these things, don't you suppose that's what the ones who believe in guilt would be talking about, as opposed to shared spinellos?

It's all theory, there's no evidence Amanda and Raffaele were involved in this murder.

Never left Ra's draer?
Whee did you get that?
No evidence of a faked break in, no evidence of anyone besides Rudy.

Must be nice to live in your world.

 

[komponisto]

While forcibly restraining the victim and using at least 2 different knives?

There is no indication that more than one knife was used. This idea was invented by pro-guilt believers in order to accommodate the fact that the "double-DNA knife" doesn't match the evidence at the scene.

 

[Draca]

That is shocking. Was it even mentioned in the court by the defense? There's alot of things that multiple boards discuss about police being sloppy but I haven't found any transcripts that the defense in fact complained about it that much. Did they? I know that there are several points in defense's case that the poilice mishandled evidence, but are they aware of the facts like you just mentioned?

I don't think they have attacked the forensic and police work nearly enough. They may not be able to because of possible slander charges, local custom and because it is a small city where they all know and work together. The defense is certainly aware of all these problems. I wish the jury would be made aware of it.