Continuation Part 2 - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case

[Kaosium]

I see things have suddenly gone terribly quiet at the forum where the Curatolo story was originally posted (thanks again, Jools!). I wonder why that might be - it's certainly a very "discussion-worthy" article.......

Well, the professional witness bum is now a smack dealer too, perhaps that adds to his credibility in some quarters? Certainly a serially testifying, homeless wretch who sells heroin on the side can see as well as any other? That his story doesn't make sense, that it is inconsistent in each telling and refers strongly to an element present only on another day can now be put down to him sampling his wares! He'd have gotten his story straight if it wasn't for all the junk messing him up!

You can expect the 'rehabilitation' of Curatolo to commence soon, I'm sure, in more than one sense...



These witnesses would have embarrassed Jim Garrison prosecuting Clay Shaw.

 

[Kaosium]

I believe that, in the circumstances, that might be an appropriate response

Here it is 'translated' by Google. I formatted it a little, but strap yourselves in, it's always a wild ride reading google-translated Italian:

The homeless Totò Antonio Curatolo, Supertest the investigation into the murder of Meredith Kercher, the man who poses with his testimony, Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito, ended on trial for drug dealing. Yesterday morning the hearing against him (which is celebrated in the court Daniele Cenci, prosecutor Silvia Nardi, defender Marri) has been postponed until next November.

The investigation - coordinated by the prosecutor Tullio chicory - brought against the homeless allegation of drug dealing continued. In practice in three months in the spring summer of 2003, Curatolo - who was born in the province of Avellino in June of 1956 - would have sold twice a week for three months, doses of heroin to an addict Perugia, Nicola M.; second investigations conducted by police with stalking, stalking and photographs, would sell drugs to 30 euro per dose.

Curatolo Toto - who had the role of witness in two other trials terrible news events such as the murder of the poor lady Scotia, houses, killed in Via delle Cantine and murder of young North African Najla Dridi, killed off in the pool of Pompeo Pellini, at that time in restructuring - Kercher murder investigation, said (of the texts is a "slow combustion" means that they have made their statements months later) that he had seen the night of 1 November 2007 in the gardens of Piazza Grimana, where he was sitting on a bench reading a week, Amanda and Raffaele.

And yet his memories to the fact that that evening was all a bustle of young people and coaches shuttle in the Etruscan Arch leaving for the major clubs on the outskirts of Perugia. Now the defenders of Raphael (Luca Maori and Giulia Bongiorno) with defensive activity found seven texts (operator of nightclubs, director of SIAE, the owners of the bus) who say that evening as the clubs were closed. The Assize Court of Appeal (President John Borsini, alongside Massimo Zanetti) has reopened the debate, as well as for DNA tests on the knife and the hook of the bra of the victim, even to hear these seven witnesses. If they confirm the statements made to defend the credibility of homeless risk of landslides. Also on charges of drug dealing, although ongoing, will not help its credibility. As was the case with another witness, an Albanian Kokomani, who had told him (he) had seen all together, in via della Pergola, Amanda, Raffaele and Rudy Guede

 

[Chris_Halkides]

who directs the investigation

Italy 'permits' the prosecutor to investigate and prosecute the case? That is their job!

Ummmm, who else should do it?

TomCH,

Although this is not universally agreed upon, some here think that Mignini and other prosecutors become involved in the investigation at an earlier stage than in other systems. Douglas Preston commented to this effect some time ago.

 

[LondonJohn]

TomCH,

Although this is not universally agreed upon, some here think that Mignini and other prosecutors become involved in the investigation at an earlier stage than in other systems. Douglas Preston commented to this effect some time ago.

And at that point it becomes apposite to ask the question posed since Roman times: "Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?" - sometimes colloquially translated as "Who watches the watchmen?"

 

[LondonJohn]

Well, the professional witness bum is now a smack dealer too, perhaps that adds to his credibility in some quarters? Certainly a serially testifying, homeless wretch who sells heroin on the side can see as well as any other? That his story doesn't make sense, that it is inconsistent in each telling and refers strongly to an element present only on another day can now be put down to him sampling his wares! He'd have gotten his story straight if it wasn't for all the junk messing him up!

You can expect the 'rehabilitation' of Curatolo to commence soon, I'm sure, in more than one sense...


These witnesses would have embarrassed Jim Garrison prosecuting Clay Shaw.

It's important to remember that these are currently only unproven allegations. But the apparent strength of the evidence (according to this report), coupled with the incredibly curious timing of the prosecution, add up to a most interesting situation.

I wonder if the prosecutor in the Knox/Sollecito appeal might now ask for Curatolo's original trial testimony to be disregarded and withdrawn, rather than have him put back on the stand and questioned about his alleged sideline, and his "interesting" relationship with the Perugia authorities between 2003 and 2011....?

 

[Amazer]

Just Asking Questions, Amazer?

No, just genuine puzzlement about Dan O.'s claim.

On what grounds does he claim that what is illogical for a break in is equally illogical for a staged break in.

 

[LondonJohn]

Here it is 'translated' by Google. I formatted it a little, but strap yourselves in, it's always a wild ride reading google-translated Italian:

The homeless Totò Antonio Curatolo, Supertest the investigation into the murder of Meredith Kercher, the man who poses with his testimony, Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito, ended on trial for drug dealing. Yesterday morning the hearing against him (which is celebrated in the court Daniele Cenci, prosecutor Silvia Nardi, defender Marri) has been postponed until next November.

The investigation - coordinated by the prosecutor Tullio chicory - brought against the homeless allegation of drug dealing continued. In practice in three months in the spring summer of 2003, Curatolo - who was born in the province of Avellino in June of 1956 - would have sold twice a week for three months, doses of heroin to an addict Perugia, Nicola M.; second investigations conducted by police with stalking, stalking and photographs, would sell drugs to 30 euro per dose.

Curatolo Toto - who had the role of witness in two other trials terrible news events such as the murder of the poor lady Scotia, houses, killed in Via delle Cantine and murder of young North African Najla Dridi, killed off in the pool of Pompeo Pellini, at that time in restructuring - Kercher murder investigation, said (of the texts is a "slow combustion" means that they have made their statements months later) that he had seen the night of 1 November 2007 in the gardens of Piazza Grimana, where he was sitting on a bench reading a week, Amanda and Raffaele.

And yet his memories to the fact that that evening was all a bustle of young people and coaches shuttle in the Etruscan Arch leaving for the major clubs on the outskirts of Perugia. Now the defenders of Raphael (Luca Maori and Giulia Bongiorno) with defensive activity found seven texts (operator of nightclubs, director of SIAE, the owners of the bus) who say that evening as the clubs were closed. The Assize Court of Appeal (President John Borsini, alongside Massimo Zanetti) has reopened the debate, as well as for DNA tests on the knife and the hook of the bra of the victim, even to hear these seven witnesses. If they confirm the statements made to defend the credibility of homeless risk of landslides. Also on charges of drug dealing, although ongoing, will not help its credibility. As was the case with another witness, an Albanian Kokomani, who had told him (he) had seen all together, in via della Pergola, Amanda, Raffaele and Rudy Guede

Blimey. Three murders in Perugia...that seems a lot. Interesting that Curatolo witnessed something pertinent to all three..........

.....oh, wait.........I've missed something much more important here: you mean that one of the key prosecution "superwitnesses" in the murder trial of Knox and Sollecito (and a witness in two other previous murder trials) is on trial for dealing heroin - at exactly the time that his credibility and motivation are coming under close scrutiny??!!

And what else, you say? This alleged drug dealing offence (allegedly corroborated by police surveillance and photographic evidence) took place in 2003, yet a prosecution is only being brought in 2011? Gosh, I wonder what that might mean: why would the police and prosecutors seemingly sit on clear evidence of a serious crime for all this time??!!

Still, three murders in Perugia, eh? That does seem like a lot...

 

[LondonJohn]

Well, the professional witness bum is now a smack dealer too, perhaps that adds to his credibility in some quarters? Certainly a serially testifying, homeless wretch who sells heroin on the side can see as well as any other? That his story doesn't make sense, that it is inconsistent in each telling and refers strongly to an element present only on another day can now be put down to him sampling his wares! He'd have gotten his story straight if it wasn't for all the junk messing him up!

You can expect the 'rehabilitation' of Curatolo to commence soon, I'm sure, in more than one sense...



These witnesses would have embarrassed Jim Garrison prosecuting Clay Shaw.

Ahhhh, denial mode has already kicked in elsewhere. I call shenanigans

 

[Kaosium]

It's important to remember that these are currently only unproven allegations. But the apparent strength of the evidence (according to this report), coupled with the incredibly curious timing of the prosecution, add up to a most interesting situation.

I wonder if the prosecutor in the Knox/Sollecito appeal might now ask for Curatolo's original trial testimony to be disregarded and withdrawn, rather than have him put back on the stand and questioned about his alleged sideline, and his "interesting" relationship with the Perugia authorities between 2003 and 2011....?

Removing my tongue from my cheek, these are indeed interesting charges, and as noted, also unproven, though going from the Amanda Knox trial what the police and prosecutor want in the court, they get.

It sounds like they've got pictures and probably a statement from this addict, I agree that is awfully curious that it took so long to prosecute, and wonder why it hadn't come up at all even though he was testifying as a 'superwitness' in a prominent trial.

Had anyone heard a whisper of this? That Curtalolo was up on drug charges?

 

[el buscador]

Removing my tongue from my cheek, these are indeed interesting charges, and as noted, also unproven, though going from the Amanda Knox trial what the police and prosecutor want in the court, they get.

It sounds like they've got pictures and probably a statement from this addict, I agree that is awfully curious that it took so long to prosecute, and wonder why it hadn't come up at all even though he was testifying as a 'superwitness' in a prominent trial.

Had anyone heard a whisper of this? That Curtalolo was up on drug charges?

Don't you know the PR campaign arranged it all? At least, according to the pmf cultists.

 

[LondonJohn]

Don't you know the PR campaign arranged it all? At least, according to the pmf cultists.

Or Sollecito's father, according to the very latest!

Yeah, it makes perfect sense that Sollecito's father and/or David Marriott were somehow in contact with the Perugia police and prosecutors back in 2003 - and somehow persuaded them to gather lots of evidence of Curatolo dealing heroin and then not bring charges against him in 2003 or 2004.

Furthermore, it's also perfectly feasible that Sollecito Sr and/or Marriott injected themselves into the Perugia prosecution process in late 2010, and somehow persuaded the police and prosecutors to drag out this extensive evidence of criminal activity (which, remember, they'd somehow managed to persuade the police/prosecutors to "keep on ice" for some seven years), and finally bring a prosecution against Curatolo. Presumably all this would have been accomplished either by way of large monetary payments, or perhaps by threats of violence...?

Yeah, this makes perfect sense.

Not.

 

[LondonJohn]

Lest we forget:

http://www.truejustice.org/ee/index..._2_on_perugia_i_meet_a_very_decent_brave_man/

 

[Kaosium]

I think the State Department has already acted on this case. My suspicion is they worked with Girlanda on his public request to take Amanda's photo down from the "Wall of Shame." Of the many things that offend people about this case, the concept of being assumed guilty before being tried is one of the most offensive, especially to Americans. Even "prudish" Americans, of which there are no longer very many, tend to cling tightly to their civil rights.

Here's a translation of the letter Rocco sent:

"Girlanda. -
To the Minister of the Interior.
- To know - given that:

an executive of the state police, also in a television interview on the YouTube site to see on television the corridor of the police station in Rome, where they are exposed framed photographic portraits of people like the leaders of organized crime, serial killers and other criminals convicted with very heavy and judgments have become final;

the director in question also shows one of the successes of the Central Operations Service, immediately after the images of the head of the Mafia, Bernardo Provenzano, a framed photographic portrait of American student Amanda Knox, for which as you know has just begun the appeal process ;

from as far as we see in the pictures of the interview, there is no trace of photos relating to the other accused in the same process and there is no trace of the only defendant convicted recently in a final in such proceedings;

seems, therefore, is chosen to represent only the highest value attributed to media, which in fact becomes the subject of television interviews by leaders of the state police who participated in the investigation;

the video in question was translated and distributed in the United States, feeding, not without reason, the accusations against our country that he represented the three defendants in the process of Perugia only a U.S. citizen, on remand, however, to accompany the best-known recipients of mafia bosses who have been convicted in numerous life sentences;

this picture was posted in the offices of the state police, to its knowledge the questioner, even before the first trial, and accompanied by questionable statements to the press of that ruling, also said in the video, where he an investigation into claims that only "psychological", and without any scientific and technical support, should have arrived in a very short time to the identification of perpetrators;

should be duly noted, also based on the statements to the press by that ruling, which under the legal principles of our country a defendant may be guilty may be set at the end of three sets of proceedings by the judiciary, not the end of the interrogations police;

as is well known, the judiciary bodies gives specific authority to police investigations, and not delegated to the role of judges;

is indeed rather strange and disturbing to the rule of law that, in spite of what is expressly required by the Code of Criminal Procedure Article 530 of the need to test absolutely certain and unambiguous, it is possible to judge a citizen convicted only on a "psychological" and after a police interrogation;

if this precedent were to be accepted, this would allow in the future to put up at the premises of the state police, including pictures of convicted criminals, including photos of any citizen, student, entrepreneur, journalist, teacher, politician, for which it been investigated and has been applied for a trial -:

who has formally approved the televising of the offices to a location within the state police and the interview with the manager, at what date and on what grounds;

initiatives such as the administrative and disciplinary intends to take in relation to gross violation of the principle of presumption of innocence by the director of the State Police indicated in the preamble, which defines public "guilty" of the defendants apparently even before the first trial in a movie which unfortunately is widespread and published abroad;

who decided, with an initiative that the questioner seems to present a profile defamatory and otherwise in violation of the legal principle of presumption of innocence, to post along with those of the most heinous crime a portrait of an American student charged and for which only at the time was not even started the proceedings at first instance;

if you do not intend to order the immediate removal of the portrait, at least until the completion of each case and pending a final ruling by the trial courts, the only body in this country that has given the decision on the guilt of a defendant. (4-10296)"

 

[komponisto]

Massei and Cristiani's answers to Kevin's questions, part 1

For the record, here's my best attempt at representing how Massei and Cristiani would answer the questions posed by Kevin_Lowe earlier. All page citations refer to the original text of the report.

[*]How do you explain the fact that all of Meredith's last meal was still in her stomach, and none of it was in her bowel, if she was undisturbed until 10:30pm and died after 10:30pm? This is completely inconsistent with everything we know about human digestion. Estimating time of death by stomach contents is imprecise to a degree, but not to anything like the degree needed to explain this. No credible source claims that the time for stomach contents to begin moving into the duodenum in a healthy adult having eaten a small-to-moderate meal with no alcohol, extreme stress or other confounding factors can plausibly exceed four hours, and exceeding three hours is very unlikely indeed. Since there was no digested matter in Meredith's duodenum, and we can establish from the statements of Meredith's friends that she ate her last meal no later than 18:30, there is reasonable medical certainty she died before 22:30, and it is very unlikely indeed that she died later than 21:30.

Massei and Cristiani appeal to the uncertainty and wide variability of digestion transit times. They cite the fact that some meals can take 6-7 hours, or even longer, to fully leave the stomach (ignoring the fact that this is not the relevant variable, since the food had not yet even begun to leave the stomach). Following an expert who testified in the preliminary proceedings, they use the presence of food residue in the (rest of the) small intestine to hypothesize that there may also have been residue in the duodenum. They also note the presence of a small amount of alcohol (0.43 grams per liter), consistent with drinking a single glass of beer or wine. (pp. 180-183)

[*]How do you explain the fact that Meredith's mobile phone pinged a tower in between her house and the final resting place of her phones at 22:13, if she was not murdered until 23:30 or similar? Meredith's phone had never pinged that tower before so while it was physically possible for her phone to reach that tower if she stuck it out the window, there is no evidence that it ever did so in the normal course of things. This is nigh incontrovertible evidence that at 22:13 the killer had left her house and was en route to the place where they dumped her phones.

Our authors make no comment on the fact that Meredith's phone had never reached that tower before, or the fact that it could have been reached from an intermediate location by the killer en route, and simply conclude that since it was possible for it to have reached it from her house, it must have done so. (p. 337)

[*]Do you acknowledge that Rudy confessed in his prison diary to being at the site from 20:30 onwards, and claimed that Meredith was murdered some time not long after that? Do you have any explanation for why Rudy would lie to put the time of death back so far, if indeed he was lying about Meredith's time of death?

There is no mention of Rudy's prison diary in the report that I can recall.

[*]Do you acknowledge that there is absolutely no positive evidence for a later time of death, and that Massei's conclusion about the time of death was arrived at by assuming that Knox and Sollecito were guilty and confabulating a time of death consistent with that assumption, rather than by determining the time of death and then checking whether Knox and Sollecito could possibly have been present at that time?

I'm guessing they would argue that the time of death can only be ascertained to within a span of several hours from the medical data, so they have to use the rest of their "knowledge" to come up with a more specific time. However, they exhibit a blatant misunderstanding of the concept of confidence intervals on p. 177, where they write "In the case at hand, therefore, the hypothesis that death occurred around 23:00 has 95% probability." This statistical howler, which severely undermines the response I suggested, comes after a passage where they incorrectly describe what appears to be an expert's estimate of a 95% confidence interval of death within 21.5 hours and 30.5 hours of the analysis as follows: "these data...allow one to draw a Gaussian curve, the center of which indicates 22:50 as the time of death with 95% confidence, with a range of between 21:30 and 30:30 of the analysis [rilievo]."

(I wonder if anyone else has ever commented on this basic misunderstanding of statistics by Massei and Cristiani before. At least I assume the misunderstanding is theirs, and not that of the expert whose testimony they are citing!)

[*]How do you explain the fact that the characteristics of Amanda's "confession" (vagueness, doubts about its authenticity, obvious errors of fact, conformity with police theories at the time, later retraction) match with those of an internalised false confession, a well-recognised and objectively documented psychological phenomenon? There is no evidence Amanda knew enough about such false confessions to fake one so convincingly, and indeed if she knew enough to fake one she would almost certainly know that such confessions often lead to the confessor being convicted. If it is highly implausible that she faked an internalised false confession, the only alternative was that this was a real internalised false confession.

Despite Massei's own rather involved colloquy with Amanda at the trial about her interrogation, this is almost entirely unaddressed in the report. Instead, our authors, as if in imitation of internet guilters, simply use Lumumba's innocence and good relations with Amanda to deduce in a single step that Amanda must have been trying to throw him under the bus as an attempt to deflect suspicion from her. It's as if the idea of a false confession induced by police is completely beyond their ability to imagine. All they say on the matter is that there's no proof that the police asked about Lumumba first, and there was no reason for them to do so, since they had no reason to think of him (thus completely ignoring the text message!). (pp418-419).

[*]Do you acknowledge that since Meredith died long before 23:30, the witnesses who claim to have heard a scream at about that time cannot have been hearing Meredith scream, and that this destroys the claim that these witnesses confirm Amanda's internalised false confession because they heard the scream Amanda described? If not, why not?

They don't grant the premise here, holding "with 95% confidence" that Meredith died around 22:50! This likewise renders the next three questions irrelevant, so I'm omitting them.

In fact since this post is getting long I'll break it up here, saving the rest of the questions for a later post.

 

[LondonJohn]

I'm guessing they would argue that the time of death can only be ascertained to within a span of several hours from the medical data, so they have to use the rest of their "knowledge" to come up with a more specific time. However, they exhibit a blatant misunderstanding of the concept of confidence intervals on p. 177, where they write "In the case at hand, therefore, the hypothesis that death occurred around 23:00 has 95% probability." This statistical howler, which severely undermines the response I suggested, comes after a passage where they incorrectly describe what appears to be an expert's estimate of a 95% confidence interval of death within 21.5 hours and 30.5 hours of the analysis as follows: "these data...allow one to draw a Gaussian curve, the center of which indicates 22:50 as the time of death with 95% confidence, with a range of between 21:30 and 30:30 of the analysis [rilievo]."

(I wonder if anyone else has ever commented on this basic misunderstanding of statistics by Massei and Cristiani before. At least I assume the misunderstanding is theirs, and not that of the expert whose testimony they are citing!)

Oh my word! I must admit that I'd never spotted this one - I was already looking past the parts dealing with estimating ToD from residual body temperature - due to the long elapsed time before Lalli measured the residual temperature, coupled with his inexplicable failure to weigh the body.

But this is an extraordinary misunderstanding of confidence intervals (and of statistical analysis in general) by the esteemed judicial panel. What's worse, they've used their grotesque misunderstanding to actually bolster their views on ToD - and what's even worse, they don't even seem to realise that in doing so, they are contradicting the ToD they settle upon later on!

I might be going out on a limb here, but I'm guessing that the two "professional" judges on this panel were either law or humanities graduates, and that the six lay judges were also of well-below-average scientific intelligence....

 

[Chris_Halkides]

I beg to differ

Or Sollecito's father, according to the very latest!

Yeah, it makes perfect sense that Sollecito's father and/or David Marriott were somehow in contact with the Perugia police and prosecutors back in 2003 - and somehow persuaded them to gather lots of evidence of Curatolo dealing heroin and then not bring charges against him in 2003 or 2004.

Furthermore, it's also perfectly feasible that Sollecito Sr and/or Marriott injected themselves into the Perugia prosecution process in late 2010, and somehow persuaded the police and prosecutors to drag out this extensive evidence of criminal activity (which, remember, they'd somehow managed to persuade the police/prosecutors to "keep on ice" for some seven years), and finally bring a prosecution against Curatolo. Presumably all this would have been accomplished either by way of large monetary payments, or perhaps by threats of violence...?

Yeah, this makes perfect sense.

Not.

LondonJohn,

Yes it does make sense. One just needs to invoke retrocausality.

 

[Danceme]

Just Asking Questions, Amazer?

One of the stock arguments that the break-in must have been staged has been something like (and I emphasise for the benefit of those with amazingly or perhaps strategically poor reading comprehension skills that I claim to be quoting no particular person) "It's soooooo obvious that no real burglar would break in that way, I can tell from my armchair with some carefully selected pictures that don't give a correct sense of scale that Knox and Sollecito staged the break-in!".

You seem very comfortable stating from your armchair the opposite. Clint Van Zandt was there and he said this;

"I’ve stood below the broken window and believe it could have been too high off the ground to have been a point of entry by an intruder."

That particular argument is directly self-defeating, which I think was Dan O.'s point, because if it was that obvious then nobody would have staged it that way either.

That's utter nonsense. It implies an incongruous similarity in thinking between the calm analytical reasoning process a cat burglar would engage in when walking around a premises to stake out his best point of entry and the frantic reasoning two inexperienced people would engage in when attempting to cover their tracks after just murdering someone. Nothing similar there.

 

[LondonJohn]

LondonJohn,

Yes it does make sense. One just needs to invoke retrocausality.

 

[LondonJohn]

A small point related to the prosecution of Sig. Curatolo:

Some people may have wondered whether the length of time between the alleged offence (spring/summer 2003) and the prosecution of the crime (late 2010/early 2011) might have meant that the crime happened too long ago to be prosecuted now (i.e. whether the statute of limitations had been reached for this crime).

Well, the short answer is that for this crime, Italy is seemingly still well within its statute of limitations. The Italian code of criminal procedure states that the statute for criminal acts is limited to a period of time equalling the maximum incarceration penalty for that particular crime (but for serious crimes, this period cannot be less than six years).

I can't immediately put my fingers on the maximum prison sentence for dealing heroin in the amounts alleged in the Curatolo case. However, there's plenty of information available on the maximum sentence for dealing cannabis: up to 6 years' imprisonment.

And given that in the UK the maximum prison sentence for cannabis dealing is 14 years, but the maximum for heroin dealing is life, it's extremely fair to suppose that the maximum penalty for heroin dealing in Italy is at least 10 years in prison. So, if that supposition is accurate, then the statute of limitations for heroin dealing is also at least 10 years. Meaning that the prosecutors would have had until at least mid-2013 to bring charges against Curatolo.

Hope that clears things up a little.

 

[Kaosium]

That's utter nonsense. It implies an incongruous similarity in thinking between the calm analytical reasoning process a cat burglar would engage in when walking around a premises to stake out his best point of entry and the frantic reasoning two inexperienced people would engage in when attempting to cover their tracks after just murdering someone. Nothing similar there.

This same 'frantic reasoning' which led Massei et al to conclude they opened up the window to the inside, closed the outer shutters and positioned the inner ones just so allowing them to throw the rock through the window side-to-side without leaving the house and the glass would reflect off the inner shutters just enough to 'fool' police into thinking the rock had come through the window from the outside.

Uh, huh.

If they had the time and ingenuity to come up with that, they'd have picked an easier window to enter, wouldn't you think? Why let all that go to waste because they picked a window some might believe could be too high off the ground?