Continuation Part 2 - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case

[Chris C]

The bra came apart on both the straps and clasp at seem marks. It could have been wripped off. In the photo above you can see the seperation of the two cloth parts and the pulled threads.

We know the clasps are bent, but your saying the bra could have torn by pulling on it before complete failure by the clasps. Yet regardless, If i remember correctly the prosecution claims it was cut off. So my question remains, how much blood was left in the "cut" area of the bra.

 

[Kevin_Lowe]

How many boxers have you seen get hit on the cheek and jaw flush. No cut, knock out. Meredith isn't a boxer so I'm sure she isn't accustomed to getting hit in the face hard enough to cut open her cheek and bruise her face. Meredith was struck hard enough to leave bruising on the gums and a cut on the face.

Hang on, careful what you are arguing for. Just because a blow that does not split the skin can KO does not mean that every blow that splits the skin will KO, nor is it even established that it isn't just a knife cut.

I've had similar injuries without being knocked out.

Though lets look at her wounds closer. 1 or 2 hits to the face. Meredith drops to the floor knocked out. Hits floor bruises her elbows, hip, thighs, forearms and dislocates her shoulder.

Now a damaged rotator cuff has turned into a dislocation. This is getting sillier by the minute.

Every one of those can be left by a drop to the floor after loosing consciousness temporarily. Attempts to get up, 1 more blow behind ear and fight over. Rest of the bruising could then be left by the sexual assault and throat cutting afterwards.

This is just a story you've made up. It doesn't fit with the evidence (that you have already been told about) that Meredith was leaving bloody hand prints after she had been stabbed, it doesn't flow naturally out of her known injuries, it's purely conjecture.

Now if you want to blame the cut on a knife that brings in a whole different monster about how 3 people couldn't have been involved and how it goes against the prosecutions theory.

Rudy's fumbling around with a knife trying to bring it around to her throat and in the struggle he cuts her cheek... what am I missing that makes this a "whole different monster"?

Is this going anywhere or what?

 

[Kaosium]

Now I dont know whether to believe Ron's version because I find it hard to believe she was even conscious at this point. At most she only had the use of one arm and suffered two different blows to the face with one of them hard enough to break open the skin. Plus the blow behind the back ear. I have been hit in the face by some very large men. Some of them hard enough to stagger me and none of those cut my face open. So either she was fighting for her life and got cut on the hands and face by a knife, or she was hit hard enough 3 times in the head to render her unconscious.

My understanding is different. Knocking someone out by striking them is a rather unreliable endeavor, it's much easier to cause unconsciousness if you asphyxiate them thereby stopping the flow of oxygen to their brain. Blows to the face are not likely to achieve that, despite how much they may get cut. Think of a boxer bloody but unbowed, they can take a lot of damage without being knocked out. Conversely one can go down with one blow--provided that blow is in the right spot. There's a reason for the term 'glass jaw.'

Here's a guide that might be helpful to the discussion:

4-1. VITAL TARGETS
The body is divided into three sections: high, middle, and low. Each
section contains vital targets (Figure 4-1, pages 4-5 and 4-6). The effects of
striking these targets follow:

a. High Section. The high section includes the head and neck; it is the most
dangerous target area.

(1) Top of the head. The skull is weak where the frontal cranial bones join.
A forceful strike causes trauma to the cranial cavity, resulting in
unconsciousness and hemorrhage. A severe strike can result in death.

(2)Forehead . A forceful blow can cause whiplash; a severe blow can
cause cerebral hemorrhage and death.

(3)Temple. The bones of the skull are weak at the temple, and an artery
and large nerve lie close to the skin. A powerful strike can cause
unconsciousness and brain concussion. If the artery is severed, the resulting massive hemorrhage compresses the brain, causing coma and or death.

(4)Eyes. A slight jab in the eyes causes uncontrollable watering and blurred vision. A forceful jab or poke can cause temporary blindness, or the eyes can be gouged out. Death can result if the fingers penetrate through the thin bone behind the eyes and into the brain.

(5)Ears. A strike to the ear with cupped hands can rupture the eardrum
and may cause a brain concussion

(6)Nose. Any blow can easily break the thin bones of the nose, causing
extreme pain and eye watering.

(7) Under the nose. A blow to the nerve center, which is close to the
surface under the nose, can cause great pain and watery eyes.

(8)Jaw. A blow to the jaw can break or dislocate it. If the facial nerve is
pinched against the lower jaw, one side of the face will be paralyzed.

(9)Chin. A blow to the chin can cause paralysis, mild concussion, and
unconsciousness. The jawbone acts as a lever that can transmit the force of a blow to the back of the brain where the cardiac and respiratory mechanisms are controlled.

(10) Back of ears and base of skull. A moderate blow to the back of the ears or the base of the skull can cause unconsciousness by the jarring effect on the back of the brain. However, a powerful blow can cause a concussion or brain hemorrhage and death.

What you're trying to get at is the autonomic nervous system to 'shut off' the flow of oxygen to the brain. As you can see, it's a pain in the ass to get at, hitting much of the head is unlikely to produce that result, either by direct force or by 'bouncing' it off the other side of the skull, which is as nasty as it sounds. Nailing the chin or right below it is usually the best bet, which is why boxers are trained to keep their heads down. Otherwise the other locations are generally not vulnerable to someone striking from the front.

It sounds like only one of the blows, the one behind the ear, is the only one that had a decent chance to produce unconsciousness, and it is not necessarily probable that it should have. If there are other indications that she was mobile then it would be reasonable to presume she was conscious as Ron Hendry does in his analysis. Note that those blows that opened up cuts on her face may well have stunned her by bouncing other portions of the brain about in the skull, making her much more vulnerable and easier to manipulate, but they were unlikely to actually cause loss of consciousness.

 

[Chris C]

Ok Kevin, since you seem to be on the offensive, maybe you should start with this post.

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=6789371&postcount=1759

My response was not only did she have defensive wounds, but she was nearly beaten to death.

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=6789927&postcount=1792

Sherlock doesn't think she was beaten near to death.

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=6789937&postcount=1794

Your response that all but the neck wounds were superficial.

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=6789964&postcount=1799

My response explaining that her other wounds were far from SUPERFICIAL.

Hang on, careful what you are arguing for. Just because a blow that does not split the skin can KO does not mean that every blow that splits the skin will KO, nor is it even established that it isn't just a knife cut.

I've had similar injuries without being knocked out.

On the same aspect, for you to think that my arguement that Meredith might have been unconscious, after she was struck in the head 2 or 3 times with enough force to break the skin and cause swelling in her mouth and bruising behind her ear, is absurd also.

Now a damaged rotator cuff has turned into a dislocation. This is getting sillier by the minute.

Sorry about the slip on the disclocation. I get them confused sometimes due to the fact that while in the Military I was caught in an ice storm, slipped, fell, braced my fall with my arm and boom. Dislocated shoulder and torn rotator. Either way, Meredith torn rotator was severe enough for them to believe she would have have little use of that arm.

However, just for fun. Here are the common causes of torn rotator.

Direct blow to the shoulder area
Falling on an outstretched arm
Chronic degenerative wear and tear on the tendons
Arthritis may decrease the space for the tendons
Chronic instability of the humerus may traumatize the tendons
Repetitive overhead motion of the arm such as in:
Swimming
Baseball (mainly pitching)
Tennis

This is just a story you've made up. It doesn't fit with the evidence (that you have already been told about) that Meredith was leaving bloody hand prints after she had been stabbed, it doesn't flow naturally out of her known injuries, it's purely conjecture.

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=6676091&postcount=21873
Meredith's bloody hand prints? or Bloody handprints?
I know there are bloody handprints, some of them have been proven to be Rudy's. Which ones have been proven to be Meredith's? Its a simple question and I was the one that asked it. Lack of quilters responding to your posts, leaving you on edge? However, just because you feel its impossible for someone to be struck in the face, knocked out, bruise and damage their body on the fall and then regain consciousness doesn't mean its impossible. It happens every Friday and Saturday night at the local bars.

Rudy's fumbling around with a knife trying to bring it around to her throat and in the struggle he cuts her cheek... what am I missing that makes this a "whole different monster"?

Is this going anywhere or what?

Wow, I guess i'll explain it to you.
If the cut happened because of a punch, then the prosecution can just write it off as a superficial wound like so many of the other blows to her body.

If you have to explain the cut to her face from a knife, thats a whole different monster. It leaves open two possibilities. One an attack from behind where her face gets cut either by accident or because she is struggling. Two an attack from the front where she receives other knife wounds like the ones she also has on her hands. The hand cuts could have also come from behind while trying to prevent the attacker from cutting her throat. Either way, a knife cut to hands and face is a whole different monster for the prosecution to explain. None of which they ever did explain. Also I feel the cuts to the hands and face would be hard to fathom if 2 more people are holding your arms.

Now just because I agree with some of the stuff you post, doesn't mean I agree with everything.

With all that said.

Kevin do you in fact agree that most of the bruising, cut to the cheek, and torn rotator cup could have all come from a couple punches to the face and fall.

A fall, in point of fact, that would have allowed Rudy to gain a position of authority over the victim.

 

[Chris C]

My understanding is different. Knocking someone out by striking them is a rather unreliable endeavor, it's much easier to cause unconsciousness if you asphyxiate them thereby stopping the flow of oxygen to their brain. Blows to the face are not likely to achieve that, despite how much they may get cut. Think of a boxer bloody but unbowed, they can take a lot of damage without being knocked out. Conversely one can go down with one blow--provided that blow is in the right spot. There's a reason for the term 'glass jaw.'

Here's a guide that might be helpful to the discussion:


What you're trying to get at is the autonomic nervous system to 'shut off' the flow of oxygen to the brain. As you can see, it's a pain in the ass to get at, hitting much of the head is unlikely to produce that result, either by direct force or by 'bouncing' it off the other side of the skull, which is as nasty as it sounds. Nailing the chin or right below it is usually the best bet, which is why boxers are trained to keep their heads down. Otherwise the other locations are generally not vulnerable to someone striking from the front.

It sounds like only one of the blows, the one behind the ear, is the only one that had a decent chance to produce unconsciousness, and it is not necessarily probable that it should have. If there are other indications that she was mobile then it would be reasonable to presume she was conscious as Ron Hendry does in his analysis. Note that those blows that opened up cuts on her face may well have stunned her by bouncing other portions of the brain about in the skull, making her much more vulnerable and easier to manipulate, but they were unlikely to actually cause loss of consciousness.

Its called being knocked out. Doesn't mean its permanent. Its temp, some can be a fraction of a second. Just enough for a person to lose control and drop. Yes, and the blow to the back of the head could have made her unconscious also or happened as a result of hitting the floor.

 

[Withnail1969]

Its called being knocked out. Doesn't mean its permanent. Its temp, some can be a fraction of a second. Just enough for a person to lose control and drop. Yes, and the blow to the back of the head could have made her unconscious also or happened as a result of hitting the floor.

This makes it even more unlikely that Meredith was able to scream loud enough for Nara to hear her.

 

[Kaosium]

Its called being knocked out. Doesn't mean its permanent. Its temp, some can be a fraction of a second. Just enough for a person to lose control and drop. Yes, and the blow to the back of the head could have made her unconscious also or happened as a result of hitting the floor.

Perhaps I misunderstood then. You're saying you think she was concussed and thus 'stunned' momentarily, perhaps causing collapse? That can happen easily with the brain bouncing around in all that cerebrospinal gunk, and would obviously have made her more malleable, thus explaining the lack of defensive wounds.

 

[Kaosium]

This makes it even more unlikely that Meredith was able to scream loud enough for Nara to hear her.

Welcome back Withnail! Were you the one playing 'matchmaker' elsewhere?

I highly doubt Nara heard anything to do with the murder anyway. As I recall it took her a while to get around to reporting what she heard, and going from that November 12th Fox compilation of (London) Times articles I've posted a couple times they were already 'lining up' screams, having one reported at 1 AM or so if I recall correctly. It strikes me as possible this was a big reason the autopsy results took so long to establish a time of death, they were trying to find something to corroborate it all with, only have little success.

With a scientific time of death rather than one developed through convenience they lose the scream, they should lose Toto, leaving only whatshisname the celebrity-seeking twit as a 'witness.' All he claimed to 'witness' was Amanda lurking around his store some nine hours after the murder anyway, which is hardly damning as the forensics revealed no clean-up, and obviously Rudy wiping with rags doesn't constitute a bleach cleaning which would have been necessary to eliminate any DNA.

 

[Danceme]

The luminol prints were probably not made in Meredith's blood for reasons already discussed. How, specifically, do you tie them to the crime? How do you answer the criticisms of the knife and bra clasp as put forth in the Johnson/Hampikian open letter?

Personally I find the luminol footprints very hard to explain. I accept there are other substances that luminol can react with and the ones I find most convincing are perhaps rust or floor cleaner. However, the only prints found correspond with the shapes and sizes of Amanda and Raffaele's feet, not Laura or Filomena who also showered and walked on cleaned floors, for longer than Amanda as they were there first. Also the only prints were in the vicinity of the murder room, not elsewhere in the cottage.

Hi Sherlock Holmes,
I guess that you can add me too to the very small group that believes that Rudy Guede probably had someone else with him, someone more experienced, someone he is very afraid of, someone who did stab Meredith Kercher in her throat multiple times in a most brutal, bloody way. And someone who then left fast, leaving Rudy there still.

Or to the even smaller group that believes that Rudy got there as Aviello or someone else had just stabbed Meredith Kercher in her throat and was leaving the scene...

Though it could have been Rudy Guede all by himself commiting this horrible murder, I wonder if he was really capable of shoving a knife into Meredith Kercher's throat.
Peace, RWVBWL

PS-I do reserve the right to change my opinion though!

I think, if Amanda and Raffaele are innocent, that Rudy was also not alone. I wonder if there is anything at all in his background, anger issues etc, which would account for such a savage attack.

Hi RWVBWL
I just can't bring myself to believe that anyone besides RG was in that room. Just as AK and RS, I believe that anyone besides RG would have left some trace no matter how small.

If someone else was there and expected to leave a "trace no matter how small" then the bra clasp fits this bill too.

 

[Danceme]

....... which is hardly damning as the forensics revealed no clean-up, and obviously Rudy wiping with rags doesn't constitute a bleach cleaning which would have been necessary to eliminate any DNA.

Ron Hendry believes the floor was wiped in several spots as I posted earlier. Perhaps it was to obscure what would possibly have been recognizable shoe or foot prints. Couple this with the luminol prints and how they were sporadic and the theory has legs. Even if the luminol prints were unrelated to the murder, why are they sporadic and not continuous as Amanda for instance, left the shower one day and walked back to her room with rusty water on her feet? Why are Raffaele's there?

 

[Withnail1969]

Personally I find the luminol footprints very hard to explain. I accept there are other substances that luminol can react with and the ones I find most convincing are perhaps rust or floor cleaner. However, the only prints found correspond with the shapes and sizes of Amanda and Raffaele's feet, not Laura or Filomena who also showered and walked on cleaned floors, for longer than Amanda as they were there first. Also the only prints were in the vicinity of the murder room, not elsewhere in the cottage.

If there had been a cleanup, there would be no prints. If the prints were something to do with the murder, they would have tested positive for blood.

I wasn't aware that the prints found were particularly compatible with Amanda and Raffaele's feet, nor was I aware that reference prints had been taken from Filomena, Laura and Meredith.

 

[Kaosium]

Ron Hendry believes the floor was wiped in several spots as I posted earlier. Perhaps it was to obscure what would possibly have been recognizable shoe or foot prints. Couple this with the luminol prints and how they were sporadic and the theory has legs. Even if the luminol prints were unrelated to the murder, why are they sporadic and not continuous as Amanda for instance, left the shower one day and walked back to her room with rusty water on her feet? Why are Raffaele's there?

Well, they had the bloody rags, did they test positive for either Raffaele's or Amanda's DNA? That's how you get real evidence, not just pretend it *might* be evidence.

Raffaele doesn't have any footprints there. Have you seen the comparison of Rudy and Raffaele's footmark compared to them side-by-side? There's about a half dozen posts showing them in late October sometime, actually just search SomeAlibi's posts and go back to the oldest one available and you'll probably find them easily.

I don't know why they're sporadic, and the fact that they are and tested negative for blood means they're just marks that showed up with Luminol, you'd expect they'd find a lot of stuff like that, just as they did at Raffaele's, that have nothing to do with the murder. Spray down your bathroom with Luminol sometime and see what you find, and then you can tell me if you think it's evidence you murdered someone...

 

[CDHost]

... Freedom of speech does not seem to preclude the use of fallacies, lies and distortion. Just uttering a continual stream of jibberish qualifies as free speech. Freedom of communication is perhaps a better concept in that communication implies the exchange of ideas. Perhaps Freedom of fallacy free communication implies the highest freedom of all.

I propose that the ONLY good group would encourage fallacy free communication and NOTHING but the fallacy free communication.

What you are describing is essentially Scholasticism where you have a regulated truth and a high quality methodology. Debate is regulated, it occurs mostly in those areas on which the truth is not known. You are allowed to question but once a fallacy is pointed out you are obligated to recant your argument, rather than continue to propagate falsified arguments. The problem of course is that the politically powerful are needed to enforce dogma, so essentially the truth becomes little different than the views that the people with the best army support.

Conversely what came after, a democratic view of truth, you lose any idea that the speech is of great importance. Falsehoods and lies travel freely. People in power see themselves as not dealing in truth so much as trying to control effects; and end up with a plurality of truths with the powerful mostly indifferent. Where a truth needs to emerge it emerges politically, debate plays a role but it is a bare fisted debate, rhetoric, not reasoned discourse.

I believe strongly in the latter over the former but there was a real debate between these two ideals and often we see the caricature of scholasticism that emerged out of the reformation.

Anyway hoped that helped.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

yoga

Indeed, that's something I figured out as well, I can't count how many times I've had to adjust my theories to eliminate something disproven or to incorporate 'new' data. It is nice to have a framework to start with though, that makes corroborating things easier in my mind.

Incidentally, re-reading Napoleoni's version of events recently caused me to wonder: has anyone actually 'solved' the cartwheel mystery which was where this discussion began? Off the top of my head I recall that some sources indicate it was actually yoga, others a cartwheel at the request of a police officer, and Napoleoni et al said in court it was a spontaneous cartwheel that caused her to think Amanda was simply nutty.

kaosium,

Fiona and I had a long debate about this in the first thread, complete with parsing of the trial testimony. I don't think it is solvable; it is a case of she said, they said. However, I contacted sources very close to Amanda, and they maintain that she was stretching and/or doing yoga poses. This is also what Frank Sfarzo reported. I suspect that the officer who first commented to her on this was trying to strike up a conversation and gain some trust.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

brief thoughts on the luminol prints in the hallway

Danceme,

No reference prints were taken from Laura or Filomena, so they might have a similar foot size to Amanda, for all we know. In Darkness Descending it was reported that the luminol was overapplied, leading to dilution of the images (I do not consider this book to be all that reliable, however). At least some of the luminol-positive area in the household were negative by TMB, and all three of the luminol positive footprints were negative for DNA.

Mary_H suggested that Amanda made one or more prints on the morning of 2 November. I seem to recall she talked about scooting after her shower, using the bathmat, but I do not recall the details. To expand upon something I said earlier, if they were part of the crime, then why aren't there more prints, why are there only right feet, and why does one print face toward Meredith's room? My bottom line is that the prints are not easy to explain but they are neither exculpatory nor inculpatory.

 

[Dan O.]

But I remember reading the transcript of Amandas court-testimony about the light in her room when she was in the house in the morning (the shower - the blow-drying of the hair...) she had no light in her room and testified it was not dark at all because of the natural light from the balcony.
And this was hours earlier and outside more dark than after 13:00. As far as I know the window of Amandas room is also smaller than the others.

Of course, Amanda didn't have half a dozen people crowded into the hallway blocking the light from the balcony doors at the time.

 

[Dan O.]

Though others might disagree, I believe that Rudy Guede was involved in the break-in at the lawyers office. But recalling an old Perugia Shock posting, I wonder who turned off the burglar alarm? Rudy, or someone else, someone more experienced?

Rudy probably figured it out himself. He's a troubled individual, but he's obviously quite intelligent.

What kind of lame burgar alarm can be turned off by someone that doesn't know the security code without setting it off? I have known for at least three decades how to design alarm systems that cannot be defeated without inside knowledge.

There is of course an alternate meaning for the statement "the alarm system was turned off" and that is that the alarm system was never activated that night.

 

[RoseMontague]

This picture I had not seen before. It gives a different view of Amanda and Raffaele outside the cottage. The one of them kissing seems to be the one I see most often.

 

[Justinian2]

What you are describing is essentially Scholasticism where you have a regulated truth and a high quality methodology. Debate is regulated, it occurs mostly in those areas on which the truth is not known. You are allowed to question but once a fallacy is pointed out you are obligated to recant your argument, rather than continue to propagate falsified arguments. The problem of course is that the politically powerful are needed to enforce dogma, so essentially the truth becomes little different than the views that the people with the best army support.

Conversely what came after, a democratic view of truth, you lose any idea that the speech is of great importance. Falsehoods and lies travel freely. People in power see themselves as not dealing in truth so much as trying to control effects; and end up with a plurality of truths with the powerful mostly indifferent. Where a truth needs to emerge it emerges politically, debate plays a role but it is a bare fisted debate, rhetoric, not reasoned discourse.

I believe strongly in the latter over the former but there was a real debate between these two ideals and often we see the caricature of scholasticism that emerged out of the reformation.

Anyway hoped that helped.

The following is an interesting paragraph from that article:

[...] They admitted the force of human authority when the conditions of its valid application were verified. But in theology, the authority of revelation did not coerce their reason and in philosophy and in natural science they taught very emphatically that the argument from authority is the weakest of all arguments.

That has been the essence of most of the discussions here. The Anti-guilters believe very emphatically that the argument from the authority of the Italian courts is the weakest of all arguments. Conversely, the guilters frequently seem to argue that authority is truth. As evidence slips from their grasp, they seem to be growing silent. However, the appeal ramps up soon...

 

[RoseMontague]

I have a theory about the lamp cord, where and when it was plugged in that also has a bit of mystery to it. I would like to get everyone's opinions first based on these three pictures:





This last picture is below the desk in the second picture.