Continuation Part 2 - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case

[Katody Matrass]

NBC Today, well, today.

Good to see media still follow the case.

 

[tsig]

1) Knox always claimed that the "cuffs to the back of the head" were because the police were frustrated that she couldn't "remember" - not because the police were accusing her of being directly involved in the murder.

2) You still seem to be under some sort of misapprehension that those of us arguing on the side of acquittal are somehow bound together in a homogeneous group, which follows some sort of prepared script or strategy. It's not only clear that this is not the case, but also that it speaks more to your powers of reasoning and observation...

3) Where do you get the idea that the "early and precise ToD" (as you put it) has been "abandoned" (as you put it)? Meredith died before 10pm, and probably before 9.30pm. All the external evidence shows that, and the preponderance of the expert testimony from the first trial (including that of the prosecution's own experts!) shows that. I have little doubt that if the appeal trial gets that far, the defence will be able to show that to the court's satisfaction as well.

PS You don't know what the word "trope" means. Maybe you should look it up before using it next time...

Definition of TROPE
1
a : a word or expression used in a figurative sense : figure of speech b : a common or overused theme or device : cliché <the usual horror movie tropes>



English is a fine language you should learn it sometime.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

fitting the profile

shuttlt,

If I said Amanda does not fit the profile, that opinion would not carry extraordinary weight (I lack expertise in profiling). However, when former FBI profiler John Douglas said it in Maxim magazine, it has a certain amount of heft.

 

[lane99]

...If I said Amanda does not fit the profile, that opinion would not carry extraordinary weight...

Maybe not "extraordinary" weight.

But at least it would show you weren't lacking in common sense.

 

[shuttlt]

shuttlt,

If I said Amanda does not fit the profile, that opinion would not carry extraordinary weight (I lack expertise in profiling). However, when former FBI profiler John Douglas said it in Maxim magazine, it has a certain amount of heft.

The claim about him never being wrong reminds me of a claim about lab contamination that you took great exception to. One would have thought profiling would be less of an exact science. Doesn't he normally do serial killers and people where the violence is a result of their need to kill rather than unplanned events where people have ********** up? There are threads on here about whether profiling is in the same bucket of woo as astrology.

Anyway, I'm responding to a claim, not building a case.

 

[LondonJohn]

Definition of TROPE
1
a : a word or expression used in a figurative sense : figure of speech b : a common or overused theme or device : cliché <the usual horror movie tropes>



English is a fine language you should learn it sometime.

Since you've chosen to take up the baton on this, I'll take the time to tell you as well that you're wrong. Here's why:

The word "trope" was used incorrectly in the sentence

...after thousands of posts pushing the "Internalized False Confession'/ waterboarding" trope...

This is an incorrect usage of "trope". The correct word here would be "mantra" (if one wanted to be derogatory, which the writer clearly did), or "argument" (if one wanted to be civil).

And the reason why "trope" is inappropriate and wrong in that sentence is actually directly alluded to in the definition you so kindly provided. The clue is in the words "theme" and "device", and the example given. An example of the correct usage of "trope" would be something like this:

The movie contained the standard horror-film trope of the girl breathing with relief as she thinks she's safe, followed immediately by the killer bursting through the door and attacking her.

Judging by your post, you can't see the difference. But maybe this post of mine has helped to enlighten you.

English is a fine language: you should learn it some time (I've corrected your grammar - you're welcome).

 

[RoseMontague]

Judge Massei spent a year examining *all* evidence as well as listening to the best lawyers in Italy arguing your points and presenting 'scenarios'.
He labored another 3 months detailing in addition to his scenario, his 470 page reasons why *all* the jurors were convinced of a 'scenario' of guilt.

He certainly had all the evidence available and that labor included everything he could possibly come up with that pointed towards guilt. Perhaps you should direct that to Alt+F4 as well.

Despite that we are left with things like a large bag, large knife. Raffaele must have used one of his knives as the other murder weapon. Quintavalle helped discover that the detective was wrong. Curatolo got the time correct one time out of a dozen but that was of course, the correct one. We have no idea why the cops fried three hard drives. The meal time was moved up despite three witness statements, the Time of Death was moved up to match Curatolo. The broken down car testimony was pretty much ignored, the testimony and report of the defense cell phone expert completely ignored, the defense re-enactment of the rock breaking the window made fun of, and they decided to trust Stefanoni instead of the defense DNA experts (who didn't have the raw data,btw).

All of this in a 400+ page report that includes contradictions on what cell phone covers or doesn't, stopping, returning, and starting of topics in no particular order, some mostly useless information, and the question that Filomena asked Amanda was implied differently than the real question. It is basically a disorganized piece of donkey kong, imo.

 

[shuttlt]

http://www.skepdic.com/refuge/funk58.html
Skeptic's Dictionary article claiming criminal profiling is just confirmation bias and post hoc rationalization.

the Liverpool group selected a hundred stranger rapes in the United Kingdom, classifying them according to twenty-eight variables, such as whether a disguise was worn, whether compliments were given, whether there was binding, gagging, or blindfolding, whether there was apologizing or the theft of personal property, and so on. They then looked at whether the patterns in the crimes corresponded to attributes of the criminals—like age, type of employment, ethnicity, level of education, marital status, number of prior convictions, type of prior convictions, and drug use. Were rapists who bind, gag, and blindfold more like one another than they were like rapists who, say, compliment and apologize? The answer is no—not even slightly.*

 

[LondonJohn]

Hey, Fuji:

Any progress yet on the answers to the questions you posed elsewhere, but which relate directly to arguments on this thread?

1) Any news on the existence of detailed police photographs of the ground below Filomena's window? Any reference to such photos found anywhere?

2) Any esteemed legal (or paralegal) opinions on whether the findings of fact in Guede's trial process can be carried straight across as proven facts to the trials of Knox and Sollecito?

Looking forward to an update!

 

[shuttlt]

And a version of Randi's classic astrology test:

Alison "gave the details of the crime, the profile prepared by the FBI, and a description of the offender [who had been caught] to a group of senior police officers and forensic professionals in England." They rated the profile as highly accurate. Alison then gave another group of officers the same case materials to evaluate, except that he created an imaginary set of traits for the killer. Again, the officers rated the profile as highly accurate. Like Ray Hyman discovered years ago, it doesn't matter what you tell people; they'll validate your claims if they want you to be right. They'll ignore what doesn't fit and work hard to find meaning and significance in your reading or profile.

I hope that the police community reads Gladwell's account and recognizes that it is not an accident that some of them think that people claiming to be psychic sometimes seem to be right. They'll at least get a laugh, as I did, when Gladwell reports that after Douglas told a group of detectives what traits were likely in the bad guy they were after, one of the detectives asked him if he were psychic. He wanted to know because the FBI profiler was saying the same things a psychic had told them the week before.

From the same page as the previous quote.

and

Behavioral profiling has never led to the direct apprehension of a serial killer, a murderer, or a spree killer..

 

[Chris_Halkides]

West Memphis, Ramsey, and Knox/Sollecito

The claim about him never being wrong reminds me of a claim about lab contamination that you took great exception to. One would have thought profiling would be less of an exact science. Doesn't he normally do serial killers and people where the violence is a result of their need to kill rather than unplanned events where people have ********** up? There are threads on here about whether profiling is in the same bucket of woo as astrology.

Anyway, I'm responding to a claim, not building a case.

shuttlt,

Here is what the article said: "'In both cases—West Memphis and Knox—the police allowed theory rather than evidence to direct their investigations, and that is always a fatal error.'

He has never been proved wrong. (He took a then-controversial stance in support of JonBenet Ramsey’s parents, declaring their innocence in the death of their daughter long before DNA absolved them. He did it by once again stressing evidence—or, in this case, the lack of it— over theory.)"

The actual wording is subtly different from yours, and the situations you are trying to compare are quite different. I am also including some of the context of the quote. Do you disagree with him that letting theory instead of evidence to direct one's investigation is bad? What do you think of Mignini's claim that the covering of Meredith's body suggested a female murderer?

 

[LondonJohn]

http://www.skepdic.com/refuge/funk58.html
Skeptic's Dictionary article claiming criminal profiling is just confirmation bias and post hoc rationalization.

The problem with offender profiling is that many people (including many in the police force and criminal justice system) do not understand its very clear limitations. Profiling has only ever had proven success as a tool to point investigators in the direction of a more narrowly-defined group of suspects. And even then, it has far from a 100% success rate (just ask the police hunting the Washington sniper...).

What profiling should never be used for is as a form of direct evidence in and of itself. But police and prosecutors have erroneously used it in this fashion on numerous occasions ("The suspect fitted the offender profile, so this is evidence that he was the culprit.") The case of Colin Stagg in the UK was perhaps the most egregious example of misused offender profiling - in which an overambitious and misguided psychologist was also involved in the sorry debacle.

 

[pilot padron]

Since you've chosen to take up the baton on this, I'll take the time to tell you as well that you're wrong. Here's why:
The word "trope" was used incorrectly in the sentence

This is an incorrect usage of "trope". The correct word here would be "mantra" (if one wanted to be derogatory, which the writer clearly did), or "argument" (if one wanted to be civil).

And the reason why "trope" is inappropriate and wrong in that sentence is actually directly alluded to in the definition you so kindly provided. The clue is in the words "theme" and "device", and the example given. An example of the correct usage of "trope" would be something like this:

Judging by your post, you can't see the difference. But maybe this post of mine has helped to enlighten you.

English is a fine language: you should learn it some time (I've corrected your grammar - you're welcome).

Could someone please help me to understand where/how this unsolicited argument completely about 'communications engineering/correcting another's grammar' relates in any way to the discussion of Amanda Knox ?

Was the 'argument' per chance intended to be about use of word 'trollop' ?

 

[Kaosium]

She has never claimed this so far as I'm aware. I guess it might be the case and there were reasons why she hasn't mentioned it.

That was the second statement which was thrown out by the Supreme Court, thus it never came up.

 

[platonov]

Definition of TROPE
1
a : a word or expression used in a figurative sense : figure of speech b : a common or overused theme or device : cliché <the usual horror movie tropes>



English is a fine language you should learn it sometime.

Thank you tsig, but that was unnecessary - although the well known definition you provide is indeed applicable in this context.
[Perhaps google alone isn't a substitute for erudition ]

More to the point if platonov uses a term he understands what it means and uses it correctly.

If it should ever happen that nobody else is aware of the usage then he has merely coined a neologism

ps @ pilot - tsig was merely putting the E in JREF.

 

[LondonJohn]

Could someone please help me to understand where/how this unsolicited argument completely about 'communications engineering/correcting another's grammar' relates in any way to the discussion of Amanda Knox ?

Was the 'argument' per chance intended to be about use of word 'trollop'

No, it was a corrective response to someone who mistakenly (and rudely) told me I was wrong about what the word "trope" meant. It also had nothing to do with communications engineering, any more than it was to do with farming. Ironically, it was less off-topic than your post above....

At what time on November 1st 2007 do you think Meredith Kercher died, and why? (see - we're back on topic!)

 

[shuttlt]

shuttlt,

Here is what the article said: "'In both cases—West Memphis and Knox—the police allowed theory rather than evidence to direct their investigations, and that is always a fatal error.'

I read the article. That's his opinion.

He has never been proved wrong. (He took a then-controversial stance in support of JonBenet Ramsey’s parents, declaring their innocence in the death of their daughter long before DNA absolved them. He did it by once again stressing evidence—or, in this case, the lack of it— over theory.)"

He may have never been "proved wrong", but what difference does that make given that profiling has never actually caught anyone and profiles seem to be reported post hoc as being accurate even if they are randomly assigned just like astrology.

The actual wording is subtly different from yours, and the situations you are trying to compare are quite different. I am also including some of the context of the quote. Do you disagree with him that letting theory instead of evidence to direct one's investigation is bad? What do you think of Mignini's claim that the covering of Meredith's body suggested a female murderer?

I disagree with putting a criminal profiler forward as an authority as you did when criminal profiling itself is unvalidated and highly questionable. As for Mignini's claim, it sounds like the sort of stuff a criminal profiler would come out with, though they normally say "white male, mid 20s to early 30s" I think, rather than "female", but then they mainly deal with serial killers.

 

[LondonJohn]

Thank you tsig, but that was unnecessary - although the well known definition you provide is indeed applicable in this context.
[Perhaps google alone isn't a substitute for erudition ]

More to the point if platonov uses a term he understands what it means and uses it correctly.

If it should ever happen that nobody else is aware of the usage then he has merely coined a neologism

Could someone please help me to understand where/how this unsolicited argument completely about 'farming/usage of words' relates in any way to the discussion of Amanda Knox ?

But yes, I know what you're driving at. I'm just off to parse myself a warm bath.

 

[shuttlt]

The problem with offender profiling is that many people (including many in the police force and criminal justice system) do not understand its very clear limitations. Profiling has only ever had proven success as a tool to point investigators in the direction of a more narrowly-defined group of suspects.

There are studies that show it does better than chance?

 

[LondonJohn]

Thank you tsig, but that was unnecessary - although the well known definition you provide is indeed applicable in this context.
[Perhaps google alone isn't a substitute for erudition ]

More to the point if platonov uses a term he understands what it means and uses it correctly.

If it should ever happen that nobody else is aware of the usage then he has merely coined a neologism

ps @ pilot - tsig was merely putting the E in JREF.

Any reason for the third person reference to yourself? Heaven forbid that there were two people using the same login: that would certainly result in that username being......disinvited...from the forum.