Continuation Part 2 - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case
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Why Amanda Went Crazy.
It so happens that Amanda's "shaking"---or concussive convulsions?---were not observed by Rita Ficarra only at 5:45 am, when Ficarra added the note to Amanda's DECLARATION.
In Ficarra's testimony before the court, on February 28, 2009, she says that Amanda first started shaking hours earlier, when Amanda first blurted out "He did it!" See: La Nazione
For unknown reasons, having had one concussion significantly increases a person's risk of having another.[54] Having previously sustained a sports concussion has been found to be a strong factor increasing the likelihood of a concussion in the future. See: Concussion
Did Amanda have any opportunity to sustain a concussion earlier in her life?
Let's hope Amanda isn't hid in the head again. She might confess to killing Sarah Scazzi.
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___________________
It so happens that Amanda's "shaking"---or concussive convulsions?---were not observed by Rita Ficarra only at 5:45 am, when Ficarra added the note to Amanda's DECLARATION.
In Ficarra's testimony before the court, on February 28, 2009, she says that Amanda first started shaking hours earlier, when Amanda first blurted out "He did it!" See: La Nazione
For unknown reasons, having had one concussion significantly increases a person's risk of having another.[54] Having previously sustained a sports concussion has been found to be a strong factor increasing the likelihood of a concussion in the future. See: Concussion
Did Amanda have any opportunity to sustain a concussion earlier in her life?
Let's hope Amanda isn't hid in the head again. She might confess to killing Sarah Scazzi.
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Did you bother reading the rest of her post, or are you misrepresenting what Fiona posted on purpose?
platonov
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That doesn't follow - she might falsely accuse somebody else of killing Sarah Scazzi.
But on the concussion - aren't you missing an obvious solution.
She may have banged her head while doing the cartwheels.
Alternatively, the sports thing as you say or perhaps she had a fall as a child - would that explain the recurring nature of 'talking complete rubbish'.
Don't forget that, according to her own testimony, a similar 'concussion' occurred on Dec 17.
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Kaosium
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Pilot, that's an old post, why don't you pick out the contentions you find still convincing. If it's all of them, then say so, but make them yours. Some of those appear based on outdated and incorrect information, others suggest an unfamiliarity with the facts, which would figure as the Massei Report would not become available for another six months, and at this point the thread is only about three months old.
platonov
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'One crime - one perp'
This point is certainly original but not very compelling and is unknown in jurisprudence or criminal law AFAIK - I am open to correction on this.
It's not a contest to see who has the most or 'bestest' evidence against them with the winner receiving the prize of a murder conviction and everyone else gets a free pass or tickets to the show.
'One crime - one perp' is certainly a simple maxim but not necessarily one that has much to recommend its application in the field of justice or logic.
This point is certainly original but not very compelling and is unknown in jurisprudence or criminal law AFAIK - I am open to correction on this.
It's not a contest to see who has the most or 'bestest' evidence against them with the winner receiving the prize of a murder conviction and everyone else gets a free pass or tickets to the show.
'One crime - one perp' is certainly a simple maxim but not necessarily one that has much to recommend its application in the field of justice or logic.
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Kaosium
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Which of those arguments would you like to advance? I understood perfectly what Rose meant, and perhaps the OP might too, sixteen months and 50k posts later!
If you don't, then take up the baton and let's play.
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Chris_Halkides
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mixed DNA and related issues
Perhaps I took a wrong turn in criticizing Fiona’s scientific acumen, but even if that is true, nothing I said was intended to be a personal attack. I am grateful that Fiona was willing to put down her ideas about the case in a clear and straightforward fashion and am perfectly willing to challenge them in as civil a manner as I am able.
“iv. The footprint evidence revealed by luminol in the hall and Filomena's room.” Fiona wrote, “These were bare footprints and there is no explanation as to why they would be in Filomena's room: there is no reason Knox's dna is mixed with the substance and the scientists say they can tell blood from other stuff revealed by luminol.” My understanding is that there are two amorphous blobs, not footprints, in Filomena’s room. There is also a luminol-positive area in Raffaele’s kitchen (sample 101), containing the DNA profile of an unknown male, among many luminol-positive spots, most of which do not contain DNA. The results from Raffaele’s apartment suggest that finding luminol-positive areas in a home is not a rare event, something that Dr. Gino’s testimony also supports.
Luminol is a presumptive test for blood, not a confirmatory test, and there are substances known to produce false positives. The lack of Meredith’s DNA in samples 178-180 (footprints in Amanda’s room) and the lack of either Meredith’s or Amanda’s DNA in 181-182 and 184 (footprints in the corridor) do not support the notion that the luminol-positive substance is blood. The samples that did give positive DNA results were tested with TMB, and the TMB tests were negative.
The footprints do not form a complete trail, and the three in the hallway are all right feet, IIRC. In addition, I think that all of the evidence (both DNA and luminol, and against Rudi as well as the other two) that was collected on 18 December deserves to be held in lower esteem that the evidence collected earlier for two reasons. First, non-forensic personnel had been in the house, tossing Meredith’s room, for example. Their actions might have transferred biological samples from one room to another. Second, by this time all three suspects were in custody, and the chances of unconscious forensic bias are thereby raised.
“v. The mixed blood and dna in the bathroom and in the footprints.” Let us assume that Fiona meant Meredith’s blood mixed with Amanda’s DNA in the bathroom. There are many reasons how mixed DNA could have happened. Meredith’s blood may have ended up on Amanda’s biological matter previously left there. This seems quite reasonable for the bidet plug especially, and I see no reason to exclude it for the other DNA samples. Massei attempts to connect the time the DNA was deposited to the time of the murder. However, his argument seems to equate a clean bathroom with a DNA-free bathroom. Kaosium and I have given some citations recently on casual deposition of DNA.
The other main way that mixed DNA can happen is if the investigators inadvertently mix it. I have documented that Dr. Stefanoni’s view on how often to change gloves does not square with John Butler’s textbook. There is also a series of photos at IIP of a forensic policeperson with an identical crease in his or her gloves collecting multiple evidence samples. Other commenters have written of seeing one member of the forensic police collect evidence using both sides of a swab. Therefore, if there were DNA from one person on the glove, it could easily transfer to the swab bearing the DNA of someone else. Someone can correct me if I am wrong, but did one person drop a swab on the floor and continue to collect with it? Another possibility is for a sample to be contaminated in the laboratory.
My conclusion is that these two points (iv and v) are at best weak evidence of guilt, but can just as easily be seen as no evidence at all. Thank you, RoseMontague, for going through the entire list.
Perhaps I took a wrong turn in criticizing Fiona’s scientific acumen, but even if that is true, nothing I said was intended to be a personal attack. I am grateful that Fiona was willing to put down her ideas about the case in a clear and straightforward fashion and am perfectly willing to challenge them in as civil a manner as I am able.
“iv. The footprint evidence revealed by luminol in the hall and Filomena's room.” Fiona wrote, “These were bare footprints and there is no explanation as to why they would be in Filomena's room: there is no reason Knox's dna is mixed with the substance and the scientists say they can tell blood from other stuff revealed by luminol.” My understanding is that there are two amorphous blobs, not footprints, in Filomena’s room. There is also a luminol-positive area in Raffaele’s kitchen (sample 101), containing the DNA profile of an unknown male, among many luminol-positive spots, most of which do not contain DNA. The results from Raffaele’s apartment suggest that finding luminol-positive areas in a home is not a rare event, something that Dr. Gino’s testimony also supports.
Luminol is a presumptive test for blood, not a confirmatory test, and there are substances known to produce false positives. The lack of Meredith’s DNA in samples 178-180 (footprints in Amanda’s room) and the lack of either Meredith’s or Amanda’s DNA in 181-182 and 184 (footprints in the corridor) do not support the notion that the luminol-positive substance is blood. The samples that did give positive DNA results were tested with TMB, and the TMB tests were negative.
The footprints do not form a complete trail, and the three in the hallway are all right feet, IIRC. In addition, I think that all of the evidence (both DNA and luminol, and against Rudi as well as the other two) that was collected on 18 December deserves to be held in lower esteem that the evidence collected earlier for two reasons. First, non-forensic personnel had been in the house, tossing Meredith’s room, for example. Their actions might have transferred biological samples from one room to another. Second, by this time all three suspects were in custody, and the chances of unconscious forensic bias are thereby raised.
“v. The mixed blood and dna in the bathroom and in the footprints.” Let us assume that Fiona meant Meredith’s blood mixed with Amanda’s DNA in the bathroom. There are many reasons how mixed DNA could have happened. Meredith’s blood may have ended up on Amanda’s biological matter previously left there. This seems quite reasonable for the bidet plug especially, and I see no reason to exclude it for the other DNA samples. Massei attempts to connect the time the DNA was deposited to the time of the murder. However, his argument seems to equate a clean bathroom with a DNA-free bathroom. Kaosium and I have given some citations recently on casual deposition of DNA.
The other main way that mixed DNA can happen is if the investigators inadvertently mix it. I have documented that Dr. Stefanoni’s view on how often to change gloves does not square with John Butler’s textbook. There is also a series of photos at IIP of a forensic policeperson with an identical crease in his or her gloves collecting multiple evidence samples. Other commenters have written of seeing one member of the forensic police collect evidence using both sides of a swab. Therefore, if there were DNA from one person on the glove, it could easily transfer to the swab bearing the DNA of someone else. Someone can correct me if I am wrong, but did one person drop a swab on the floor and continue to collect with it? Another possibility is for a sample to be contaminated in the laboratory.
My conclusion is that these two points (iv and v) are at best weak evidence of guilt, but can just as easily be seen as no evidence at all. Thank you, RoseMontague, for going through the entire list.
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Boom!
Platonov,
I don't know what "concussion" Amanda suffered on December 17. Maybe you can expand.
What is clear from her court testimony is that Amanda didn't start singing her confession on the night of November 5th until after she'd been struck by the cop...
_____________________________________
"AK: It's difficult for me to say that one specific person said one specific
thing. It was the fact that there were all these little suggestions, and
someone was saying that there was the telephone, then there was the fact that...
then more than anything what made me try to imagine something was someone
saying to me "Maybe you're confused, maybe you're confused and you should
try to remember something different. Try to find these memories that
obviously you have somehow lost. You have to try to remember them. So I
was there thinking, but what could I have forgotten? And I was thinking,
what have I forgotten? what have I forgotten? and they were shouting
"Come on, come on, come on, remember, remember, remember," and boom! on
my head. [Amanda slaps herself on the back of the head: End of video segment]
"Remember!" And I was like -- Mamma Mia! and then boom! [slaps head again]
"Remember!"
_____________________________________
And, according to Rita Ficarra, Amanda wasn't "shaking" until she started singing, so only after she'd been struck on the head.
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____________________
Platonov,
I don't know what "concussion" Amanda suffered on December 17. Maybe you can expand.
What is clear from her court testimony is that Amanda didn't start singing her confession on the night of November 5th until after she'd been struck by the cop...
_____________________________________
"AK: It's difficult for me to say that one specific person said one specific
thing. It was the fact that there were all these little suggestions, and
someone was saying that there was the telephone, then there was the fact that...
then more than anything what made me try to imagine something was someone
saying to me "Maybe you're confused, maybe you're confused and you should
try to remember something different. Try to find these memories that
obviously you have somehow lost. You have to try to remember them. So I
was there thinking, but what could I have forgotten? And I was thinking,
what have I forgotten? what have I forgotten? and they were shouting
"Come on, come on, come on, remember, remember, remember," and boom! on
my head. [Amanda slaps herself on the back of the head: End of video segment]
"Remember!" And I was like -- Mamma Mia! and then boom! [slaps head again]
"Remember!"
_____________________________________
And, according to Rita Ficarra, Amanda wasn't "shaking" until she started singing, so only after she'd been struck on the head.
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Katody Matrass
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I'd say Rose is merciful by not mentioning Fiona's argumentation about it. It all boils down to subjective incredulity and in effect shows how clueless Fiona is about what she tries to argue. Hint - the question of crap in criminology was raised by Fuji not long ago, settled and put to rest.
platonov
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AK's credibility questioned again
Fine
Are you not familiar with the testimony lead by her own lawyer on this point !
Or do you not accept AK's own word on the matter - You guys really are more skeptical of her than the cops or the court on some issues
I can look for a link to my post if you wish - I have already linked to it several times.
That was how the whole IFC/Wb trope was dispatched.
ETA The testimony that you posted was later contradicted by AK herself on the stand.
I had a post on that also - linked to several times as well.
Does no one read the testimony
or more importantly my posts 
Fine
Are you not familiar with the testimony lead by her own lawyer on this point !
Or do you not accept AK's own word on the matter - You guys really are more skeptical of her than the cops or the court on some issues
I can look for a link to my post if you wish - I have already linked to it several times.
That was how the whole IFC/Wb trope was dispatched.
ETA The testimony that you posted was later contradicted by AK herself on the stand.
I had a post on that also - linked to several times as well.
Does no one read the testimony
or more importantly my posts
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Mary_H
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The point is, you suggested Fiona did not argue for guilt. Many of her posts show she did.
Mary_H
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To some extent, everyone with a strong point of view on this case approaches their arguments with bias. There are some circumstances of the case that we can't be absolutely certain about, so we use what we know about the case and about life to interpret them. What happened in the interrogations is an example of this phenomenon.
Here is Fiona's speculative interpretation of the meaning of Amanda's accusation of Patrick:
The writer openly admits she is using what she knows about interviews to inform her conclusion. Even when Fiona wrote this, many people disagreed with her, and interpreted the accusation completely differently. They were probably using, among other things, what they know about interviews to inform their conclusions.
For Fiona to say that she cannot see the accusation as anything other than "an attempt to frame an innocent man" shows a rigidity and certitude that are at odds with pipelineaudio's characterization of Fiona's style of debate. i.e., "The most she did was to point out that some of the claims could be true based on available evidence, or that a statement about the evidence was true or false."
_______________Fine
Are you not familiar with the testimony lead by her own lawyer on this point !
Or do you not accept AK's own word on the matter - You guys really are more skeptical of her than the cops or the court on some issues
I can look for a link to my post if you wish - I have already linked to it several times.
That was how the whole IFC/Wb trope was dispatched.
ETA The testimony that you posted was later contradicted by AK herself on the stand.
I had a post on that also - linked to several times as well.
Does no one read the testimony
Okay, Platonov, let me make this simple. Did Amanda, in her court testimony, say that the cops hit her after she'd confessed that Patrick did it? If so, a fine way to show their gratitude.
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platonov
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No. They gave her tea and cakes apparently.
Precisely what kind of cakes I don't know and its probably not important. C Dempsey the food blogger may have the lowdown on this - its her area of expertise. Now she is not a reliable source on many issues but one hopes that in her own field, as it were, her professional integrity would win through.
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Mary_H
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RoseMontague
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A more recent quote from Fiona regarding Amanda's statements:
It is interesting to me that despite a different opinion on the question of innocence or guilt, I am in basic agreement with Fiona on this latest quote.
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Chris_Halkides
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conveying confusion
I see it a little differently. Amanda's diary refers to her feeling safe in prison (I don't recall the exact quote). I am not quite sure to which statement Fiona refers when she talks of volunteering a statement. I think she was trying to convey her confusion in her handwritten note (if it were, then she succeeded completely). Of course, a more fundamental problem for the pro-guilt community is that she did not name Guede if her intention was to portray herself as a terrified bystander. I have never been able to understand their position on this question.
RoseMontague,
I see it a little differently. Amanda's diary refers to her feeling safe in prison (I don't recall the exact quote). I am not quite sure to which statement Fiona refers when she talks of volunteering a statement. I think she was trying to convey her confusion in her handwritten note (if it were, then she succeeded completely). Of course, a more fundamental problem for the pro-guilt community is that she did not name Guede if her intention was to portray herself as a terrified bystander. I have never been able to understand their position on this question.
Mary_H
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I don't see any evidence that Amanda "portrayed herself" as a terrified victim or as traumatized. She would have to have quite a bit more familiarity with the process she was going through, even if it were in the US or the UK, to be able to strategize like that. There is more evidence to support the premise that she actually was terrified and traumatized. She made her written statement because she actually did have doubts, not to present herself in a certain role.
I do agree she did not know she was confessing to anything, and she testified that even the next day when they brought her arrest warrant to sign and took her to a cell, she did not realize she was under arrest.
Kaosium
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I disagree. Without the context available perhaps I'm misreading it, but I get the impression it is suggesting that it was all an act to pretend to victim status to misdirect them so they'd let her out of there. Then she continues the act in her note trying to keep her options open? Something like that?
Then why didn't she give them a believable story? What they have in those statements is gibberish, useless to police (in reality) yet who actually said it corroborated what they knew about the crime. I think there's a gross misunderstanding by some of the power relationship in that room, Little Miss Cartwheels wasn't running the show! The police have to be satisfied with what they get, it has to be believable to them. They're assuming she's lied before, they're going to be on the lookout for more 'lies,' unless they get what they think is a plausible explanation of events they're not going to go away. Especially if the plan is to arrest her and Raffaele, then race right out and drag Patrick away while he's feeding his baby, work him over nice-n-pretty, get virtually nothing from him--then parade through Perugia in an ostentatious display and announce 'case closed.'
There had to be something in those statements that compelled them to believe her. The 'staged break-in' goes entirely unmentioned, the moment of the murder is a blank, outside the text message there's nothing connecting it with a timeline, she doesn't even 'hear' the scream, they have to dodge that with her suggestion she must have had her ears covered. 'Fine. We'll write that down. Fine.' Nothing corroborates except if they thought Patrick was the murderer for reasons previously discussed here and the thread in the Conspiracy section.
Now, I also think it possible that Amanda never totally believed the entire suggestion that were trying to implant in her mind, that she met Patrick, went to the house, covered her ears etc, however in the stress and confusion of the moment they convinced her it must have, or that saying she thought it probably happened was her only way out of an impossible situation. My interpretation of the testimony is that all she really got were some 'flashes' of imagination that at some point she thought were possibly real memories, which was the only way at that moment to square what the cops were telling her about Raffaele and the 'hard evidence' with reality. Then they walked her through it and she balked at just about everything which is why they ended up with so little of value--but they had the part they wanted and figured they'd find 'proof' of the rest with the forensics.
Only Amanda knows for sure, and considering her ordeal and what she endured it would be churlish to assign blame to her. For those that might, they should ask themselves if they're currently claiming to be 'afraid' of posting on a heavily moderated thread because a dozen people might pounce on their posts and assemble characters in formation that make up mean words that disparage their arguments. Amanda had a dozen cops going at her for hours, and then again hours more, people with authority, that could deprive her of food, water, and just being able to go the bathroom. They weren't just disparaging what she was saying, they were employing real 'personal attacks,' crowding her personal space, and even started hitting her. That she signed a statement that agreed with what they insisted must have happened is on them not on their victim, Amanda Knox.
As for the note, not only the handwriting reveals the unlikelihood of her being concussed, but also I believe that note suggests she was thinking rationally. However, she had three pieces of information that just didn't fit and she was trying to figure out what could be the truth of the matter, as well as try to organize her thoughts by writing, which was her way according to other information available about her. She also seemed to figure she could get it across better with the written word as they weren't really listening and the translator wasn't really translating. Thus as the experience fades she starts to realize the 'flashes' are probably just imagination, but how does she square the 'hard evidence' and what she's heard from the cops that Raffaele said, with her memories of that evening which weren't exactly set in stone to begin with being as she was just enjoying being young and a little bit naughty and hardly watching the clock?
As another recent example of the method of ILE madness is the Scazzi case. Now I haven't spent as much time on that as you have, Rose, but as I recall it they got him to admit to being the murderer, and then kept after him to implicate his daughter as well? In other words he didn't come up with that, they insisted upon it as I recall, then televised the whole thing according to Barbie Nadeau? Then he recants it as soon as he sees a lawyer? Something like that? I suspect that something similar happened with Amanda Knox, that they pushed Patrick on to her, and eventually she did end up signing those statements, but in her case they'd actually managed to implant a few false memories that it took her a little while to totally realize were completely false.
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