Continuation Part 2 - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case

[Alt+F4]

Then it goes to the Supreme Court which in this case, in the unlikely event it gets that far, will almost certainly find Amanda and Raffaele not guilty and release them. Then they will start paying them money for the wreckage this inane system has done to their lives.

What Italian law specifies this?

If for some bizarre corrupt reason it gets past the Supreme Court, then it will go to the ECHR and they have lots of experience rectifying the errors of the Italian Court System.

You do know that the ECHR has no power to overturn a verdict or free anyone from prison, right?

 

[Kaosium]

What Italian law specifies this?

The one that got Patrick his money for his two weeks in prison, dunno the exact name and number. Like he did, Raffaele and Amanda will also appeal for more from the ECHR as well.

As for the ECHR, the mechanism employed would probably the one where Hellmann garnered his reputation in overturning another verdict that had gotten through the Supreme Court. A judgment against the Italian Courts on the grounds of Fair Trial in the ECHR would qualify I'd think.

 

[LashL]

Alt+F4, you seem to be going off on tangents and trying to avoid the points raised so I'm going to first quote my own post and then your response (aka quasi-non-response)

Alt+F4, I don't really understand your posts in this regard. You seem to be suggesting that those who think the convictions at first instance may be unsafe haven't seen enough evidence to make that determination, and yet at the same time, you seem to be suggesting that you believe the convictions to be safe and appropriate even though you haven't seen any more evidence than those who disagree with you.

Many of your posts also seem to be suggesting that 'the court got it right because they must have seen some secret stash of evidence that the rest of us haven't seen and that's good enough for me' - which is decidedly non-skeptical and decidedly antithetical to critical thinking.

In fact, the suggestion that there is some secret stash of evidence that the court relied upon, but that was never mentioned mentioned in the 400+ pages that make up the Massei sentencing report, never mentioned in the press, and never mentioned in the appeal documents - not even by the prosecution who are simultaneously appealing - strikes me as patently ridiculous.

Let me clarify. My belief in the pairs guilt (which doesn't follow exactly with the prosecution's case) is very much based on the limited evidence that is available to the public.

So, do tell, what is it about the "limited evidence that is available to the public" that leads you to believe in proof beyond a reasonable doubt of the guilt of Ms. Knox and Mr. Sollecito?

I've never said there is a secret stash of evidence

You've certainly alluded to it over and over and over again, ad nauseam, without providing a scintilla of evidence in support of the existence of any such secret stash of evidence, so why now suddenly pretend otherwise?

Specifying now that you never "said" it even though you've alluded to it multiple times is just disingenuous on your part, Alt+F4.

but then what is one to think when an important prosecution witness was later claimed to be a deaf, crazy shut-in? You don't think that's an important piece of information?

Non-sequitur, completely silly on your part, and has nothing to do with my post, so stop trying to go off the reservation with nonsense, please. You seem to do that a lot when you find the discussion inconvenient to your non-skeptical beliefs or when you find your posts being exposed as exhibiting a decidedly non-skeptical approach to things and when you find your arguments being shown up for being decidedly lacking in critical thinking. But this kind of hand-waving and changing the subject on your part won't work with me.

Focus, please.

I think it's patently ridiculous to believe, as many do, that the pair are 100% innocent and that there is "no evidence against them" without reading the trial transcript. My opinion.

Again, this is just hand-waving, subject-changing, and nonsensical on your part. I've never said that I believe Knox and Sollecito to be "100% innocent" or that there is "no evidence against them" so this is just silliness on your part. So, stop playing silly buggers and address the substance of my post instead of pretending to do so by completely changing the subject and by pretending that I've said or suggested something that I haven't.

Now, if you don't mind, please go back to my post (which I quoted above for your convenience) and address its actual content instead of pretending to do so by substituting your own nonsense, non-sequiturs, strawmen, and red herrings for what I actually wrote.

 

[Dan O.]

If Guede answers questions, he will either tell the truth - which I believe is that Amanda and Raffaele weren't involved - or he will give some kind of version corresponding to the prosecution's claims.

My addition in bold. You don't know that; there are I believe only four people who know with certainty whether AK and RS were involved, and one of them is dead.

My addition in bold.

You appear to have left out the possibility that Rudy wasn't making up the story of his friend/accomplice or the possibilities of Amanda or Raffaele slipping out that night without the others knowledge thus removing the certainty of their knowledge of the others involvement (though both have made statements that they don't believe the other could have left to commit this crime).

The only certainty we have, as far as anything in this case can be certain, is that Rudy was there that night (and that Meredith is dead).

 

[Sherlock Holmes]

I'd need to understand the context. What is one to think when one is told that Meredith began her last meal at about 6.00 to 6.30, and that at post mortem her duodenum was empty and there were recognisable chunks of semi-digested pizza in her stomach? You don't think that's important?

Maybe she took the pizza home and microwaved it and ate it at 9.15. Or maybe the post mortem report has been misreported, and there was actually ample ingesta in the duodenum and half way down the jejunum.

Failing either of these eventualities, Meredith died before ten o'clock, probably quite a bit before ten o'clock. Whether anyone thought they heard a scream at a later time, and what their psychological problems may or may not have been is neither here nor there in that context.




And has anyone wholly disagreed with you on this? However, 100% proof of innocence is not required for an acquittal. By the same token, I think it's patently ridiculous to believe, as you do, that the pair are 100% guilty on the basis of what evidence is in the public domain.

Rolfe.

Rolfe - Instead of blindly believing everything your pro innocent Foaker crowd says, do a little research yourself and come up with your own conclusion. Yes, for the most part, they are telling the truth, but they are leaving out important aspects, they know about them, they researched them, but these aspects don't jive with what they are saying so they omit them. That deceitful and very telling. Search TOD and stomach contents, and not just one site, see what most are saying, and when they state that stomach contents are not reliable in determining TOD, find out why.

Hint - look for what can slow down or stop digestion all together and see if it fits in with this case.

I've said for quite a while, stomach contents will probally show us when the attack stated, but not when it ended.

 

[platonov]

My addition in bold.

You appear to have left out the possibility that Rudy wasn't making up the story of his friend/accomplice or the possibilities of Amanda or Raffaele slipping out that night without the others knowledge thus removing the certainty of their knowledge of the others involvement (though both have made statements that they don't believe the other could have left to commit this crime).

The only certainty we have, as far as anything in this case can be certain, is that Rudy was there that night (and that Meredith is dead).

Nonsense - they were together according to AK's 'detailed' yet temporally confused testimony.


But RS hasn't made made a clear declarative statement on this since Nov 5th 2007.

He then said she was out from 9.00 -1.00.

On Nov 8th 2007, he hedged saying she definitely / probably / maybe / I was stoned / mighta' been with him but was keeping his options open.

There followed some scribbling in notebooks..... which hinted AK might or might not have been involved.

Then his lawyers went to court in 2008 to protest that evidence against AK shouldn't be held against him.

Since then silence.

He stood up in court on several occasions [to claim he didn't know RG etc etc etc] but never to state unequivocally that he was with AK in the critical period under discussion.

Weird eh ?

Or maybe his lawyers got through to him.

 

[tsig]

They would be acquitted and released from their remand status. It would then be up to the prosecutors to decide whether they felt they had a case to take to the Supreme Court regarding a misapplication of the law (they could no longer file any dispute on findings of fact). It would be highly unusual for prosecutors to file such a case in the Supreme Court - I imagine it would only ever happen in cases where there was a very strong public perception that the court erred in its acquittal (think OJ Simpson as an example).

OJ was tried in Italy?

 

[Kevin_Lowe]

It seems to me that for all her faults, Nadeau knows her audience.

To a rational person her ad hominem remarks about "baby killers" are transparently irrational. As far as any evidence that has been presented goes a baby killer is no more or less likely to lie about the matter under review than an embezzler, rapist, abuser of prosecutorial power, shoplifter or any other jailbird.

However as you can see by the avidity with which the guilters have aped the "baby killer" meme, her target audience is a group of people inclined for whatever reason to experience a rush of gratification and switch their rational functions off when you push their hate button. Trigger their hate response and they'll eat out of your hand without ever stopping to think about what it is they are eating. Clever!

 

[Kevin_Lowe]

Rolfe - Instead of blindly believing everything your pro innocent Foaker crowd says, do a little research yourself and come up with your own conclusion. Yes, for the most part, they are telling the truth, but they are leaving out important aspects, they know about them, they researched them, but these aspects don't jive with what they are saying so they omit them. That deceitful and very telling. Search TOD and stomach contents, and not just one site, see what most are saying, and when they state that stomach contents are not reliable in determining TOD, find out why.

Hint - look for what can slow down or stop digestion all together and see if it fits in with this case.

I've said for quite a while, stomach contents will probally show us when the attack stated, but not when it ended.

You do know that Rolfe is a veterinary pathologist, right?

Asking her to "educate" herself by perusing the remarks uninformed guilters are making about the matter elsewhere is like telling your doctor that they need to go read Youtube comments in order to diagnose your wart.

 

[Alt+F4]

So, do tell, what is it about the "limited evidence that is available to the public" that leads you to believe in proof beyond a reasonable doubt of the guilt of Ms. Knox and Mr. Sollecito?

I have posted my opinions on this case many, many times already.

Specifying now that you never "said" it even though you've alluded to it multiple times is just disingenuous on your part, Alt+F4.

Again, I've never said it. Of course, you can believe whatever you think I have alluded to.

Focus, please.

Rude, especially coming from an administrator and from someone who opinions I often thought were great when we were both posting on the 9/11 conspiracy threads years ago. Everything else you have said in your post is nothing other than a demand that I agree with you. I'm sorry but what does and doesn't work with you makes no matter to me.

 

[platonov]

When an 'ad hom' meets an 'ad hom'

It seems to me that for all her faults, Nadeau knows her audience.

To a rational person her ad hominem remarks about "baby killers" are transparently irrational. As far as any evidence that has been presented goes a baby killer is no more or less likely to lie about the matter under review than an embezzler, rapist, abuser of prosecutorial power, shoplifter or any other jailbird.

However as you can see by the avidity with which the guilters have aped the "baby killer" meme, her target audience is a group of people inclined for whatever reason to experience a rush of gratification and switch their rational functions off when you push their hate button. Trigger their hate response and they'll eat out of your hand without ever stopping to think about what it is they are eating. Clever!

You make an interesting point, although strictly speaking, it deals with a judgement on the 'personality' of others not the argument/case itself and thus might be an ad hom

Whether the court understands the complex ad hominem argument - w.r.t to a 'baby killer' who, when reminded he had to tell the truth and was under investigation for false statements, suffered a 'drop in blood pressure' - to the same nuanced degree that you do remains to be seen.

Methinks they might not be as well read in logic or philosophy as some and thus jump to erroneous conclusions.

We shall see

 

[Alt+F4]

However as you can see by the avidity with which the guilters have aped the "baby killer" meme,...

It's not a meme Kevin, it's a fact and it was done with a shovel to murder this human being:

 

[Chris_Halkides]

a figure is worth a thousand words

Show me the evidence, please.

Alt+F4,

I would point out that Page 5 of the Johnson/Hampikian open letter has a good figure, an electropherogram of the knife profile, but I know that you think that the knife never left the drawer.

 

[Dan O.]

Alt+F4, Why do you keep bringing up little Tommy Onofri to try and discredit Mario Alessi? That case was solved only because one person told the truth about what happened. Without that statement the police had nothing. There was no body, no forensic evidence, no leads except for some child pornography on the fathers computer.

 

[pipelineaudio]

This is what you don't get John. What you or I think about the time of death or any other aspect of this case doesn't matter one, tiny, single bit.

This is not the Amanda Knox support forum. It's a forum for skepticism and those who propose that they are certain of the pairs innocence without benefit of the trial transcript, all the photographs put into evidence or the actual various scientific reports are not skeptics.

This is what bugs me.

Evasion noted

 

[Kaosium]

Rolfe - Instead of blindly believing everything your pro innocent Foaker crowd says, do a little research yourself and come up with your own conclusion. Yes, for the most part, they are telling the truth, but they are leaving out important aspects, they know about them, they researched them, but these aspects don't jive with what they are saying so they omit them. That deceitful and very telling.

That isn't very nice!

Just because many here don't accept your tortured-for-hours-without-evidence-for-it theory doesn't mean they're being dishonest. Simply because someone can think up a theoretically possible way it could have been a ToD of 11:40 doesn't mean that becomes a fact without anything to support it other than the imagination of the 'theorist.' That may well be common on other boards, which might well be why it's so easy for them to descend into delusion.

Going on the kind of 'evidence' those boards prefer, there is more reason to think a member of the Polizia di Stata committed this crime than Raffaele and Amanda. Or for that matter that Meredith died at 11:40.

Think about it.

Search TOD and stomach contents, and not just one site, see what most are saying, and when they state that stomach contents are not reliable in determining TOD, find out why.

Stomach contents are uniquely valuable in this case simply because of two conditions: we know just about when the meal was started, and nothing had passed to the duodenum. Being as the the meal started about 6:30 to be generous in the direction of guilt, by 9:30 there is only a small percentage chance that Meredith hadn't been stabbed already. That happens to be the earliest Raffaele and Amanda could have gotten there had they put Naruto in and raced like demons to the cottage and stabbed Meredith...for no reason at all.

Most cases aren't going to be like this one, Sherlock. This is just one of the ones it which stomach contents can determine the probability that Meredith was stabbed starting at about 8:56. That time correlates with her arriving home not having done anything, Rudy by his own admission already being there, her interrupted call attempt to her mother, and happens to be the most likely time she was stabbed according to the fact she still hadn't passed anything to her duodenum. The curve is kinda like a ski slope from there, by the time it gets to 9:30, the absolute earliest Amanda and Raffaele could have gotten there, you're at the bottom of the slope all leveled off and gliding for a little while longer just above 0%. Going almost 2.5 hours with everything in the stomach is unusual, but nothing like over 3.5 hours.

Sherlock, no matter what time Meredith started eating, the most likely time she was stabbed was right around 9:00. It's all downhill from there, and it's a quick journey to the bottom, even if she started as late as 7:00 which is suggested by none of the witnesses, and might have simply have been an error on Itrona's part. LondonJohn put it like this for a start time of 6:30 recently:

"Given that we know Meredith started her last meal at around 6.30pm, and GIVEN THAT WE KNOW SHE DID NOT DIE BEFORE 9.00PM, what are the relative probabilities now? They are as follows:

a) Prob that she died between 6.30pm and 9.00pm: 0%
b) Prob that she died between 9.00pm and 10.00pm: 96% (approx)
c) Prob that she died between 10.00pm and 11.00pm: 3.4% (approx)
d) Prob that she died later than 11.00pm: 0.6% (approx)"

Hint - look for what can slow down or stop digestion all together and see if it fits in with this case.

I've said for quite a while, stomach contents will probally show us when the attack stated, but not when it ended.

Then why are you arguing it anymore? The Massei theories are dead now. No one is going to argue a 11:40 ToD, not even Mignini wanted to, he had to in order to incorporate Curatolo's testimony, that's a done issue. The whole point of the argument before was that 11:40 was simply fantasy, and being as there's no evidence of your extended torture theory, it remained basically impossible.

What's actually dishonest is looking solely for ways it was possible Raffaele and Amanda did it, without looking at the ways it is likely that they didn't. It is likely they couldn't even have been there. It is likely they couldn't have been in that murder room leaving no traces of their being there. It is likely that if all three of them conspired together with a grand total of six days of cuddling and one introduction between all three of them that they'd have squealed each other out long ago. It is likely that if you catch a known burglar and have a break-in there was no staging.

It is extremely unlikely that a police force that arrested three people on no legitimate evidence but mistakes and misunderstandings happened upon a bizarre conspiracy basically unique in the history of human behavior.

 

[RandyN]

It's funny how the CTers keep insisting that the "pro-guilt" side has to "prove" their case. Amanda Knox is a convicted murderer. We don't have to prove anything.

And before you ask, we also don't have to prove that we landed on the Moon.

So what is it again that you are skeptical about? You seem fairly certain about everything
.

 

[RandyN]

Why would Rudy Guede say anything when he is called? I doubt the court can compel anything of him except for his appearance. Look at what happened to Alessi. He now faces fraud charges brought by the prosecutor.

I understand he is a child killer but what was his fraud? Did he lie about someone? If that’s true why didn’t the prosecutor file fraud charges against Toto, or Quintinville, or Stefanoni? All have lied in court about this case. For that matter why not file fraud charges against the police who lied about RS call time to police or the non warm wash machine or the book or the sweater?

OTOH look at what the statements of the criminals accomplished. The judge decided he needs to speak to RG. Who will say nothing. And it is unnecessary for him to say anything because he is not the big development of the last hearing. The new big witness will be Rudy's friend. This is the guy who informed the police that Rudy was probably involved in this murder. The police never figured out that Rudy was involved...it was not his fingerprints, or his hand prints or even DNA that led police to Rudy. It was Rudy’s pal who went to the police and said "Hey I think Rudy Guede is involved in this murder.

Now we get to hear the first story. The skype call which leaves out AK and RS. I wonder how slime lawyer Maresca will question this guy? And make no mistake Maresca is slime. He is nothing more than an extra prosecutor who only gets paid if he can keep AK,RS in prison.

Kercher SR gave up dignity when he hired this man. Who BTW was suggested to him by Mignini. I don’t think its fair that his daughter was killed by a maniac. But this subhuman ambulance chaser speaks for and represents the Kerchers now. I see no dignity in that. Only hatred and revenge. And he may well be wrong. What then?

 

[snook1]

Alt+F4, I don't really understand your posts in this regard. You seem to be suggesting that those who think the convictions at first instance may be unsafe haven't seen enough evidence to make that determination, and yet at the same time, you seem to be suggesting that you believe the convictions to be safe and appropriate even though you haven't seen any more evidence than those who disagree with you.

Many of your posts also seem to be suggesting that 'the court got it right because they must have seen some secret stash of evidence that the rest of us haven't seen and that's good enough for me' - which is decidedly non-skeptical and decidedly antithetical to critical thinking.

In fact, the suggestion that there is some secret stash of evidence that the court relied upon, but that was never mentioned mentioned in the 400+ pages that make up the Massei sentencing report, never mentioned in the press, and never mentioned in the appeal documents - not even by the prosecution who are simultaneously appealing - strikes me as patently ridiculous.

That's exactly what I had on my mind...Great post.

 

[Mary_H]

I could point you towards all those who have reported (with certainity) that they have seen a UFO or Bigfoot. I'm a skeptic and a critical thinker, that's why I post on this forum. Just show me the actual evidence/verbatim testimony, not what others say the evidence and testimony is. Why is this so difficult? You would expect nothing less if it was a claim of a UFO or Bigfoot.

Your analogy is coming at this from the wrong direction, Alt+F4. In this case, the police and the prosecutors claimed they saw a UFO and Bigfoot. Innocence supporters asked them for evidence, but they were not able to provide it.

Now you are asking the innocence supporters to prove the police and prosecutors did not see a UFO and Bigfoot. Can't be done.