Continuation Part 2 - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case

[platonov]

You don't have a link. Several weeks ago (IIRC) somebody pointed out that the bra clasp was torn from the strap along a seam (because the stitch holes were visible on the crime photos), and that the prosecution had it wrong that it was cut from the strap. The point s/he was making was that the prosecution lost credibility by getting details like this wrong - not, AFAICS, that the fact of being cut or torn in itself invalidated the DNA evidence.

I did not engage in this discussion; identifying small details of the crime scene is not something I have time or inclination to do, although I respect the vital contribution of those who have done so.

The bra clasp was never credible evidence for a number of reasons: it was produced like a conjuring trick the day after the only other "evidence" against Raff was shown to be worthless; the video of its collection shows the police team mishandling it in a way highly likely to cause contamination; and it was never clear why his DNA would have got on the metal hook during the course of the murder in any case.

Link- there's a couple of pages of this stuff around that post and it came up later also IIRC.

 

[platonov]

Kind of rude not replying, but oh well. Perhaps you feel that I don't rate a reply. That's ok !

Better if I hadn't replied perhaps.

I addressed this at some length (2 or 3 times) a few days ago and now my 'in a nutshell' reply seems to have upset at least one poster

 

[LondonJohn]

Over on "DSK Rape File", the business of "justice for Meredith Dominique" continues unabated.

One other thing the idiots don't understand is that what's at issue in the DSK case is whether a criminal offence was actually committed at all. That's not the case in the Kercher murder: she was definitely the victim of a homicide by one or more other people.

And that leads to an important issue: in most murder cases where there's a body, the court can be satisfied beyond all doubt that the criminal offence of murder took place. The only other question to answer, therefore, is who committed the offence. And someone must be the perpetrator - the question is who?

Therefore, in cases where there's little physical evidence against the defendant, the prosecution often justly employs exactly this line of reasoning: if not the defendant, then who killed the victim? The Scott Peterson case is a good example of this. There was a load of circumstantial non-physical evidence against him, but taken on its own, it might not have been enough to convict. But the prosecution could ask the jury to consider the following: Laci Peterson was dead, she was definitely killed by somebody and her body was dumped in water, so somebody definitely killed her and dumped her. And if that person wasn't her husband, then who could it possibly have been? There was no evidence that Laci Peterson had any kind of secret life (lovers, drug debts, etc), and the MO of the murder simply didn't tally with stranger-killing (not to mention the fact that stranger-murder is massively less common than spousal murder). The jury was able to use this argument in its deliberation, and I suspect that it formed a key basis for the guilty verdict.

In the case of the murder of Meredith Kercher, we are not presented with the same problem. The case is entirely compatible with a single person - Rudy Guede - confronting, killing and sexually assaulting a lone girl in a deserted house on a dark night. We don't need to address the question of "If not Knox and/or Sollecito, then who?", because we already know "who": Rudy Guede.

 

[CoulsdonUK]

Platonov

Maybe you can help, has the court appointed experts report been formerly released early?

 

[platonov]

Platonov

Maybe you can help, has the court appointed experts report been formerly released early?

Not as far as I know - it was leaked to the press a day or so ? before it was supposed to be 'lodged with the court' but the actual court hearings in late July etc still stand.


ETA There should be an interesting couple of days in court.

 

[LondonJohn]

In what way are you dealing with Maresca? In addition, the outcome of this appeal will not change anything for the Kercher family; with equal deference I doubt that Raffaele and Amanda parents if it were possible would change places with the Kercher’s.

I would hope that the outcome of the appeal trial might have the effect of making Mr Kercher consider how and why he directed his opprobrium towards Knox and Sollecito - before the trial process was even complete. He might want to ask himself why he decided to write those articles in the UK national press: what was his motivation, and what were his objectives?

But of course I (and every right-thinking person) would agree wholeheartedly with your final clause: any way you look at it (short of an erroneous death penalty for Knox or Sollecito, which obviously isn't even possible in this case), the Kercher family has got by far the worst outcome of this sorry case. But that obvious fact shouldn't serve to minimise the very real trauma that the family and friends of Knox and Sollecito (as well as the two defendants themselves) have gone through over the past three and a half years.

 

[LondonJohn]

Platonov

Maybe you can help, has the court appointed experts report been formerly released early?

It was formally submitted to the courts a day early, by the looks of things (the leaked pages have an official court stamp dated Wednesday 29th June, and the report was originally supposed to have been submitted on Thursday 30th June). Therefore, the leaks did not precede the formal submission. I don't know what the rules are on disclosure of court documents when they are on the official record, but I'm imagining that whoever leaked them* might have checked that beforehand.

* obviously, that's more likely to be someone connected to the defence.....

 

[RWVBWL]

??????????????

Like all good CT's it can be amended as necessary without changing the overall effect.

Hi Platonov,
You know something?
Often, when I read the postings of yours, I too am wonderin' ????????
Thanks for the clarification!

Greetings all,
I've been enjoying reading what has been going down in the Appeals Trial of Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito.

Heck, I even read a bit on websites offering a different point of view. When I 1st joined JREF, the pro-guilters here ran amok, it was tough to try and combat their viewpoints when I felt that serious miscarrage of justice had occured in Perugia, Italy. Nowadays, it is a joy to read the intelligent, well written theories and discussion of facts that are often brought forth here that are now starting to come to play in the Appeals Trial. Hats off to Halides1. I hope to see the ToD issue brought forth, which London John, Kevin Lowe, and many others, most recently Rolfe, -(who, it appears, even testifies in court as an expert witness on similiar matters) have been discussing. It's often a challenge to try and follow this discussion, and the DNA issues too, -(which is something that I, a surfer who is sitting a mere 25 feet away from the Pacific Ocean right now as I enjoy the cold taste of a beer), haven't a clue about.

What I find supprising though when compared to when I 1st joined here at JREF is that the heavy hitters in the pro-guilt community seem to have all withdrawn from debate here. This I find odd, especially as I have seen it written that 1 of the founding moderators on 1 of the PMF websites, brags that she was a state debate champion! And if I recall correctly, she has even posted here before at JREF. Come on Skeptical Bystander, there's a good debate goin' on here, especially since the Appeals Trials are under way.

Why don'tcha come on over and debate, champ?



R.I.P. Mereith Kercher

 

[Antony]

Link- there's a couple of pages of this stuff around that post and it came up later also IIRC.

So, after 3 or 4 rounds of posts, your link turns out to be me saying something else. Let's just remind readers of this exchange (if there are any left) what your claim was:

Around the same time that several posters claimed that unless 'we' or 'they' could explain exactly how RS cut off the bra then it didnt count !!

Actually, I'm beginning to see how your mind works - at least on this point. What I was saying was that your fingers don't actually touch the bra hooks when undoing the catch. The point is that without reason to think that Raff's DNA would get on the bra clasp during the course of the murder, then it becomes just something unexplained, and not evidence of anything at all.

Of course, you've made no attempt to understand this point, and instead you've made an equivalence between my talking about unhooking the bra, and someone talking about cutting it off.

 

[Justinian2]

In what way are you dealing with Maresca? In addition, the outcome of this appeal will not change anything for the Kercher family; with equal deference I doubt that Raffaele and Amanda parents if it were possible would change places with the Kercher’s.

Not now, anyway, because it appears there is a better than 50 percent chance that Amanda will be home.

However, there comes a time, when you would rather forget. My father was in a nursing home for six years with a stroke. We were all struggling to remmeber him the way he was before the stroke. We were happy when he finally died. We cried to remember him the way he was, but were relieved it was all over.

What I'm saying, is that if Amanda were to stay in jail for 26 years, that would be a life ender. Not only for Amanda and Raffaele, but their families. Not only that, but there society would be dead to them and they would damn the society to hell that did this or allowed it to happen until the day they died - and beyond if you believe that reincarnation is meritorious for future survival.

There are existences worse than death.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

Lessons maybe not learned

Halides1

I write this not as an attack or indeed berating anyone. However, involving an attorney is sensible advice if you are in the position where your child or student might be in police custody for a given reason, doesn’t help if your child or student is lying in a morgue.

CoulsdonUK,

With due respect your answer utterly fails to address the point I was making. Unfortunately police tend to latch onto people who are close at hand whether that suspicion is or is not warranted. Witnesses can turn into suspects quickly, and they can say a great many things that are not true. The Norfolk four are one of many examples. Long ago Kestrel supplied a link to a lecture on how much damage a person can do to himself or herself by allowing an interrogation to proceed in the absence of an attorney. The police have participated in more interrogations than potential suspects, and college-age students, particularly good ones, are a bit naive in this respect, in my estimation.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

the waiting is over

Platonov

Maybe you can help, has the court appointed experts report been formerly released early?

CoulsdonUK,

Now that the report has been formally made to the court and its concluding section translated, what is your opinion of it?

 

[LondonJohn]

CoulsdonUK,

With due respect your answer utterly fails to address the point I was making. Unfortunately police tend to latch onto people who are close at hand whether that suspicion is or is not warranted. Witnesses can turn into suspects quickly, and they can say a great many things that are not true. The Norfolk four are one of many examples. Long ago Kestrel supplied a link to a lecture on how much damage a person can do to himself or herself by allowing an interrogation to proceed in the absence of an attorney. The police have participated in more interrogations than potential suspects, and college-age students, particularly good ones, are a bit naive in this respect, in my estimation.

I imagine that if Giacomo Silenzi (Meredith's new Italian boyfriend) had been in Perugia on the night of November 1st 2007 without a solid alibi, he would have been subjected to some very.....interesting.....interviews from the Perugia police. If that had been the case, who knows what kind of trouble he might have ended up in if he'd appeared in the least bit suspicious to the "crack" flying squad team.

 

[CoulsdonUK]

I would hope that the outcome of the appeal trial might have the effect of making Mr Kercher consider how and why he directed his opprobrium towards Knox and Sollecito - before the trial process was even complete. He might want to ask himself why he decided to write those articles in the UK national press: what was his motivation, and what were his objectives?

But of course I (and every right-thinking person) would agree wholeheartedly with your final clause: any way you look at it (short of an erroneous death penalty for Knox or Sollecito, which obviously isn't even possible in this case), the Kercher family has got by far the worst outcome of this sorry case. But that obvious fact shouldn't serve to minimise the very real trauma that the family and friends of Knox and Sollecito (as well as the two defendants themselves) have gone through over the past three and a half years.

I have concluded that Mr Kercher wrote those articles in part because he felt is daughter’s brutal murder had been replaced by the celebrity the media bestowed on Amanda by the media, and then latterly trying to ensure the public knew the person Meredith was, then holding Raffaele and Amanda culpable for her murder. I for one think he is just as entitled to his opinion as Raffaele and Amanda’s parents, 4 or 5 articles since his daughter was murdered hardly seems excessive to me.

Now the appeal, it’s not over yet is it? As far as I know this appeal is being prosecuted in a court in Perugia, Italy not on internet forums or the media but a court with a judges and a jury.

 

[CoulsdonUK]

Halides1

With due respect your answer utterly fails to address the point I was making. Unfortunately police tend to latch onto people who are close at hand whether that suspicion is or is not warranted. Witnesses can turn into suspects quickly, and they can say a great many things that are not true. The Norfolk four are one of many examples. Long ago Kestrel supplied a link to a lecture on how much damage a person can do to himself or herself by allowing an interrogation to proceed in the absence of an attorney. The police have participated in more interrogations than potential suspects, and college-age students, particularly good ones, are a bit naive in this respect, in my estimation.

We keep doing this, I found your response failed to address the murder victim although I understand your focus of this case, we see things very differently your response is in the context of what happened to Amanda, whilst mean is what happened Meredith.

Now that the report has been formally made to the court and its concluding section translated, what is your opinion of it?

I think I’ll reserve an opinion until it is presented in court, I am suspicious of media, after all how much of what was said about Amanda was accurate?

 

[LondonJohn]

I have concluded that Mr Kercher wrote those articles in part because he felt is daughter’s brutal murder had been replaced by the celebrity the media bestowed on Amanda by the media, and then latterly trying to ensure the public knew the person Meredith was, then holding Raffaele and Amanda culpable for her murder. I for one think he is just as entitled to his opinion as Raffaele and Amanda’s parents, 4 or 5 articles since his daughter was murdered hardly seems excessive to me.

Now the appeal, it’s not over yet is it? As far as I know this appeal is being prosecuted in a court in Perugia, Italy not on internet forums or the media but a court with a judges and a jury.

You've created a straw man here. Your original post, to which my post was an answer, stated the following:

In addition, the outcome of this appeal will not change anything for the Kercher family

I think that you're wrong in this, and I proposed a situation where Mr Kercher might want to change something - his attitude towards Knox and Sollecito. In addition, I am not suggesting that the outcome of the appeal is now a pre-ordained decision of not-guilty - although you might be aware that my opinion for a long time is that there should be acquittals (and this week's developments are only going towards strengthening that opinion)

 

[Antony]

Halides1We keep doing this, I found your response failed to address the murder victim although I understand your focus of this case, we see things very differently your response is in the context of what happened to Amanda, whilst mean is what happened Meredith.

CoulsdonUK, why should anyone focus on the murder victim? What does it achieve?

 

[LondonJohn]

CoulsdonUK, why should anyone focus on the murder victim? What does it achieve?

Nobody discussing this case should forget that at its very heart is a young woman - Meredith Kercher - who was brutally murdered. But nothing whatsoever will ever bring her back: what's important now is correctly identifying and punishing any person who was responsible for her death, and for her family and friends to get some form of closure, however poor a substitute that may be for losing Meredith.

 

[komponisto]

Over on "DSK Rape File", the business of "justice for Meredith Dominique" continues unabated.

No, no! You mean "New York Wrongful-Prosecution File"!

I actually think it's just as well that they distract themselves in this way. It might allow them to detach their group identity somewhat from a particular set of beliefs about the Kercher case (while simultaneously considering the prospect of miscarriages of justice in general), so that perhaps they can at least gradually open themselves to updating their Kercher beliefs on the evidence.

Probably a vain hope, but...hey, DSK's hope looked vain a few weeks ago!

One other thing the idiots don't understand is that what's at issue in the DSK case is whether a criminal offence was actually committed at all. That's not the case in the Kercher murder: she was definitely the victim of a homicide by one or more other people.

And that leads to an important issue: in most murder cases where there's a body, the court can be satisfied beyond all doubt that the criminal offence of murder took place. The only other question to answer, therefore, is who committed the offence. And someone must be the perpetrator - the question is who?

Therefore, in cases where there's little physical evidence against the defendant, the prosecution often justly employs exactly this line of reasoning: if not the defendant, then who killed the victim? [...]

In the case of the murder of Meredith Kercher, we are not presented with the same problem. The case is entirely compatible with a single person - Rudy Guede - confronting, killing and sexually assaulting a lone girl in a deserted house on a dark night. We don't need to address the question of "If not Knox and/or Sollecito, then who?", because we already know "who": Rudy Guede.

Yep. This is the First Fundamental Error of the Kercher Case: failing to update on the fact of Guede's guilt. Ask a guilter whether contradictory statements and the like are suggestive of murder, and, if you're lucky, they might cease snorting and snickering long enough to reply "but we know there was a murder!" In fact, of course, this is wrong. We know there was a murder, but it has already been explained away by the evidence against Guede, and cannot be used as evidence against Knox or Sollecito without connecting them to Guede.

(I'm sorry to say there were even a few people on Less Wrong who made this mistake, by saying that "the correct prior" for guilt should take into account that a murder occurred.)

The Second Fundamental Error, for what it's worth, would be overvaluing behavioral/"circumstantial" evidence versus "physical". (In other words, failing to "succumb" to the "CSI effect".)

 

[komponisto]

I think I’ll reserve an opinion until it is presented in court, I am suspicious of media, after all how much of what was said about Amanda was accurate?

You can read the conclusion yourself.