Continuation Part 2 - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case

[RoseMontague]

Anybody know when the appeal resumes?
Isn't a review of the DNA evidence next on the agenda?

I believe it is this coming Monday the 25th and the DNA expert report will be discussed. Hopefully we will get live twitter updates as before so we can comment in real time as the hearing progresses.

 

[komponisto]

halides1,

I didn't realize it at first either, but Ergon and the man from Atlan are the same person.

Rose,

The DNA results for Rep. 198-199 read as follows:

"Results: both the extracts, one deriving from trace A belonging to Rep. 199, and the other deriving from the bulb of the hair formation which constitutes Rep. 198, were negative for the quantification test and thus were not deemed to be suitable for the subsequent DNA amplification phase."

 

[RoseMontague]

Don't bet the farm on the quality of my Italian, Rose, but I think the results should be interpreted as follows: Sample 199, the "presumed biological substance" tested positive for TMB, but negative for an antibody test for human tissue. It was subjected to DNA extraction which did not yield a detectable amount of DNA. For this reason it was judged unsuitable for PCR amplification and electrophoresis. Sample 198, the 6 cm, dark brown, catagen phase hair had a few cells attached to the hair bulb. DNA extraction was performed on the bulb, again with no DNA detectable in the extraction solution, and no further analysis was performed.

One further question. I noticed on the Rep 01 test (presumed blood stain on comforter) that they did this same antibody test as on the Rep 198 and got a negative but then proceeded with what looks like 2 different antibody tests and got a positive result. Why stop with one and go further with another?

 

[LondonJohn]

Wow, just wow. It really was hair then and a positive TMB for blood. On the broken window sill. Of the window that was allegedly broken as part of a staging. Would you describe Amanda or Raffaele's hair as dark brown? How about Rudy's? I think this is the one the defense is asking additional testing on. It will be interesting to see if this is covered in court. I wonder how this sample was "stored"?

Does anyone know the details of the antibody test as it relates to testing human hair? What are the chances of a false negative?

The hair had no blood on it though, according to Diastole's post. And not only was this hair apparently "dark brown", but it was also apparently 6cm in length (up to and including the end of the root). Now, IIRC none of Knox, Sollecito or Meredith had head hair this short on the day of the murder. But guess who did have dark brown hair of around this length on the day of the murder: Mr Rudy Guede.

So I would surmise that this hair very likely belonged to Guede. And if that's the case, either Guede was for some reason party to the supposed "staging" in Filomena's room - and somehow shed a hair during the staging - or he actually did break in through Filomena's window, and shed a head hair in the physical act of climbing through the window. Needless to say, my money's firmly on the latter option.

 

[RoseMontague]

On both specimens DNA extraction was performed but DNA quantification returned "too low" ( ) result. It means there was not enough DNA for amplification and further testing.

That is what it should mean, yes.

Thanks to all that are helping with my questions. Stay tuned, more coming.

 

[stilicho]

They've got themselves convinced that the court-appointed experts are about to be exposed as ignorant amateurs in the pay of the Knox family...

Rolfe.

Cite?

What will happen on 25 JUL 2011 is that the debate will continue in a real-world Italian courtroom presided over by Hellmann. There is no evidence whatsoever that the fresh set of experts has any connection to the Knox family.

The decision to include or exclude evidence will be based on what's presented in the future and there's no way now to predict that. The people at the PMF, through translation and interpretation, have helped to frame the potential and probable course of that debate. There will be few surprises.

 

[LondonJohn]

Just by way of reiteration: the partial print on the bathmat was not only incorrectly measured by Rinaldi, it was actually incapable of being accurately measured by anyone. Furthermore, it strongly appears that Rinaldi decided that the print matched Sollecito (by virtue of his bogus comparison of the big toe portions), then actively sought to match further measurements on the bathmat print to those of Sollecito's reference print - which he had right in front of him!

I shouldn't need to point out just how badly this goes against the principles of scientific comparative analysis. All the key measurement dimensions on the bathmat partial print are subject to significant margins of error: that's utterly plain to see from just a cursory look at the print itself. In addition to that, Rinaldi himself stated that the nature of the bathmat print meant that it could not be used for positive identification, but only for elimination. But he rapidly contradicts himself by saying, in effect, that "in this particular instance" it's appropriate to make an identification to Sollecito.

I repeat: Rinaldi's efforts in this area are nothing more than pseudoscience, coupled with (I suspect) a scientifically-indefensible methodology to match the bathmat print to Sollecito's reference print. I confidently expect this issue to be successfully argued by the defence in the appeal before Hellmann and his court.

 

[piktor]

Greek to judges ears

An anonymous commenter at PMF wrote, "Other than clarifying that there are 'minor traces' from other undescribed, unidentified male or males, and suggesting contamination a possibility without confirmation or demonstration, it does not negate Dr. Stefanoni's discoveries on the bra clasp.

Dr. Stefanoni and C&V are looking at the same graphs and data. Stefanoni says some markings are 'stutter', C&V call those same markings 'other' 'minor contributors' unnamed, unidentified, unknown. Sounds like they are all saying the same thing with different words."

1. The presence of other contributors makes it virtually a certainty that some of the DNA arrived by either secondary transfer or contamination (it is difficult to imagine how primary transfer could explain all traces). 2. Conti and Vecchiotti are not necessarily looking at the same graphs; much of the point in obtaining the electronic data files is being able to make graphs using slightly different parameters, as noted by Dan Krane in his report on the Leskie case. 3. Stutter is an artifact of the PCR process, as I have discussed upthread. Other minor contributors means that the allele is real. They are not the same thing at all.

halides,

You actually think the judges are going to "study" the lesser peaks.

Conti and Vecchiotti were given months on end to study the clasp information and the only concrete finding is confirmation that the victim and Sollecito's traces are on the clasp. Plus "minor contributors" with a Y-haplotype. And these minor contributors are indefinite alleles.

C&V say the clasp reading is "unreliable" because of an academic disagreement over "stutter" as Stefanoni says or sure as sin them things ain't stutter but "alleles" as C&V say.

Suddenly the judges are instant "scientists" wise in the ways of the peaks, alleles, stutters, Y-haplotypes, secondary and tertiary transfer?

The judges will be looking at Sollecito's stuff on the clasp. The rest is scientific opinion in a manner of degree, not substance.

 

[Rolfe]

The people at the PMF, through translation and interpretation, have helped to frame the potential and probable course of that debate. There will be few surprises.

That's really interesting. You believe that lawyers involved in this case are reading an internet forum and getting their intended arguments from there?

What was that about library cards and Google-investigating, you were saying?

I'm not knocking internet discussion of any subject at all. However, the concept that posters might really believe their posts are being read by those involved in the case IRL, and even more, that legal experts will base their approach to a case on Googled criticisms of court-appointed experts by anonymous (and overwhelmingly amateur) forum posters, is a new one on me.

Rolfe.

 

[RoseMontague]

Cite?

What will happen on 25 JUL 2011 is that the debate will continue in a real-world Italian courtroom presided over by Hellmann. There is no evidence whatsoever that the fresh set of experts has any connection to the Knox family.

The decision to include or exclude evidence will be based on what's presented in the future and there's no way now to predict that. The people at the PMF, through translation and interpretation, have helped to frame the potential and probable course of that debate. There will be few surprises.

What PMF has done is ignore their resident DNA expert's opinion as well as thoughtful's rational posts to come up with various fantasy scenario's that will never happen. It is simply wishful thinking. The experts report is devastating to the prosecutions case.

A similar thing has happened with the footprint/shoe-print issue. Your own translator admits Massei makes an error and despite various court documents and testimony from both the prosecutions footprint expert and DNA expert PMF chooses to go with Massei's version that is already admitted is in error. The fact that Massei used a piece of false information as part of his motivation is telling. The fact that PMF can't admit the error is amusing.

Quoting thoughtful on FBN's article at TJMK:

1) You do mention the ISFG guidelines, but only lower down, rather than up there with the numerous American references cited, giving the impression at first that European guidelines are not considered.

2) You leave out the two places where the report, to my mind, makes a fair and precise remark about contamination.

a) It can typically happen to LCN samples when they are run in the same machine where ample samples of the same person have already been run, and this is what was done with the knife blade DNA,

b) One way to check that the bra clasp did not pick up Raffaele's DNA from the floor would have been to swab the floor. This was apparently not done, and for all we know, Raffaele's DNA could have been all over the floor and if so, that would certainly have been a good thing to know.

3) You say that CV accuse Stefanoni of the "misattribution" of peaks, but you don't add the important facts that

a) she attributed certain peaks - quite a number of them - to stutter rather than human beings.

b) these were exactly every peak not belonging to Raffaele Sollecito (himself undoubtedly present in the Y-haplotype, and in greater quantity than other contributors)

c) she rejected those other peaks in spite of, and not according to, the ISFG guidelines. Indeed, the guidelines are not intended to be rigorously and rigidly followed, as she stated in court, but nor are they meant to be ignored in the case of every single peak except for that of the main contributor/suspect, unless another specific criterion or reason for doing so is supplied, which as far as we know it was not.

Quoting Greggy at PMF:

I suggest that Dr. Stef, like many scientists including myself, was under a consideration amount of pressure (external and self-induced) and wanted to accomplish something great. You will find that many scientists are accomplishment-driven and more apt to lament missing great discoveries than great salaries. The Prosecution was possibly pressuring her for "smoking gun" type evidence and she had an ingenious idea on how to optimize the LCN protocol to obtain maximal sensitivity. The Prosecution was possibly telling her that if she didn't come up with quick DNA results that could directly link Knox and Sollecito to the murder that Knox could be released on bail and gone. in deadline situations like that, scientists are human beings and sometimes cut corners telling themselves that they will go back and do it the right way later with all the controls. Unfortunately, some scientists don't take the high road later and admit that their data interpretations have changed somewhat after re-evaluating the data with controls in place, and some even get defensive about the results that they know in their hearts are shaky, another human reaction

 

[Paninaro]

halides,

You actually think the judges are going to "study" the lesser peaks.

Conti and Vecchiotti were given months on end to study the clasp information and the only concrete finding is confirmation that the victim and Sollecito's traces are on the clasp. Plus "minor contributors" with a Y-haplotype. And these minor contributors are indefinite alleles.

C&V say the clasp reading is "unreliable" because of an academic disagreement over "stutter" as Stefanoni says or sure as sin them things ain't stutter but "alleles" as C&V say.

Suddenly the judges are instant "scientists" wise in the ways of the peaks, alleles, stutters, Y-haplotypes, secondary and tertiary transfer?

The judges will be looking at Sollecito's stuff on the clasp. The rest is scientific opinion in a manner of degree, not substance.

What about reasonable doubt? The way the clasp was handled when stored and the risk - however small it may be - that the traces of Sollecito's DNA is contamination should make the bra clasp very poor evidence of guilt. That's all anyone's arguing, even though the believers in innocence tend to think the risk of contamination is high or probable or likely or sure or what you want.

If I was a lay judge in a case where I believed strongly in the guilt of the accused; I still wouldn't see this as evidence of guilt and would disregard it, due to too much uncertainties.

 

[theRealBob]

That's really interesting. You believe that lawyers involved in this case are reading an internet forum and getting their intended arguments from there?

What was that about library cards and Google-investigating, you were saying?

I'm not knocking internet discussion of any subject at all. However, the concept that posters might really believe their posts are being read by those involved in the case IRL, and even more, that legal experts will base their approach to a case on Googled criticisms of court-appointed experts by anonymous (and overwhelmingly amateur) forum posters, is a new one on me.

Rolfe.

No. They usually just get on the phone and ask me....

 

[komponisto]

Cite?

What will happen on 25 JUL 2011 is that the debate will continue in a real-world Italian courtroom presided over by Hellmann. There is no evidence whatsoever that the fresh set of experts has any connection to the Knox family.

The decision to include or exclude evidence will be based on what's presented in the future and there's no way now to predict that. The people at the PMF, through translation and interpretation, have helped to frame the potential and probable course of that debate. There will be few surprises.

Nice to see you, stilicho; perhaps you'd like to address a previous post of mine where I pointed out an error in your criticism of my arguments:

They never include things such as the high probability of a cover-up at a murder scene, the high probability of that cover-up including a staged burglary, or high probability of a murderer guiding others to "discover" the victim, each of which happened in this case as though it were a textbook example.

Well, if [stilicho] thinks I haven't taken this information into account, why doesn't he come out and say how much he thinks it should raise my probability of guilt, then? As opposed to complaining about "misapplying Bayesianism" or making a silly argument that I'm somehow obliged to include this in the prior rather than updating on it to obtain a posterior.

Suppose I start with my prior of 0.001 (probably an overestimate) based on the rarity of the hypothesized crime; and then [stilicho] informs me that most murders involve a cover-up. How far upward should I update? How much evidence that Knox and Sollecito are guilty does that fact constitute?

The answer is zero. If the murder rate is small, then the murder-followed-by-cover-up rate is even smaller -- regardless of the proportion of the latter within the former. As in the old feminist bank teller story, [stilicho] has fallen victim to the conjunction fallacy. What [stilicho] needs is information that raises the probability of guilt, not information that raises the probability of something else given guilt.

(EDIT: How ironic that in the course of criticizing the explicit use of probability theory, [stilicho] commits exactly the kind of reasoning error that shows how important it is.)

 

[JREF2010]

What about reasonable doubt? The way the clasp was handled when stored and the risk - however small it may be - that the traces of Sollecito's DNA is contamination should make the bra clasp very poor evidence of guilt. That's all anyone's arguing, even though the believers in innocence tend to think the risk of contamination is high or probable or likely or sure or what you want.

If I was a lay judge in a case where I believed strongly in the guilt of the accused; I still wouldn't see this as evidence of guilt and would disregard it, due to too much uncertainties.

if i was a lay judge i wouldn't convict on a bathmat blob either.

this train of thought makes me wonder, how is all the previous information presented to the lay judges?

obviously they will hear the great DNA debate. but how will they become familiar with the luminol prints, the bathmat, the 112 call, the cell tower data etc?

 

[HumanityBlues]

halides,

You actually think the judges are going to "study" the lesser peaks.

Conti and Vecchiotti were given months on end to study the clasp information and the only concrete finding is confirmation that the victim and Sollecito's traces are on the clasp. Plus "minor contributors" with a Y-haplotype. And these minor contributors are indefinite alleles.

C&V say the clasp reading is "unreliable" because of an academic disagreement over "stutter" as Stefanoni says or sure as sin them things ain't stutter but "alleles" as C&V say.

Suddenly the judges are instant "scientists" wise in the ways of the peaks, alleles, stutters, Y-haplotypes, secondary and tertiary transfer?

The judges will be looking at Sollecito's stuff on the clasp. The rest is scientific opinion in a manner of degree, not substance.

You're right. The judges aren't suddenly scientists. All they're going to remember is "unreliable".

 

[HumanityBlues]

That's really interesting. You believe that lawyers involved in this case are reading an internet forum and getting their intended arguments from there?

What was that about library cards and Google-investigating, you were saying?

I'm not knocking internet discussion of any subject at all. However, the concept that posters might really believe their posts are being read by those involved in the case IRL, and even more, that legal experts will base their approach to a case on Googled criticisms of court-appointed experts by anonymous (and overwhelmingly amateur) forum posters, is a new one on me.

Rolfe.

It's not actually that far fetched. The prosecution might actually be that stupid.

 

[komponisto]

That's really interesting. You believe that lawyers involved in this case are reading an internet forum and getting their intended arguments from there?

What was that about library cards and Google-investigating, you were saying?

I'm not knocking internet discussion of any subject at all. However, the concept that posters might really believe their posts are being read by those involved in the case IRL, and even more, that legal experts will base their approach to a case on Googled criticisms of court-appointed experts by anonymous (and overwhelmingly amateur) forum posters, is a new one on me.

Rolfe.

I actually do think the prosecution (or perhaps Maresca) will argue along the lines we see at PMF -- not because they necessarily take their cues from PMF, but simply because the same arguments are likely to occur to them independently. (Both PMF and the lawyers are searching for the best arguments against C and V, so it wouldn't be particularly surprising if they came up with similar answers.)

In fact, on the day the report was released, Maresca already signaled his intention to question the experts' qualifications.

 

[Kevin_Lowe]

Hi Stilicho.

While you're here, I was wondering about these remarks you made:

I've always found it intriguing that the same lab and the same people identified Guede through forensic tests and yet the Groupies™ have never contested those results. This has no value in a courtroom but it sure does to anyone observing from a distance. If sloppy police work and endemic laboratory contamination caused a wrongful conviction in the cases of Knox and Sollecito then it probably does in the case of Guede too.

There is a single Groupie™--Wilkens-What's-His-Face--who truly believes all three are innocent and that the police deliberately framed all of them. He's the only honest and consistent one of the bunch.

Along similar lines, in response to Stint7 expressing well-worn confusion as to how someone could possibly question the DNA results from the bra clasp and the knife without necessarily throwing the DNA results Rudy left at the scene out the window, you said:

Never ever an answer to this. Fiona was still at the JREF when this was asked repeatedly. Not a peep that made a whit of sense.

Frank™ has gotten the closest of any of the Groupies™ by button-holing several of those at his site (before it moved to wherever--haven't read it since he was escorted away from Blogger) and telling them to stop calling the Polizia Scientifica crooks or cheats.

Why is this simple question so hard for the Groupies™ to confront? Why is this simple question so hard for the US media to ask?

Now PMF has been accused on occasion, by persons including myself, as being an incestuous echo chamber where the blind lead the blind into deeper and deeper confusion about the facts of this case. I'm sure you would agree that if this was true it would be a very serious problem, although you may or may not agree that this is true.

This sort of post is the kind of content that attracts and some would say validates the accusation that PMF is an echo chamber breeding various kinds of factual and cognitive errors. Because I'm absolutely sure that this exact mole has been popped up many, many times by various pro-guilt posters and hammered down promptly every single time. I'm also absolutely sure you were an active participant in the discussion at some of the times in which this happened.

Just to repeat the hammering, here are several important differences that justify different treatment of these different items of evidence.

1. At the time the claimed DNA evidence against Raffaele was allegedly collected, the police had already committed themselves to the theory that he was involved in the murder but their sole piece of evidence (one of Rudy's shoeprints they had claimed was Raffaele's because they could not count to seven) had just been demolished leaving them empty-handed.

2. There are numerous and very serious methodological questions about the safety of Stefanoni's procedures and conclusions with regard to the bra clasp and knife, as exhaustively documented in the recently-released report by the court's chosen independent experts. No such questions have as yet been raised about Stefanoni's procedures and conclusions with regard to the evidence against Rudy.

3. Rudy has no plausible excuse for his DNA being found on or inside Meredith's person, since he never had any business in that house in the first place. Amanda has an excellent excuses for her DNA being found on Raffaele's kitchenware, and Raffaele a reasonably good one for his DNA being found on an object which had (allegedly) been kicking around for weeks on the floor of a house Raffaele had visited.

4. Extremely strong, direct physical evidence already places Rudy in the room where Meredith was murdered and sexually assaulted. Rudy has form for similar crimes and the Lone Wolf hypothesis is not hypothesising an extraordinarily unusual crime. Far less hangs on the DNA evidence in his case in than in the cases of Amanda and Raffaele. If the DNA evidence against Rudy got thrown out tomorrow there would still be proof beyond reasonable doubt of his guilt, whereas if the DNA evidence against Amanda and Raffaele gets thrown out on Monday the police will have no evidence to tie them directly to the crime at all.

The thing is, you should already know all this. Maybe you even do know all this. So can you see how to an informed observer remarks like yours do create the impression that PMF fosters an atmosphere which is actively detrimental to understanding the reality of the case?

 

[RWVBWL]

Wow, just wow. It really was hair then and a positive TMB for blood. On the broken window sill. Of the window that was allegedly broken as part of a staging. Would you describe Amanda or Raffaele's hair as dark brown? How about Rudy's? I think this is the one the defense is asking additional testing on. It will be interesting to see if this is covered in court. I wonder how this sample was "stored"?

Does anyone know the details of the antibody test as it relates to testing human hair? What are the chances of a false negative?

The hair had no blood on it though, according to Diastole's post. And not only was this hair apparently "dark brown", but it was also apparently 6cm in length (up to and including the end of the root). Now, IIRC none of Knox, Sollecito or Meredith had head hair this short on the day of the murder. But guess who did have dark brown hair of around this length on the day of the murder: Mr Rudy Guede.

So I would surmise that this hair very likely belonged to Guede. And if that's the case, either Guede was for some reason party to the supposed "staging" in Filomena's room - and somehow shed a hair during the staging - or he actually did break in through Filomena's window, and shed a head hair in the physical act of climbing through the window. Needless to say, my money's firmly on the latter option.

'
Hi Rose Montague and London John,
Reading your recent posts made me realize, as I've argued before here at JREF, that the cops were indeed looking for a black male when they interrogated Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito that Nov. 5th + 6th of 2007.

Wasn't the police already suspicious of Amanda and Raffaele?
Weren't they under surveilence the few days prior to their arrest?
And weren't their phones bugged?
Who had a black male boss?

I might hazard a guess that the cops saw Amanda talking with her boss Patrick Lumumba at 1:00pm on Nov. 5th in front of the Stranieri. They also probably witnessed her give Patrick a hug. Surely the cops would have known by that time that Patrick was her boss. And reported this meeting to their own boss, Mignini. It does make sense that the cops, looking for a black male, and already suspicious of Amanda, and under pressure to get her to crack before her Mother arrived in town the next day, had those 12 officers ready to 1st get Raffaele to break. And he did so, while stoned, rather quickly when called in for further questioning that night. Didn't he admit that he couldn't be sure that Amanda did not have leave his pad when he fell asleep? Didn't the cops then pull Amanda into a room for further questioning and tell her that Raffaele was not covering her alibi any more? And then they checked her phone? Why? They focused on the Certo ci vediamo piu tardi buona serata! text she sent to her boss, which they probably already knew about, which brought up Patrick Lumumba's name, her black boss. And then they got her to imagine Patrick killed Mereidth as she cowered in the kitchen with her hands over her ears and, forgetting to record this interview, because the were too busy getting ready to arrest Patrick Lumumba, finally went and did arrest a black male just on the coached imaginations of a physically and mentally exhausted young, naive woman.

Isn't it easy to see that the cops were indeed looking for a black male because they found this hair near the broken window?
Hmmmm,
RWVBWL

 

[RoseMontague]

The hair had no blood on it though, according to Diastole's post. And not only was this hair apparently "dark brown", but it was also apparently 6cm in length (up to and including the end of the root). Now, IIRC none of Knox, Sollecito or Meredith had head hair this short on the day of the murder. But guess who did have dark brown hair of around this length on the day of the murder: Mr Rudy Guede.

So I would surmise that this hair very likely belonged to Guede. And if that's the case, either Guede was for some reason party to the supposed "staging" in Filomena's room - and somehow shed a hair during the staging - or he actually did break in through Filomena's window, and shed a head hair in the physical act of climbing through the window. Needless to say, my money's firmly on the latter option.

I agree with you on the hair, but the other sample 199 is a presumed blood stain. That is the one they got a positive TMB test on but a negatory on the human antibody test (However see my post and questions on Rep 1) and also negative on the DNA test.

Rep.198 – Hair formation found between the lower cornice of the left window shutter having the broken glass, indicated in the evidence photographs with the letter “R”, (report of the evidence described carried out by the Gabinetto Provinciale of Forensic Police of Perugia) – page 172 A.F./239 R.;
Rep.199 – Sample of presumed blood substance taken of the portion of the wood of the window having the broken glass, indicated in the evidence photographs by the letter “S”,
(report of the evidence described carried out by the Gabinetto Provinciale of the Forensic Police of Perugia) – page 172 A.F./239 R.;

Does anyone have a picture of this window containing both the R and the S designating the locations of these two pieces of evidence? I am interested if the locations make sense in terms of a real break in.