Continuation Part 3 - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case

[bri1]

Can you show of any instances where a male accused of rape is asked about how many sexual partners they've had, and where 7 previous sexual partners taken to be indicative of a prediliction towards sexual violence?
And I'm talking numbers, as opposed to the nature of previous sexual encounters, such as violence or coercion being part of the nature of someone's sexual interaction.
I'd be very surprised to hear about any prosecutor in a case involving a male accused of a sexual crime bringing up number of sexual partners in order to show predisposition to sexual violence. If I'm wrong, then maybe the charge of misogyny is misplaced. If I'm right (that this never happens), then what we have is the implicit suggestion that with females (but not males), a 'high' number of sexual partners shows a prediliction for sexual violence. Which appears to be misogynistic.

Any comment, Bucketoftea? Do you agree that whilst the nature of sexual preferences might be relevant to sexual crime, (and therefore considered by the legal system as relevant), that number of sexual partners usually isn't, and that this is because numerous sexual partners is considered normal in men (who are the perpertrators of most sexual crime), and deviant in women? And further, that this judgment of deviancy is a misogynist one?

 

[Draca]

Draca, your paraphrasing of John Kercher neglected the following important words,

"which was said to contain"

"The prosecution have stated"

"are said to have changed"

"as to why he and the jury"

He was not as definitive as you have written and if you read carefully he takes care to use words such as those I've quoted above to attribute the thoughts to others. I think that's an important distinction to make.

Danceme,

I agree that in The Sun he is being more cautious in his wording. In his first three articles he states pretty clearly that he thinks they are guilty. It's good he used more temperate language in the last one.

 

[christianahannah]

Danceme,

I agree that in The Sun he is being more cautious in his wording. In his first three articles he states pretty clearly that he thinks they are guilty. It's good he used more temperate language in the last one.

I expect the family of Meredith, along with the families of Amanda and Raffaele, to be protective and biased towards the memory and image of their children. Their writings and reactions to much in this case can be excused (on all sides) when you realize they are not disinterested participants.

It is the reaction of those outside of a personal relationship with the families that I find puzzling. I find great sympathy for all, regardless of what they have said or written, especially so for John and Arline Kercher (because they no longer physically have their daughter), but also for Edda Mellas and Curt Knox and Mr. Sollecito.

 

[LondonJohn]

I disagree. There is no doubt in my mind that it is Maresca who is running the show and John Kercher who is being led. While I think it is wrong for John Kercher to try to publicly build a case for guilt against Amanda and Raffaele through his newspaper essays, I don't blame him. He fell under the spell of Mignini, Maresca and Massei at the most vulnerable, defenseless time in his life; resistance, as they say, would have been futile.

A lot of people say Amanda should have known better than to trust the cops -- well, what about John Kercher? He continues to trust the police and everyone on the side of the prosecution's case seemingly without question, and he is much older and presumably much wiser than Amanda. Too bad he didn't hire a British lawyer to protect him from the Perugian jackals.

As I have said before, I believe members of the Kercher family are suffering from a version of the Stockholm Syndrome: According to the psychoanalytic view of the syndrome, this tendency might be the result of employing the strategy evolved by newborn babies to form an emotional attachment to the nearest powerful adult in order to maximize the probability that this adult will enable—at the very least—the survival of the child, if not also prove to be a good parental figure. This syndrome is considered a prime example for the defense mechanism of identification.[8]

Ah well you and I actually agree on this. I would also contend that Maresca and Mignini have exerted undue (and improper) influence on Mr Kercher's thinking. But that's a slightly different issue. What I believe happened would have followed this linear pattern:

1) Maresca and Mignini convince John Kercher of their theory of the murder, and of Knox's/Sollecito's culpability

2) Maresca asks John Kercher for his instructions as to how Maresca should proceed in court.

3) John Kercher instructs Maresca to pursue an aggressive line against Knox and Sollecito, since Mr Kercher now believes that they are culpable.

So Maresca is acting on John Kercher's direct instructions and wishes. But it's Maresca himself who (along with Mignini) has convinced John Kercher to hold the views that lead to the instructions. An analogy would be something like this: imagine if I managed to convince you that the Earth was flat; imagine then that a third person asked me for your opinion on whether the Earth was flat; imagine that I asked you for your view on the flatness (or otherwise) of the Earth, so that I could give your view to the third person; you would tell me that you believed the Earth was flat, and I would convey this view to the third person.

 

[LondonJohn]

Here's the full story on "slippage".

It didn't happen. Standard procedure, which was followed in this case according to those who have seen the video recording of the autopsy, is to tie off the stomach, duodenum and bowel so that material cannot slip around before examining them.

The way "slippage" meme got into the story is one of the least ethical bits of Massei's work of misinformation, in my view. Ronchi, a prosecution expert who had not seen the autopsy video stated that if Lalli (the person who did the autopsy) had not tied off Meredith's bowels properly that this could explain the lack of food in the duodenum, because that food might have been accidentally squeezed down the whole length of the small intesting to the far end.

Massei, who had seen the autopsy and knew that the bowels had indeed been tied off, adapted this statement by saying "Besides this, the alimentary remnants in the small intestine must also be considered, and thus, as hypothesised by Professor Umani Ronchi, it would be possible to think that these remnants could have been found in the duodenum either because of an imperfect apposition of the ligatures, or because of an apposition of the ligatures that took place with such manner and timing as to make it impossible to avoid a sliding of material from the duodenum to the small intestine. The fact [that the] duodenum [is] empty is not [necessarily] fully reliable".

As far as Massei is concerned as long as he can tell some fairy story such that "it would be possible to think" X, then he can assume X is true. It's an even bigger leap than his usual "it is possible, indeed probable" manoeuvre, going straight from mere conceivability to effective certainty.

Unless Meredith Kercher's last meal was Harry Houdini, significant amounts of food matter did not escape down her bowel through ligatures to hide at the far end. The hypothesis that the killer moved her body and by doing so made the food in her duodenum shoot five metres down a coiled elastic tube is also somewhat unlikely to say the least.

As far as Rolfe Nelson's ideas about the fact that "almost nobody except for Amanda Knox's defense has ever cared whether a duodenum was empty or not" that's probably because this is a very unusual and specific situation. It matters in this case only because an incompetent prosecution got the time of death terribly wrong, and the accused have an alibi for the real time of death, and the victim had such an unusually long t(lag) time that the time of death could be nailed down this way with some precision. It's a very unusual set of circumstances which we should not expect to be an everyday occurrence.

I also don't think very much of his "Vacant Duodenum Hypothesis" - a hypothesis like that owes the world some citations to back it up. As it is it looks strictly like wishful thinking to me. The idea that there is a minimum 10% chance that the duodenum will be empty at any given moment regardless of what you have been eating and when is not only bizarre but also presented without any supporting evidence whatsoever.

It looks like this "Rolf" character is doing little more than plucking totally arbitrary percentages out of thin air and assigning them to certain events about which (s)he knows very little. It seems like a totally bunkum approach to trying to quantify things in this case.

As everyone else is saying, there is virtually no possibility of slippage within the intestines at any point after death. The anatomy of the intestines means that slippage is virtually impossible. Firstly, the join between the pylorus and the duodenum is like a reverse u-bend underneath a sink. It's specifically evolved to ensure that food does not slip back towards the stomach through gravity if the body is standing or supine.

Secondly, the small intestine itself is a thick elastic tube that is packed into a very small space. The path of the intestines meanders in a constantly-changing direction through the abdominal cavity, and the default condition of empty intestine is one of closure. It is to all intents absolutely impossible for food matter to either "slip" or be manipulated along anything more than an extremely short length of the small intestine. There is a slight theoreticalpossibility that food matter could have been accidentally squeezed along the intestine during the autopsy, once the small intestine had been unravelled and laid out. But it's clear that in this case the correct procedures were followed to eliminate this possibility, including proper tying-off of the intestine at various points, and careful handling of the intestine.

I also find it astonishing that "Rolf" is engaging in a pretty specialised area of debate without even bothering to find out the specifics of the case he's debating. (S)he could easily have established that there was no food matter in any of Meredith's small intestine (which is, don't forget, some 6 metres - 20 feet - in length), apart from a small amount of matter at the very far end. (S)he could also have easily found out that 500ml of semi-digested food matter (mixed with stomach acids and enzymes) was discovered in her stomach, and that this contained recognisable elements of the pizza meal. It is entirely clear that Meredith ate pizza and apple crumble at her friends' house, and that this meal was still entirely present in her stomach at the time she died. There was no slippage.

 

[LondonJohn]

Some idiots elsewhere are taking a typical confirmation-biased approach to the issue of the text messages on Knox's phone. They seem to be of the impression that Knox deleted her sent messages, but kept her sent messages. And they then seem to think that Lumumba's lawyer Pacelli "skewered" Knox on the stand when he asked questions in this vein.

But the actual truth is much simpler. Knox deleted her received text messages, and her phone automatically stored her sent messages in its memory. And anyone who has ever owned a mobile phone would immediately know exactly how and why this situation occurs. Most people have a habit of reading incoming text messages, then deleting them (unless they need to keep information contained in the message). The reason for this is obvious: there is no need to keep already-read messages in your phone memory, and it prevents the memory from clogging up. But when you send a text message, you compose it, press "send", and the phone display goes back to the standard "home page". Many people don't even realise that most handsets automatically save each sent message, unless you specifically disable that option in the phone's feature menu.

There's every indication that Knox either didn't even realise that her handset stored her sent messages, or that she didn't know how to (or couldn't be bothered to) disable that feature. But she was explicitly clear that she belonged to the majority of mobile phone users who habitually delete incoming messages as soon as they have been read.

And that's the simple reason why she didn't have Lumumba's incoming message stored on her handset, and why her reply to Lumumba was stored in her "sent messages" folder. No mystery. No skullduggery. No attempt to deceive/mislead. No devious Luciferina-like behaviour. Just an ordinary person using their mobile handset in an entirely ordinary and explicable way.

 

[billyryan]

Ah well you and I actually agree on this. I would also contend that Maresca and Mignini have exerted undue (and improper) influence on Mr Kercher's thinking. But that's a slightly different issue. What I believe happened would have followed this linear pattern:

1) Maresca and Mignini convince John Kercher of their theory of the murder, and of Knox's/Sollecito's culpability

2) Maresca asks John Kercher for his instructions as to how Maresca should proceed in court.

3) John Kercher instructs Maresca to pursue an aggressive line against Knox and Sollecito, since Mr Kercher now believes that they are culpable.

So Maresca is acting on John Kercher's direct instructions and wishes. But it's Maresca himself who (along with Mignini) has convinced John Kercher to hold the views that lead to the instructions. An analogy would be something like this: imagine if I managed to convince you that the Earth was flat; imagine then that a third person asked me for your opinion on whether the Earth was flat; imagine that I asked you for your view on the flatness (or otherwise) of the Earth, so that I could give your view to the third person; you would tell me that you believed the Earth was flat, and I would convey this view to the third person.

I agree Maresca and Mignini convinced John Kercher of Amanda and Raffaele's involvement in his beloved Mez's murder,they done this at a time when he was a man destroyed by grief as would any of us in his position,as time went on as more people took a critical look at the case Mignini with the support or advice of Maresca found it necessary to do a deal with Rudy Guede to partially point the finger at Amanda and Raffaele,though it will have no bearing on the verdict in the present appeal,it has led to no appeal to Rudy's sentence reduction which will see him released as early as 2014

I have no doubt that Maresca and Mignini know full well that Raffaele and Amanda are innocent,they have full knowledge of the brutality of what Rudy has done neither seem in anyway to care that one day John Kercher will have to face the terrible realisation that through his employment and instruction of Maresca he helped the depraved killer of his beautiful daughter to serve the absolute minimum of time in prison

 

[pilot padron]

Watch it and weep

Some idiots elsewhere are taking a typical confirmation-biased approach to the issue of the text messages on Knox's phone. They seem to be of the impression that Knox deleted her sent messages, but kept her sent messages. And they then seem to think that Lumumba's lawyer Pacelli "skewered" Knox on the stand when he asked questions in this vein.

Well, Alas, and Alack. Finally a point we agree upon..

Yes, indeed, this particular full fledged idiot definitely "seems to think" Attorney Pacelli absolutely "skewered" Knox on the witness stand.
He unequivocally and unmistakably exposed Knox as the cunning manipulative pathological liar that she has been so often so perfectly described as, and in fact indubitably is.

Knox's detestable, disgusting accusation of a totally innocent man was by no stretch of the imagination forced, coerced, water boarded or any of the other Moore/ Marriott media sheet talking points worn so pathetically thin through unending regurgitation in 59,000+ arguments on this Board.
KNOX clearly and incontestably admits she had done this dastardly deed of the false and malicious accusation of Patrick completely and totally of her own free will in her unforced and unequivocal answers elicited by Attorney Pacelli's exemplary questioning techniques.

Per..haps you (*unconsciously* of course), avoided putting up the You Tube URL showing Knox's actual verbatim testimony that you attempt to sugar coat and spin in your 'argument'.
I have included the URL so that readers might have something other than your own equally "confirmation-biased" spin type 'argument' to use to draw their own conclusions.

Watch it and weep.
http://www.youtube.com/user/ViaDellaPergola#p/u/4/UyUh5y_8efE

Amanda Knox is a justly and correctly incarcerated drugged up murderess.
If in her own home state she would not be singing songs (one chord off key), and dancing in a spa like rehab facility.
Knox would be befittingly bedded down alone for life or worse.

PS:
RE:"Knox deleted her sent messages, but kept her sent messages"
I cannot also 'agree with this part of the above argument,
1) Because I had never seen this anywhere ever before from anyone else.
2) Because without the benefit of communications engineering, I have absolutely no concept of what confirmation-biased blighted incoherent, incomprehensible, indecipherable, indistinct, inexplicit, jumbled, meaningless, muddled, thought that it is feebly and futilely intended to convey to anyone anywhere.

 

[HumanityBlues]

Wow...just amazing!

For me, the discussion of the guilt/innocence part of this case was over a long time ago. Thanks to all of efforts of the logical people here at JREF, I learned a lot about this case. It didn't take long for me to see that this was simple....Rudy Guede was the only person responsible for the death of Meredith. Occam's Razor to the max.

What really fascinates me now is the stuff that Bruce just posted. There are some really qualified people at JREF. Are there any psychologists in the group that can give some insight into people like this? There have been lots of books written about this case already, but I suspect that there will be a few more when it's over. I certainly hope that one of them addresses this aspect.

Do we really need a psychologist to explain this? Can't they just be morons?

 

[HumanityBlues]

Well, Alas, and Alack. Finally a point we agree upon..

Yes, indeed, this particular full fledged idiot definitely "seems to think" Attorney Pacelli absolutely "skewered" Knox on the witness stand.
He unequivocally and unmistakably exposed Knox as the cunning manipulative pathological liar that she has been so often so perfectly described as, and in fact indubitably is.

Knox's detestable, disgusting accusation of a totally innocent man was by no stretch of the imagination forced, coerced, water boarded or any of the other Moore/ Marriott media sheet talking points worn so pathetically thin through unending regurgitation in 59,000+ arguments on this Board.
KNOX clearly and incontestably admits she had done this dastardly deed of the false and malicious accusation of Patrick completely and totally of her own free will in her unforced and unequivocal answers elicited by Attorney Pacelli's exemplary questioning techniques.

Per..haps you (*unconsciously* of course), avoided putting up the You Tube URL showing Knox's actual verbatim testimony that you attempt to sugar coat and spin in your 'argument'.
I have included the URL so that readers might have something other than your own equally "confirmation-biased" spin type 'argument' to use to draw their own conclusions.

Watch it and weep.
http://www.youtube.com/user/ViaDellaPergola#p/u/4/UyUh5y_8efE

Amanda Knox is a justly and correctly incarcerated drugged up murderess.
If in her own home state she would not be singing songs (one chord off key), and dancing in a spa like rehab facility.
Knox would be befittingly bedded down alone for life or worse.

PS:
RE:"Knox deleted her sent messages, but kept her sent messages"
I cannot also 'agree with this part of the above argument,
1) Because I had never seen this anywhere ever before from anyone else.
2) Because without the benefit of communications engineering, I have absolutely no concept of what confirmation-biased blighted incoherent, incomprehensible, indecipherable, indistinct, inexplicit, jumbled, meaningless, muddled, thought that it is feebly and futilely intended to convey to anyone anywhere.

Well LondonJohn, you finally got him talking about the case.

*Padron*, wanna make a wager on the outcome of the appeal? How confident are you they will lose their appeal? You sound pretty confident, but it would be interesting to hear your thought on that----put it in writing.

 

[RoseMontague]

Maresca gets up to contest that the knife should be opened and checked for blood so quickly one would think that he had sat on a cactus.

The more pics I find of the knife the more confused I am. This should have been done by the biology degreed one in the very beginning. These pics show that the handle appears to be one that would be very simple to separate.

 

[Paninaro]

Well, Alas, and Alack. Finally a point we agree upon..

Yes, indeed, this particular full fledged idiot definitely "seems to think" Attorney Pacelli absolutely "skewered" Knox on the witness stand.
He unequivocally and unmistakably exposed Knox as the cunning manipulative pathological liar that she has been so often so perfectly described as, and in fact indubitably is.

Knox's detestable, disgusting accusation of a totally innocent man was by no stretch of the imagination forced, coerced, water boarded or any of the other Moore/ Marriott media sheet talking points worn so pathetically thin through unending regurgitation in 59,000+ arguments on this Board.
KNOX clearly and incontestably admits she had done this dastardly deed of the false and malicious accusation of Patrick completely and totally of her own free will in her unforced and unequivocal answers elicited by Attorney Pacelli's exemplary questioning techniques.

Per..haps you (*unconsciously* of course), avoided putting up the You Tube URL showing Knox's actual verbatim testimony that you attempt to sugar coat and spin in your 'argument'.
I have included the URL so that readers might have something other than your own equally "confirmation-biased" spin type 'argument' to use to draw their own conclusions.

Watch it and weep.
http://www.youtube.com/user/ViaDellaPergola#p/u/4/UyUh5y_8efE

Amanda Knox is a justly and correctly incarcerated drugged up murderess.
If in her own home state she would not be singing songs (one chord off key), and dancing in a spa like rehab facility.
Knox would be befittingly bedded down alone for life or worse.

PS:
RE:"Knox deleted her sent messages, but kept her sent messages"
I cannot also 'agree with this part of the above argument,
1) Because I had never seen this anywhere ever before from anyone else.
2) Because without the benefit of communications engineering, I have absolutely no concept of what confirmation-biased blighted incoherent, incomprehensible, indecipherable, indistinct, inexplicit, jumbled, meaningless, muddled, thought that it is feebly and futilely intended to convey to anyone anywhere.

She clearly says she was under pressure from the police. "They were making me accuse." Did you miss that part?

What is so hard for you to understand about this? Lumumbas involvment was not the idea of Knox but of the police. It's probably a good idea a lot of times in practical police work to put this kind of pressure on a suspect, but there is clearly a chance it will backfire and you will get wrong information.

Hysterical video, btw. Its style and art work could make weaker souls cry for sure.

 

[RoseMontague]

More shadows or starch stuff. Dan O????

 

[Chris_Halkides]

Pacelli's view of what a typical woman is

Pilot Padron,

Would that be the same Carlo Pacelli who "called Knox a 'typical woman' and then described her as a lying, scheming, manipulative, whore?" The Independent reported, "Knox's stepfather, Chris Mellas, who was in court for the hearing, later said that Pacelli's denunciation of Knox was 'a sexist discourse that sets Italy back 100 years.'" It seems to me that bucketoftea has no clue about what is or is not sexism. Maybe the two of you can retire to a place where you can explain it to him using Pacelli's overheated rant as an example.
(highlighting mine)

 

[RWVBWL]

# of Rudy Guede's sexual partners?

Hi BucketofTea,
Re:

I disagree. Sexual history for the perpetrators of a sex crime seems fair enough to me. It's when it is used against a victim (ie by defence against rape victims) that it is appallingly sexxist and judgemental.

What does seem unfair is Knox taking all the heat. Sollecito could still address the court to defend Knox's alibi...

Most of us know how many sexual partners Amanda Knox has had in her lifetime, as we do so with Raffaele Sollecito.

Do you know, BoT, how many sexual partners that Rudy Guede had in his sexual history?
If not, why do you think that it is unknown, especially as it is almost 4 years now after Meredith Kercher's brutal murder?

If I recall correctly, it was Rudy's DNA that was found in Miss Kercher's vagina...

Can you show of any instances where a male accused of rape is asked about how many sexual partners they've had, and where 7 previous sexual partners taken to be indicative of a prediliction towards sexual violence?
And I'm talking numbers, as opposed to the nature of previous sexual encounters, such as violence or coercion being part of the nature of someone's sexual interaction.
I'd be very surprised to hear about any prosecutor in a case involving a male accused of a sexual crime bringing up number of sexual partners in order to show predisposition to sexual violence. If I'm wrong, then maybe the charge of misogyny is misplaced. If I'm right (that this never happens), then what we have is the implicit suggestion that with females (but not males), a 'high' number of sexual partners shows a prediliction for sexual violence. Which appears to be misogynistic.

Nicely written post Bri1,
well put, IMHO...
RW

 

[Danceme]

I have no doubt that Maresca and Mignini know full well that Raffaele and Amanda are innocent,

Careful billyryan, you're proving the "conspiracy" theorists right.

 

[komponisto]

I disagree. Sexual history for the perpetrators of a sex crime seems fair enough to me.

What is (perhaps) fair is criminal history, not sexual history. Sex is not a crime. Not even in large quantities. It would be different if the accused had previously committed sexual crimes. It is fundamentally unfair to infer a tendency toward criminal behavior directly from sexual activity.

It's when it is used against a victim (ie by defence against rape victims) that it is appallingly sexxist and judgemental.

I don't see any difference; sexist reasoning does not become non-sexist just because the person it is applied to is accused of a crime (sexual or otherwise).

Your position is analogous to believing that racism is bad when applied to a victim, but okay when applied to a defendant -- a stance that no one in their right mind would endorse.

 

[Mary_H]

Context is all. I wouldn't regard it as sexist. You see, it was a violent sexual crime. Sex is on the table. "...does not disdain multiple frequentations" is about as neutral as it is possible to word it. And it appears to be true, as well.

Nope. No misogyny there as far as I can see.

Then you agree that violence should also be on the table. Rudy Guede did not disdain from multiple break-ins and theft of other people's property. Amanda and Raffaele did.

If we are going to examine Amanda's sexual history, then let's go all the way. Did she ever have sex with a woman before? Did she ever have sex with multiple partners before? Did she ever bring a weapon to a sexual encounter before? If not, then her "frequentations" are irrelevant to the kind of "sex" involved in this crime.

As halides1 suggested, not everyone with an active sexual history is a killer.

 

[christianahannah]

The more pics I find of the knife the more confused I am. This should have been done by the biology degreed one in the very beginning. These pics show that the handle appears to be one that would be very simple to separate.

I don't think there was any dispute as to the easiness of the handle and blade being separated. Since a result was obtained (controversial or not) by not separating the handle from the blade it was probably more effective to leave the knife intact.

As to Maresca objecting to the knife being separated, he was doing so as a matter of procedure. I think if the defense makes a formal request for this to happen to the knife the judge may grant that request if it is necessary. Or maybe the prosecution will make this request. Or maybe both will leave it alone.

 

[Mary_H]

I agree Maresca and Mignini convinced John Kercher of Amanda and Raffaele's involvement in his beloved Mez's murder,they done this at a time when he was a man destroyed by grief as would any of us in his position,as time went on as more people took a critical look at the case Mignini with the support or advice of Maresca found it necessary to do a deal with Rudy Guede to partially point the finger at Amanda and Raffaele,though it will have no bearing on the verdict in the present appeal,it has led to no appeal to Rudy's sentence reduction which will see him released as early as 2014

I have no doubt that Maresca and Mignini know full well that Raffaele and Amanda are innocent,they have full knowledge of the brutality of what Rudy has done neither seem in anyway to care that one day John Kercher will have to face the terrible realisation that through his employment and instruction of Maresca he helped the depraved killer of his beautiful daughter to serve the absolute minimum of time in prison

Well said, Billy. Kercher also will suffer from regret for 1.) unknowingly making things worse for the innocent defendants, and for 2.) doing it publicly.