Continuation Part 3 - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case

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putting the right incentives in place in forensics

Here is a recent article on forensic reform by Radley Balko. He wrote, "The best way to begin mending the problems with the forensics system is to fix the incentives, aligning them so analysts are rewarded only for sound, scientifically supported work and punished for allowing their work to be influenced by bias, intentional or not."
 
RoseMontague,

I don't recall ever seeing this comparison before. I am willing to listen to arguments to the effect that the luminol print should not be attributed to anyone (lacking whorls and what not). But I am completely baffled how anyone could attribute it to Amanda with that second toe issue. Another thing with respect to the luminol prints that I have never understood is how one can relate them to the crime when all three are right feet.

I have wondered how the tile floor could affect the photography of the luminol prints and any prints which would be made.

The tile is not smooth but porous (I am not sure this is the correct term but there are hollows and craters throughout the tile - it is not a total flat surface).

Were Rudy's shoeprints of both soles or only one? I don't think those were recovered with luminol were they?
 
I have wondered how the tile floor could affect the photography of the luminol prints and any prints which would be made.

The tile is not smooth but porous (I am not sure this is the correct term but there are hollows and craters throughout the tile - it is not a total flat surface).

Were Rudy's shoeprints of both soles or only one? I don't think those were recovered with luminol were they?

If true, and if the prints were made in blood, I don't see how none was left in those pores for the tmb test to detect.

So we now have how many reasons to believe these prints were not made in blood or by AK/RS? I'm losing count...
 
I have wondered how the tile floor could affect the photography of the luminol prints and any prints which would be made.

The tile is not smooth but porous (I am not sure this is the correct term but there are hollows and craters throughout the tile - it is not a total flat surface).

Were Rudy's shoeprints of both soles or only one? I don't think those were recovered with luminol were they?

Fortunately they were tile because the cops forgot florescent measuring tape.
If it were not for that there would be no measurements.

Some of the photos were also taken at a pretty severe angle.
 
Here is a recent article on forensic reform by Radley Balko. He wrote, "The best way to begin mending the problems with the forensics system is to fix the incentives, aligning them so analysts are rewarded only for sound, scientifically supported work and punished for allowing their work to be influenced by bias, intentional or not."

While certainly not a new concept, this bears repeating:

the main problem driving nearly all the recent forensics scandals is a built-in bias in favor of winning convictions. In too many jurisdictions, medical examiners report to the attorney general or to the state official who oversees law enforcement.
 
Earlier I had posted the defense consultant's testimony disputing Rinaldi's assertion that one of the Luminol prints belonged to Amanda. From the Rinaldi report:


Remember the consultant talked about Amanda's second toe. Check out the pictures, has this toe just been ignored? LOL:


So it's actually more likely that this particular foot print belonged to the only other person with a similar foot size who would have had reason to be walking barefoot in that part of the house: Meredith Kercher.

Chalk another one up for the "crack" forensics team, and for the (dis)honourable Judge Massei....
 
more on investigator bias

Another article on contextual information and fingerprints is here. "'The same expert on the same fingerprint can make totally conflicting decisions, depending on the context,' said Dr Dror, who presented his results at the British Psychological Society's annual meeting in York."
 
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If true, and if the prints were made in blood, I don't see how none was left in those pores for the tmb test to detect.

So we now have how many reasons to believe these prints were not made in blood or by AK/RS? I'm losing count...


Well, it's possible that if the feet only had a faint tacky trace of blood on them, there wouldn't have been enough blood to seep down into the small pores in the tiling. But that's somewhat irrelevant anyhow, since these prints weren't made in blood.

Another thing about the Luminol tests that I forgot to say at the time there was some discussion about the test procedure (a few days ago) is this: It's critically important to know the exposure settings (aperture and shutter speed, and film ASA if silver nitrate film was used) for the Luminol photos in order to determine the reliability and relevance of the results. Even the faintest Luminol traces can be made to look like the lights on a Christmas tree if the camera shutter is left open for multiple seconds at a wide aperture. The only caveat would be that the investigators would need to have very efficiently lightproofed the area being photographed - otherwise the whole scene would have appeared lit-up with a very long exposure.

I think that the Luminol photos show strong evidence of the "crack" police team having done exactly this: pushing for an extremely long exposure in order to make the prints appear more lit up. I think that the evidence for this is the multiple light dots and lighter areas on the tiling that are definitely just background "noise" - an ultra-long exposure would have amplified this "noise" in just this way.

I therefore think it would be extremely instructive and important to obtain precise exposure data for these Luminol photos, and to compare the data with exposure data from other Luminol forensic photo studies in other cases. I have a strong feeling that we would see that the Perugia police used far longer exposures than would be deemed normal. However I also would be inclined to believe that the Perugia clowns didn't even keep proper, accurate records of the exposure settings for the Luminol photos.
 
That really looks very different. I've got a feeling the court is not going to buy Rinaldi's crap this time.

I agree...
The prosecution has been found to be wrong on about every item that's been placed under thoughtful scrutiny this time.
 
Another article on contextual information and fingerprints is here. "'The same expert on the same fingerprint can make totally conflicting decisions, depending on the context,' said Dr Dror, who presented his results at the British Psychological Society's annual meeting in York."


Yes: fingerprint analysis is not the totally fail-safe 100%-accurate matching tool that most people assume. There can be - and have been - significant errors made in matching prints*. However, this problem has been minimised by improved computerised matching algorithms, based on multiple points of comparison.

* Including the notable example of an Oregon lawyer who was mistakenly positively identified as one of the 2004 Madrid train bombers through botched fingerprint analysis.
 
Fascinating read...

Here is a recent article on forensic reform by Radley Balko. He wrote, "The best way to begin mending the problems with the forensics system is to fix the incentives, aligning them so analysts are rewarded only for sound, scientifically supported work and punished for allowing their work to be influenced by bias, intentional or not."
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halides1,

thank you for bringing this article to this forum's attention. The reforms are interesting to say the least, but (like the article says) will cost money. Personally I think, minimum protocols should be established and if it's proven they weren't followed, then all evidence relating to the case should be thrown out and the defendant immediately released, regardless of how much OTHER evidence there is.

But, that's just me.

I found it interesting that even fingerprint evidence was mentioned. I always wondered about it's reliability. I mean, it's not like prints have to match 100%. All you need (if I remember correctly) is 13 (or something like that) points of similarity for it to be considered reliable. Like DNA it's all based on probabilities.

Bite mark analysis has always bothered me (amongst other things), and when Ted Bundy (I think he was guilty as sin regardless) was convicted in his first trial in Florida of the sorority house murders, the main bit of forensic evidence against him was the opinion of a bite mark analyzer. Now a days, many forensic experts think that bite mark analysis isn't as accurate as some people would like to think.

Forensic crime scene analyzers should be held to a higher degree than they currently are. Because of shows like CSI, people think when a forensic scientist says it, it's got to be true, and the result is an uphill battle for any defense lawyers arguing contamination, wrongful identifications, or bias in the analyzers work.

I truly believe without the bra clasp video in the Kercher case, it probably would have been much harder (if not virtually impossible) for the independent experts to prove contamination in this case. It's a sad but true fact that defense witnesses that argue forensics do confuse the hell out of juries (who are not experts by any means) if they don't bore them to death first.

Once again halides1 thank you for posting this,

Dave
 
fingerprints and bite marks

I found it interesting that even fingerprint evidence was mentioned. I always wondered about it's reliability. I mean, it's not like prints have to match 100%. All you need (if I remember correctly) is 13 (or something like that) points of similarity for it to be considered reliable. Like DNA it's all based on probabilities.

Bite mark analysis has always bothered me (amongst other things), and when Ted Bundy (I think he was guilty as sin regardless) was convicted in his first trial in Florida of the sorority house murders, the main bit of forensic evidence against him was the opinion of a bite mark analyzer. Now a days, many forensic experts think that bite mark analysis isn't as accurate as some people would like to think.

Forensic crime scene analyzers should be held to a higher degree than they currently are. Because of shows like CSI, people think when a forensic scientist says it, it's got to be true, and the result is an uphill battle for any defense lawyers arguing contamination, wrongful identifications, or bias in the analyzers work.

Dave
Dave,

Thank you for the kind words. I think that the science underpinning DNA analysis is the strongest of all the forensic sciences of which I am aware, but that is not to say that no problems or ambiguities exist. Rolfe has a good discussion of fingerprints at the WM3 thread. Bite marks are an area where outright fraud has been entirely too common. I think that the lengthy Koppl article has a good discussion.
 
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First of all, your diagrams wrong, where did you get it from, Rudy left no prints in the bathroom, secondly, all the shoe prints are left foot of Rudy's, the prints clearly show he was running out of Meredith's room and stopped in the living room probably to put his coat back on that Amanda had hung up for him. Rudy clearly did not stop to lock Meredith's door no matter how you want to spin it but at the same time I know you people can not accept this, because it means Amanda is GUILTY to some degree, Good day sir.

This is incredibly interesting.

So Rudy left only left foot prints while leaving Meredith's room for the ?'th time.

The bloody footprint on the bathmat, which we all know to be Rudy's can now have a narrative constructed around it.
He's taken his shoe off in the bathroom, cleaned up his right foot and the blood leaking into his sock, and is then only leaving a left foot print afterwards .
 
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I'm no expert...

Thank you for the kind words. I think that the science underpinning DNA analysis is the strongest of all the forensic sciences of which I am aware, but that is not to say that no problems or ambiguities exist. Rolfe has a good discussion of fingerprints at the WM3 thread. Bite marks are an area where outright fraud has been entirely too common. I think that the lengthy Koppl article has a good discussion.
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halides1,

by any stretch of the imagination (thank you for the Rolfe and Koppl references by the way), but I have been fascinated by forensics ever since my teens when I read ALL the original Perry Mason novels. Not the TV shows, but the actual books by Erle Stanley Gardner (on which the TV shows were based). In many of his courtroom cross-examinations it is obvious Gardner had a very accurate and factual understanding of real forensic science (which was in it's early days, before DNA, back then when Gardner first wrote his novels, late 1930s to 60s). Through those books, I came to understand (not only many basic legal concepts and courtroom protocols and procedures were but also) what postmortem lividity was, how time of death could roughly be calculated using stomach contents and also rigor mortis (if an accurate temperature wasn't taken early enough) and so much much more.

Gardner also dedicated many of his early books to groundbreaking forensic innovators of his day. Our (me and my roommate's) study and research into serial killers (which also includes missing persons which we think are closely related) has also opened me up to a whole other level of forensic investigative techniques and crime scene analysis that you just don't see in shows like CSI. The shows are flawed in many many ways to numerous to recount here.

This forum with all the DNA debates (especially after the V&C report was released) that I've read here have also been an invaluable addition to my educational accumulation. It's a fascinating subject for me and I thank everyone here for allowing me to be a part of it and (most importantly) being able to read everyone's insightful and thought provoking analysis, discussions, and debates.

Sorry for the diarrhea of the mouth, and for going OT,

Dave
 
I too have recently dared venturing over to the Perugian Murderer's Friends website for a peek.

Here's a great post over there by this WantsJustice i****.

I've got my replies to some of it between the italics since I'm not allowed to post there with any alias unless under armed guard.

I'm sorry that I misstated the knife and the Massei conclusion about premeditation. But, whether we like it or not, the knife and bra clasp were considered important pieces of evidence by the Massei court. Massei devoted 13 pages to these the knife and bra clasp (264 to 277). There is certainly other evidence, but these two pieces were not insignificant. If they are thrown out, it will hurt the prosecution's case. The question is how much.

The reason I tend to think the appeals court may exclude the bra clasp and the knife is that it appointed Drs. Conti and Vecchioti, so obviously, the court respects their judgment. My experience in the U.S. is that courts tend to rely on court appointed experts in scientific matters like this.

I understand the frustration, but there is no point of an appeals process if the court is simply going to rubber stamp the first court.

In someways it may not be a bad thing to exclude the knife and bra clasp. There is enough evidence without them and exclusion would take away a major talking point for the Knox PR machine. If the court ignores Drs. Conti and Vecchioti, then it will be accused of railroading Knox and Sollecito. But if the court excludes the evidence and finds that their is still overwhelming evidence of guilt, it may cause some fair minded people in the media to pause and relook at the case. .

Regardless, I would like the court to make the following declarations, at the beginning of their report:

1. The break-in was obviously staged and the defense has never presented any evidence to refute this.


The photos of the large pieces of glass placed on the window ledge to enter the room, footprint on the top sill of the window beneath Filomena's, and the one of the guy able to easily climb through the window disprove this.
It's a blatant breakin.

2. Meredith was killed at 22:30, making it unlikely that she returned home shortly after 9:00 and interrupted a burglary in process.

The food in the duodenum shows up another crackpot Mignini theory. The TOD is just adjusted to accomodate Raff's non-logged computer usage.
She was killed earlier that's it. The prosecution stuffed up the time to fit their personal agenda. Just ask Rudy, he says 9:20-9:30, and you know he's defintely not lying. He knows what he's talikng about and he's right.

3. The "false confession' was excluded by the first court and played no part in Knox's conviction (it's a pet peeve of mine that this is rarely mentioned). However, Knox has never explained why she didn't insist that her lawyers contact the prosecution to exonerate Mr. Lumumba.

All false confessions remain negated until the cops cough up the interrogation tape they're too scared to show.
Because it exposes their guilty natures in relation to the 'interview'

4. The appeals court carefully considered Dr. Vinci's report, but finds it obvious that the footprint on the bathmat matches Sollecito's foot (not Guede's) and the bloody shoe print in Meredith's room obviously belongs to a woman with Knox's shoe size.

They don't seem interested in rehashing Rudy's blob. It's indistinguishable outside the obvious fact that by reading the events through external data it's Rudy's without a doubt.

5. The DNA found in the hallway and Fiona's room belongs to Knox and Meredith. Further,if DNA is so omnipresent in a person's residence, why didn't the police find Fiona's and Laura's DNA in these places?

I can't really be bothered with footprints in people's own hallways. But I could point out that Meredith and Amanda lived together in a different wing of the cottage to the other two.

6. The luminol test was performed weeks after the crime, making it unlikely that the substance was bleach, juice or horseradish.

Outisde Steff's lying to the court about the tests for blood, nothing has ever been shown to the court.

6. Sollecito called the police after the postal police arrived. There is video camera evidence to support the postal police's version of events.

This is sheer rubbish and the opposite has been proven to the court to be true. As everyone here's known for ages.

7. Statements given by Knox and Sollecito were evasive and deceptive.
Every court in the world evaluates the veracity of the defendants when determining guilt or innocence.


High pressure situation (conducted by morons) young people get nervous, big deal, so what.

8. Finally, it is nice when the prosecution can provide a motive in crimes like this, but the court cannot ignore substantial evidence simply because no one can make sense of such a senseless crime.

Yeah, it's nice when they come up with something that doesn't make you p*** yourself with laughter.
The female student flatmate leading the burglar and rich student kid, who don't know each other in a sex attack ??????????
How do grown up people believe these things ?
Try Rudy the burglar broke in and killed Meredith at 9:20. Raff and Amanda were nervy murder discoverers with some slight inkling of what had gone on, and the cops told silly stories to the press upon their incorrect capture, then framed them.

Goes to show you what's being posted on the dark side.

No wonder they're not about to lose, but to be crushingly destroyed.
 
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I therefore think it would be extremely instructive and important to obtain precise exposure data for these Luminol photos, and to compare the data with exposure data from other Luminol forensic photo studies in other cases. I have a strong feeling that we would see that the Perugia police used far longer exposures than would be deemed normal. However I also would be inclined to believe that the Perugia clowns didn't even keep proper, accurate records of the exposure settings for the Luminol photos.


All the photos were taken with digital cameras and the exposure settings are available to anyone that looks for it.

How does 63.5s at f/5 and equivalent iso 1600 sound for an exposure?
 
All the photos were taken with digital cameras and the exposure settings are available to anyone that looks for it.

How does 63.5s at f/5 and equivalent iso 1600 sound for an exposure?

I'd say that is a very long exposure. I'd have to check my F-stop and iso, but it seems similar to what I use for photographing stars, and I only use a 15s exposure for them.
 
The DNA found in the hallway and Fiona's room belongs to Knox and Meredith.

Fiona? Isn't she Shrek's missus? PhantomWolf is unsure that PhantomWolf can take someone seriously when per haps they don't even know the names of the player, per chance.
 
"4. The appeals court carefully considered Dr. Vinci's report, but finds it obvious that the footprint on the bathmat matches Sollecito's foot (not Guede's) and the bloody shoe print in Meredith's room obviously belongs to a woman with Knox's shoe size."

Is it true that Hellman's appeals court has already sided with the prosecution on the bathmat/footprint issue?
 
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