Continuation Part 3 - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case

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Re: clothing - in addition to the Comodi and Napoleoni examples what Stefanoni's hot, hot silver pumps -

Those examples however are fashion statements and neither wore shorts which is a big no-no.
 
Danceme said:
You've completely misunderstood. I don't think it's blood on the booties. I think the fabric of the sterile booties may contain some chemical which, when the overspray of luminol landed on them in droplet form, what we are seeing is the droplets of luminol spray reacting to said chemical. In other words, this tech was standing there as the luminol was sprayed and some droplets landed on his booties which reacted to the chemical composition of the fabric or the sterilization chemical the booties were treated with.
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I misunderstood, I thought you 'supposed' it must be blood, which is a inherent assumption made by some about anything that lights up luminol. I think that a common but erroneous conclusion to jump to. If one starts with the thought they are blood, then noting (in the case of the footprints) the negative TMB test and the lack of the confirmation seems 'trumped' by any wildly unlikely scenario the prosecution proposes, then finishes with 'they could be blood or turnip juice, you decide.' Instead they're just some stain on the floor that tested negative for blood, and they didn't even bother to try to confirm. In reality those droplets are more likely to be blood being as they haven't tested negative for it.


Danceme said:
The absurd number of assumptions you made about me above really makes me loathe to respond in any form to your post except to point out your blatantly obvious antagonism.
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Apologies, that wasn't my intention, despite the use of 'you' I didn't intend it to be personal or antagonistic merely to point out that even if one makes the assumption that they are blood, one must then pile on more dubious suppositions they could still be a result of Amanda and Raffaele being involved in the murder. Thus totally discounting that the prosecution, which hasn't been playing fair, is out there deliberately and disingenuously gathering evidence, notably the TMB negative they would try to hide and the lack of the confirmation tests.

Frankly I think they caked that floor with luminol and then picked and chose which stains they thought they could pretend were part of the murder.



Danceme said:
You simply forget you're a 'guy' talking to a 'girl' and you remember that you're a 'lawyer' talking to a 'client' and her family, and that's she's on trial for her life, both in court and the media, and you tell her quite matter of factly that she and her loved ones really should dress more sedately and more formally in keeping with what is expected of such a serious matter in a serious court of law. Simple really, no embarrassment required. Lawyers are very used to this.
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I don't disagree with that, I meant something else. Nevermind. :)
 
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snook1 said:
That's true.
It's not the first time he was trying to use the source thing.
His sources are not reliable, at best.
Though, I'm kinda shocked that he's doing this.
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I'd be willing to bet his 'source' is the conventional wisdom of a segment of the Italian media not entirely familiar with the case. If you read through some google translated articles, mainly of a few months back, you'll see some of them started to come to the conclusion the conviction would be upheld, but that the sentence would be reduced. I kinda got the impression that's what Machiavelli thought might happen, though I cannot recall a specific reference to it off the top of my head.

Personally I think it a forlorn hope at this juncture, though apparently it is possible in the Italian System and is actually fairly common at the appeal stage, more so than outright acquittals. Of course most of those cases aren't as dubious as this one, with independent experts mocking the Italian police and forensics in court, and the 'witness' that broke the alibi laughed out of court.

What's interesting is if that is true, the Machine no longer think it looks all that 'ominous for Knox and Sollecito.' :cool:
 
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A new post on DNA contamination and secondary transfer

A new post is up at View from Wilmington. It covers some aspects of transfer of trace amounts of DNA and gives some examples of known or suspected DNA contamination.
 
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Grinder said:
Re: clothing - in addition to the Comodi and Napoleoni examples what Stefanoni's hot, hot silver pumps -

Those examples however are fashion statements and neither wore shorts which is a big no-no.
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Of course the other pejorative lie in the false description of Deanna's attire on July 4th was that she was wearing "hotpants". She clearly is not wearing hotpants. She is wearing shorts. Hotpants are defined as very short shorts where the hemline is no more than an inch or so below the crotch line, and which are usually either skintight or near skintight. Deanna's shorts were loose-fitting, with the hemline a good three or four inches below the crotch line. Deanna's shorts are not hotpants.

In addition, Ganong still appears happy to convey the impression that Deanna was wearing gaudy clothing: her "updated" version refers to Deanna's "red-white-and-blue hotpants outfit" - which is clearly intended to mislead readers into thinking that Deanna was wearing some sort of gaudy multi-colour clothing atrocity. In reality, Deanna was wearing navy blue shorts, a scarlet red top and a plan white cardigan. I fully agree that shorts are not appropriate attire for a courtroom (although Deanna wasn't the person on trial, the last time I checked), but such attempts to hyperbolise the situation tell us far more about the author than the subject the author is attempting to disparage.


ETA: These, I think, are the kind of hotpants that Ganong's description of Deanna would conjure up to most people:

http://www.topshop.com/webapp/wcs/s...ryId=203984&pageSize=20&refinements=category~[230022|208529]
 
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Fine said:
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Kaosium,

Here's what I think happened. It wasn't a forgery exactly. Maresca had a letter from Stephanie, written in fluent English, and he "improved" it by incorporating statements---statements that strengthened the argument on the eve of the next hearing--- and some of those statements written by Maresca were mumbo-jumbo English. It's unlikely that she would have approved of his "improvements" had she seen them. (Don't expect Stephanie to protest publicly the "improvement" of her letter, however much the English language was tortured.)

Komponisto's conjecture that the mumbo-jumbo resulted from double retro-translation is unlikely. In the TGcom video the letter in English is displayed and called "La lettera della sorella" (The sister's letter). If the letter as displayed had suffered double retro-translation there'd be a lot more mumbo-jumbo. Instead, most of the statements in English are fluent standard English. The reason why the Italian text is preferable to the English text---where the mumb-jumbo statements are translated---is because Maresca provided both the English text and the Italian "translation" of the text. Maresca knew what he wanted to say in the mumbo-jumbo English, so, of course, the Italian "translation" would be unambiguous. Just further evidence of mischief, in my opinion.

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Ah, I see what you're getting at now, and I think you're probably right, especially now that those more familiar with English idioms have weighed in and thought it impossible or virtually so that someone from Coulsdon would employ that usage even for something as esoteric as DNA quantification, or however it was meant to be employed in the 'original,' that kinda confused me. I did find that it seemed to make much more sense when translated to Italian and then translated back to English extraordinarily curious, if I understood that correctly.

However, I think this more interesting as it reveals what Maresca might be thinking if what he might have added can be delineated from the original, and I have to start with the assumption there was an original, as I don't think it even implies much if any misconduct. Were I writing a letter to a foreign court with proceedings in another language I'd pre-approve revisions and additions of relevant material to the court by my lawyer, I really hope poor Stephy isn't poring over which DNA traces were left where and with what. In fact isn't that what the lawyer is there for, to do that sort of thing anyway for those not versed in the court proceedings?
 
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'It is extremely difficult to understand how the results which were obtained with great care and presented in the first trial as valid could now be regraded as irrelevant.'

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...sh-sit-Amanda-Knoxs-appeal.html#ixzz1X0yuisG9


I think this is understandable, 90% of the people in the courtroom haven't a clue what the DNA is all about. Isn't that what Nick, Barbie and Andrea said in the previous table-talk interview video, a unanimous table-vote, this was not a "clean conviction".

When someone says its not a "clean" conviction, I think two things.

1- confusing
2- corruption, as in dirty, untruthful, lying, cheating, falsifying

And I wonder, why is everyone confused and even some ex-Pro Guilters saying its not a clean conviction?

And then I think of Edgardo Giobbi from the Serious Squad...
Stefanoni delaying the court and refusing to offer the data as if theres something to hide or she is an Elitist, and Mignini who dreamed up the stanic sex orgy early on, Commodi getting things wrong, the police ruining hardrives,

and now the review of the main piece of evidence, the knife..this knife that the prosecution said Amanda stabbed Meredith with, in the media and in their Animated Video.....the knife was retested.

and found to not have blood and not cleaned = Not the murder weapon

Its confusing the the Prosecution was so wrong. That Stefanoni couldn't have checked the knife better, at least the crevice.
What kind of expert doesnt check the crevice of a knife while its under the microscope?

Stefanoni did do blood tests though and they were negative on the knife and the luminol locations.
So I doubt she will argue the blood testing in a few hours.

I agree its confusing and a unclean conviction.
 
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It's normal for Mr. Kercher to do an article prior to an important hearing. This time it is a letter from Meredith's sister. I have no doubt it is authentic.

BTW, as for the countless DNA, it's the other Stefi that seems to have some difficulty getting the quantity correct.
 
halides1 said:
A new post is up at View from Wilmington. It covers some aspects of transfer of trace amounts of DNA and gives some examples of known or suspected DNA contamination.
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Thats a perfect article for the next few days.

I read all the quotes to reknowned scientists, but who is the vendor, of the lab tool, and what qualifications do they have to be setting the limits/ability of the tool for the users?
 
Rolfe said:
I note that the PMF posters seem unable to make out the text of the on-screen letter, which I believe is what has been posted here. Lacking that, someone has translated the Italian version into English. The sentence in question reads a lot better in this back-translation than it does in what purports to be the original!

Weird.

Rolfe.
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That's the strange thing, it actually makes sense in Italian but not in English! DNA "di poco conto", of little account, insignificant; but since "conto" also means "count", it's as if someone has translated it into English from Italian as "of little count", "count less", not realizing that "countless" means the exact opposite of what was being said.

Other parts of the typed letter also sound more like they were written first in Italian and then translated, like "It should also be remembered that both parties the Prosecution and the Defence" ("parties" seems to be used a lot in legal Italian to refer to the various sides in the trial, but to me doesn't sound quite natural in English there), and "Her blood with mixed traces spread through the bathroom" (again, just a strange sentence construction).

It's odd: I can only think it's a double translation, or that it was originally written in Italian. I really doubt the typed English letter is the original.
 
halides1 said:
A new post is up at View from Wilmington. It covers some aspects of transfer of trace amounts of DNA and gives some examples of known or suspected DNA contamination.
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Very informative and accurate article - thanks. It also addresses the misguided and ignorant arguments put forward by the prosecutors and most pro-guilt commentators regarding the DNA aspects of the case, chiefly in the areas of contamination and low template quantities of DNA. As your piece amply demonstrates, contamination is a very real possibility - especially if evidence is not properly collected and handled, and if the quantities under debate are in the low-template order of magnitude. And the whole issue of low template DNA is not whether it's admissible in criminal cases per se, but that very specific and strenuous protocols/procedures must be employed when working with such miniscule quantities. If these protocols and procedures are not followed (hello, Ms Stefanoni), then any low template analysis immediately and automatic becomes subject to increasing levels of reasonable doubt.
 
katy_did said:
That's the strange thing, it actually makes sense in Italian but not in English! DNA "di poco conto", of little account, insignificant; but since "conto" also means "count", it's as if someone has translated it into English from Italian as "of little count", "count less", not realizing that "countless" means the exact opposite of what was being said.

Other parts of the typed letter also sound more like they were written first in Italian and then translated, like "It should also be remembered that both parties the Prosecution and the Defence" ("parties" seems to be used a lot in legal Italian to refer to the various sides in the trial, but to me doesn't sound quite natural in English there), and "Her blood with mixed traces spread through the bathroom" (again, just a strange sentence construction).

It's odd: I can only think it's a double translation, or that it was originally written in Italian. I really doubt the typed English letter is the original.
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The pro-guilt crowd seem to have convinced themselves that the coherent version recounted in Pisa's piece for the Mail on Sunday is Stephanie's original version. That, of course, is to totally overlook the fact that for this to be the case, the screenshot incoherent "countless" version would have to - for some unfathomable reason - have been a bad Italian-English translation of the English-Italian translation of Stephanie's "original" coherent version.

It simply doesn't add up in a reasonable way. I really can't think of any decent reason why the screenshot would have show a typed version of an English-Italian-English mistranslation.
 
komponisto said:
Not exactly. Anyone can be in court, of course; but to actually participate in the trial you need to be a party to the case. The Italian system allows the victim's relatives to become a "civil party" [parte civile], if they so choose. This is analogous to filing a civil suit in Anglo-Saxon systems.

Now, from a theoretical point of view, I don't know that a civil party is actually obligated to support the prosecution; however, in practice, my understanding is that they nearly always do. In fact, they may even take harsher positions than the prosecution.

For example, as far as I know, Maresca could perfectly well have advocated for the "lone wolf" theory during Guede's trial, had his clients wished it, opposing any attempt to spread blame to Amanda and Raffaele. He could then have appealed any part of the decision which granted Guede mitigation on the grounds of the concurrent participation of others. I don't know that he could have affected the prison sentence (that may be the exclusive province of the prosecution) but he could have gotten increased monetary damages.
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An Italian working in a legal office, not a lawyer but with daily access to them and an interest in Italian law wrote a number of long, very informative and (to me at least) highly entertaining posts on the Italian System and it's complex proceedings about a year ago. Here's one thread where he goes into what the duties of the victim's lawyer entail, and there are others written about the same time that explore it even further. According to this, one of Maresca's responsibilities is to ensure as many 'aggravating' circumstances as he can, and ensure as long a prison sentence as is possible.

My point about Maresca is that he ought to have advised them long before that action against Amanda and Raffaele was likely to be fruitless, and that actual evidence exists against Rudy Guede and if vengeance was the goal, his was the head to be seeking. Instead Rudy Guede skated away and Maresca's focus was on Amanda and Raffaele, either for reasons of vengeance or money. Lawyers, they know the law, they know how court proceedings go, or at least they like to tell people they do. They tend to advise clients who are less familiar than they about such things. What kind of advisement could Maresca be giving them if they are writing articles and letters with all sorts of nonsense in them? Why did he not tell them in the beginning, or at least some point since, that the appeal was quite likely to go poorly?

Why did he hug Mignini when the DNA results were 'confirmed' when anyone with any sense whatsoever could see that had to be bogus. Going by the crime scene videos themselves, (for which he associated the Kerchers with in the case against the Sollecitos) the whole forensic case against Amanda and Raffaele--which was weak to begin with--was a total fraud. He had the ultimate 'inside information,' he didn't have to rely on trying to puzzle it out like the rest of us from news articles and websites, and he obviously knows something about the Italian legal system, being a lawyer and all.

Something about Maresca just doesn't smell right. While the victim's lawyer might well be a fervent ally of the prosecution in court in most cases, that being the obvious move, his loyalty ought to just as obviously be his clients, and in a case like this which was ridiculous on the face of it, especially to someone on the inside like that (does anyone suppose Giulia Bongiorno decided to take on a loser?) why would an accomplished lawyer like Maresca lead his clients in the wrong direction? Why wouldn't he give them good information, at least regarding the actual evidence in the case?
 
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LondonJohn said:
The pro-guilt crowd seem to have convinced themselves that the coherent version recounted in Pisa's piece for the Mail on Sunday is Stephanie's original version. That, of course, is to totally overlook the fact that for this to be the case, the screenshot incoherent "countless" version would have to - for some unfathomable reason - have been a bad Italian-English translation of the English-Italian translation of Stephanie's "original" coherent version.

It simply doesn't add up in a reasonable way. I really can't think of any decent reason why the screenshot would have show a typed version of an English-Italian-English mistranslation.
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No, I think that's just a better translation of the Italian version (Pisa's?). Take the sentence: "How can the DNA of the knife be considered a small amount when the same experts themselves cannot give an exact response to how much should be taken into consideration?" The "same experts", "gli stessi periti" - it's a phrase that could be used in English, but I think is far more common in Italian (that use of 'same', I mean). Similarly "taken into consideration" sounds more Italian in that context than English to me. Even "an exact response" sounds a bit unnatural - wouldn't you just say, "the experts can't say exactly how much DNA should be considered significant" or something similar, not "the same experts themselves cannot give an exact response to how much should be taken into consideration"!

It's a piece by Nick Pisa, with no indication that the family were involved in writing it. I think he's just reporting on the letter printed in the Italian press, probably having translated it himself.
 
katy_did said:
That's the strange thing, it actually makes sense in Italian but not in English! DNA "di poco conto", of little account, insignificant; but since "conto" also means "count", it's as if someone has translated it into English from Italian as "of little count", "count less", not realizing that "countless" means the exact opposite of what was being said.

Other parts of the typed letter also sound more like they were written first in Italian and then translated, like "It should also be remembered that both parties the Prosecution and the Defence" ("parties" seems to be used a lot in legal Italian to refer to the various sides in the trial, but to me doesn't sound quite natural in English there), and "Her blood with mixed traces spread through the bathroom" (again, just a strange sentence construction).

It's odd: I can only think it's a double translation, or that it was originally written in Italian. I really doubt the typed English letter is the original.
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The only other possibility (and one being proposed by some pro-guilt commentators) is that Stephanie actually wrote the original in Italian. But if that was the case, why was an Italian media outlet (Tgcom) not showing the Italian original in a piece that was intended to be viewed by an Italian audience? It makes absolutely no sense whatsoever that either Maresca or Tgcom would have chosen to show the English translation if the original was in Italian.

Furthermore, if Stephanie had written the original in Italian, what need would there have been for an English translation at all? After all, the letter is clearly intended for the court and an Italian audience. If Stephanie or any of the Kerchers wish to get a message across to the Anglo media, I'd have thought that they would do so directly in their common language of English, rather than via an Italian-English translation of an Italian language original letter.

I call shenanigans :D
 
LondonJohn said:
The only other possibility (and one being proposed by some pro-guilt commentators) is that Stephanie actually wrote the original in Italian. But if that was the case, why was an Italian media outlet (Tgcom) not showing the Italian original in a piece that was intended to be viewed by an Italian audience? It makes absolutely no sense whatsoever that either Maresca or Tgcom would have chosen to show the English translation if the original was in Italian.

Furthermore, if Stephanie had written the original in Italian, what need would there have been for an English translation at all? After all, the letter is clearly intended for the court and an Italian audience. If Stephanie or any of the Kerchers wish to get a message across to the Anglo media, I'd have thought that they would do so directly in their common language of English, rather than via an Italian-English translation of an Italian language original letter.

I call shenanigans :D
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LOL :D

Yes as you say, it must have been written with an Italian audience in mind. Perhaps she wrote it with the help of an interpreter (and almost inevitably Maresca)? But then, as you point out as well, it doesn't make a lot of sense that the English version was shown by tg.com - unless it was just for effect, as if to say "look it's in English, she really wrote it!"

All a bit weird, I'm not really sure what to make of it.
 
katy_did said:
LOL :D

Yes as you say, it must have been written with an Italian audience in mind. Perhaps she wrote it with the help of an interpreter (and almost inevitably Maresca)? But then, as you point out as well, it doesn't make a lot of sense that the English version was shown by tg.com - unless it was just for effect, as if to say "look it's in English, she really wrote it!"

All a bit weird, I'm not really sure what to make of it.
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Maresca is on the English speaking lawyer list. It would not surprise me at all if he put her letter out in his Italian translation and TG.com just typed it up in an English retranslation just to act like they had some kind of "exclusive".

Again, we expected something from the Kerchers before the hearing. This is a little strange but really doesn't mean a whole lot.
 
Predictions for tomorrow's hearing? C&V cross-examination by Maresca. Will <Dr. Stefi make it to the stand tomorrow? Will Barbie be back in the tweet seat?
 
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