Continuation Part 3 - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case

[smkovalinksy]

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I still say Rudy surprised her while she was taking her coat (sweatshirt) off and her hands were still trapped in the sleeves. This would explain the lack of defensive wounds. The original condition of the coat (sweatshirt) when it was found were that the sleeves were inside out.

Am I wrong here?

Dave

No, you are not wrong.

 

[Dougm]

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I still say Rudy surprised her while she was taking her coat (sweatshirt) off and her hands were still trapped in the sleeves. This would explain the lack of defensive wounds. The original condition of the coat (sweatshirt) when it was found were that the sleeves were inside out.

Am I wrong here?

Dave

You might be right. I also don't think that a petite woman being threatened by a knife would necessarily fight back with her hands, especially since it is pretty much established that he had her from behind. I think he grabbed her and was trying to keep her from screaming, and lost control of the situation. There is no scenario where I can see that she would obviously have tried to block the knife with her hands.

 

[Katody Matrass]

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I still say Rudy surprised her while she was taking her coat (sweatshirt) off and her hands were still trapped in the sleeves. This would explain the lack of defensive wounds. The original condition of the coat (sweatshirt) when it was found were that the sleeves were inside out.

Am I wrong here?

Dave

Unnecessary hypothesis.
It's possible he just pulled it down to restrain her arms during the assault.
Lack of defensive wounds is sufficiently explained by Meredith being compliant to the last moment.

 

[smkovalinksy]

This picture to me, is like the juxtaposition of two opposing forces. I actually see some kind of synchronicity to their being caught like this, facing opposite directions :

 

[LondonJohn]

The "print on mat" column is totally bogus fabricated nonsense. Just look at the bathmat print. It's not possible to get "millimetre precision" from it. Also, by choosing where to place endpoints you can get any measurements you fancy.

ETA:

Big toe width on the bathmat is much closer to 2 cm and definitely not 3 cm. Both shape and size of it matches Guede and doesn't match Raffaele.

Yes, it's somewhat important to explain this whole bathmat print measurement issue properly. I realise that SA is rather proud of his little Excel spreadsheet which he would like to think is a "devastating" piece of proof that the print is Sollecito's and definitely not Guede's. This spreadsheet compares the Rinaldi measurements of the bathmat print with the relevant measurements form the reference prints of Sollecito and Guede.

But here is why the measurement analysis is utterly bogus and misleading. The main reason why it's so wrong is that Rinaldi conducted his measurement exercise in a totally biased, inappropriate and unscientific way. His own testimony confirms that he made an initial decision that the bathmat print more closely matched Sollecito than Guede - owing to his mistaken interpretation of the big toe impression on the bathmat print. And having made the (incorrect) decision up-front that the print was likely Sollecito's, Rinaldi then placed Sollecito's reference print and the bathmat print side by side and conducted his "comparative measurements" - and lo and behold it just so happens that various of the measurements matched with the now-mythical "millimetre accuracy"! It should go without saying that Rinaldi should have attempted to take the various measurements of the bathmat print without reference to either one of the reference prints (in fact, he should really have measured the bathmat print before even seeing the reference prints).

And that leads onto the second point that shows how bogus the "bathmat-print-match-to-Sollecito-and-elimination-from-Guede" issue is: the bathmat print is actually impossible to measure with any reasonable degree of accuracy. And it is certainly not able to be compared for measurement against reference prints. This is because the reference prints were made by the subjects having the soles of their feet evenly coated in a special printer's ink, then placing a clean, heavy footfall onto a smooth, hard, flat surface. In the case of the bathmat print, however, the surface onto which the print was deposited was hightly-tufted cotton pile, which also had a textured pattern making the tufts bend and give in varying amounts. And it's impossible to know the weight of the footfall onto the mat, or the spread of the dilute blod/water mix on the sole of the foot that made the print.

For all these reasons, it's impossible to get accurate measurements of the bathmat print, let alone ones that can be used for comparison to reference prints. Rinaldi - by his own admission - used grossly improper and suspect-centric methods to "match" the print to Sollecito's reference print, and it's highly likely that his measurement of the bathmat print was heavily influenced by his knowledge of the comparative measurements on Sollecito's reference print.

I imagine that Sollecito's defence team will address all this tomorrow. Essentially, Rinaldi's footprint analysis is bogus pseudoscience at its core, and in addition it was also carried out in a wholly inappropriate and improper manner. Sollecito's defence should easily have the ammunition and argument to thoroughly discredit this piece of "evidence".

On a more general note, I am thoroughly heartened by the lack of substance in both the prosecution and Pacelli/Maresca arguments. It seems to me that they have come nowhere near proving that Knox or Sollecito participated in Meredith's murder. They all seem to have concentrated instead on varying degrees of character assassination, usually of Knox. Oh, and the "defensive wound" thing is nonsense too: if Meredith was submissive to a knife-wielding Guede right up until the end when she was on her knees, one would not expect to see either defensive wounds or restraint marks/wounds. Again, the defence teams will easily be able to explain this to the court.

Tomorrow and Thursday will be very good days for Knox and Sollecito, you can be sure of that. I believe that by the end of the week, everyone - judges, popular jurors and media alike - will be in no doubt of two things: there is insufficient evidence of the guilt of Knox or Sollecito, and it's very unlikely that they even had anything to do with the murder. Knox and Sollecito will be acquitted next week.

 

[Rolfe]

It seems to me that the prosecution and the plaintiffs have made a number of statements in their submissions that are simply and demonstrably not true. I'm a bit surprised that the judge wouldn't have interjected and corrected them on these points. But mainly, is blatant lying on the part of the prosecution grounds for appeal to the Supreme Court?

Rolfe.

 

[LondonJohn]

Unnecessary hypothesis.
It's possible he just pulled it down to restrain her arms during the assault.
Lack of defensive wounds is sufficiently explained by Meredith being compliant to the last moment.

Exactly. This "lack of defensive wounds and restraint marks" thing is just a massive red herring. The defence teams will easily be able to explain that it's totally incorrect to draw the conclusion that a lack of defensive wounds or restraint marks shows that there must have been multiple attackers. If (as I and many others believe) Meredith was forced into compliance by Guede, then there would have been no need for restraint and no presence of defence wounds.

I believe that Guede managed to manoeuvre Meredith onto all fours in front of the wardrobe merely through the use of a large knife held at her throat, coupled with the use of aggressive and threatening language and body language. I think that Meredith only realised that she was in serious danger when Guede started his sexual assault. I think she started shouting and struggling against the knife at that point, which is when the first non-fatal neck wound was inflicted by Guede. I think that this first neck wound made Meredith emit a loud scream of terror, which itself prompted Guede to inflict the deep, fatal wound. It's all sadly explainable as the work of just one depraved sex muderer: Rudy Guede.

 

[Poppy1016]

Hi Rolfe
Do you know if the defense is able to object when false statements are being made? It is a shame that the jury hears all these lies and charachter assasinations.

 

[LondonJohn]

It seems to me that the prosecution and the plaintiffs have made a number of statements in their submissions that are simply and demonstrably not true. I'm a bit surprised that the judge wouldn't have interjected and corrected them on these points. But mainly, is blatant lying on the part of the prosecution grounds for appeal to the Supreme Court?

Rolfe.

I doubt it. But you can be sure that the defence teams will be careful to a) point out the dissembling and misleading behaviour of the prosecution/civil lawyers, and b) give full corrections.

One need only look at the newspaper stories coming out of the past two days of the trial to realise that there is no case for guilt against Knox or Sollecito. I believe the defence teams will give carefully-crafted arguments tomorrow and Thursday, which will demolish any residual belief that Knox and Sollecito actually participated in the murder of Meredith Kercher.

 

[Poppy1016]

I don't feel the defense was assertive enough the first trial. The prosecution was able to use the same lies they are now repeating. I hope the defense launches an all out attack which will totally expose all those involved in this fiasco.

 

[Kaosium]

Did you see this?

Also high drama in court today as Michelle Moore, the wife of Steve Moore, retired FBI expert and outspoken critic of the prosecution, (both in the courtroom as observers), decided it would be a good idea to let Mignini know she though he was "an evil person". She is now being detained. She may receive a costly fine for insulting (libeling) him. At this time she is not allowed to leave the building.

http://www.westseattleherald.com/2011/09/26/news/update-3-amanda-knox-court-today-prosecutor-migni

Oy vey....

"We all have a dark side, to say the least...."

If this is true, how many people now has Mignini charged in the course of this case? I lost count a while back, lemme see if I can figure it out:

5 members of the Sollecito family: Father, mother, sister, aunt, uncle?

2 Members of Amanda's family: Father and mother.

1 Francesca Bene, journalist for Giornale dell 'Umbria.

2 Telenorba journalists.

2 (at least) from Oggi, Giangavino Sulas and the 'editor and director'--which could be the same person.

1 more Italian reporting on the case, Frank Sfarzo, and successfully had his blog closed down.

2 Americans writing about the case, Steve Shay of the West Seattle Herald, and Joe Cottonwood.

2 defense lawyers, Luciano Ghirga and Luca Maori.

1 more time for Amanda, a whole new court case to handle her 'vicious' slander that she was whupped a couple times.

1 poor guy who just wanted to give Amanda's family a picture.

3 of the prisoners that testified to what Rudy told them in jail.

So if this actually results in charges, a suit or an 'investigation' that will be the twentieth time at least in this case, all basically unrelated to his loony murder charge. He's at about 21 extra people charged, excluding Amanda.

That's after his last 20 charge explosion in the Monster of Florence case, which resulted in his disciplining, a suspended prison sentence.


Is the truth a defense in Italy?

 

[Rolfe]

Hi Rolfe
Do you know if the defence is able to object when false statements are being made? It is a shame that the jury hears all these lies and character assassinations.

My impression is that in Scotland if an advocate says something in his summing-up that is contrary to the evidence presented, the judge can (and will) interject to point out the error. The advocate has to accept the correction with due humility. But IANAL. And although I have a very low opinion of the Scottish criminal justice system (currently trawling for non-existent/fabricated evidence to bring an acquitted defendant back to trial for doing something that didn't happen in the first place), the shameful scenes in Perugia these past few days would certainly not happen here.

Rolfe.

 

[LondonJohn]

I don't feel the defense was assertive enough the first trial. The prosecution was able to use the same lies they are now repeating. I hope the defense launches an all out attack which will totally expose all those involved in this fiasco.

I think the defence teams had quite a few shortcomings in the first trial, actually. But I think that things have changed quite a bit since then, for various reasons.

I think we all need to bear in mind that the overwhelming priority for the defence teams is to ensure that the court decides there is insufficient proof to find Knox or Sollecito guilty of the various crimes with which they're charged. Everything should be focussed upon this primary goal: acquittal. I think that the defence teams (including the non-court consultants drafted in to assist) will be able to assess the best tactic for ensuring this outcome. Sometimes, the best option is simply to say that the prosecutors haven't proved the case, sometimes the best option is an aggressive attack on the prosecutors and police, and sometimes the best option is to focus on arguing for the innocence of your clients.

My feeling is that the defence teams will concentrate mainly on demolishing, piece-by-piece, each and every item of evidence that the prosecutors/Maresca have used in their attempt to demonstrate guilt. They will also have to address evidence that doesn't even seem to have been touched by prosecutors/Maresca in the appeal - such as Quintavalle's testimony or the phone evidence - since the court can consider these things totally independently. And I think that coupled with that will be an argument that a demolition job on the characters of the defendants is not an argument for guilt on the specific charges. And I think they will finish by pointing towards the evidence that tends to suggest not only that Guede committed this act alone, but also that Knox and Sollecito were very likely nowhere near the cottage at the time of the murder.

 

[katy_did]

But here is why the measurement analysis is utterly bogus and misleading. The main reason why it's so wrong is that Rinaldi conducted his measurement exercise in a totally biased, inappropriate and unscientific way. His own testimony confirms that he made an initial decision that the bathmat print more closely matched Sollecito than Guede - owing to his mistaken interpretation of the big toe impression on the bathmat print. And having made the (incorrect) decision up-front that the print was likely Sollecito's, Rinaldi then placed Sollecito's reference print and the bathmat print side by side and conducted his "comparative measurements" - and lo and behold it just so happens that various of the measurements matched with the now-mythical "millimetre accuracy"! It should go without saying that Rinaldi should have attempted to take the various measurements of the bathmat print without reference to either one of the reference prints (in fact, he should really have measured the bathmat print before even seeing the reference prints).

And that leads onto the second point that shows how bogus the "bathmat-print-match-to-Sollecito-and-elimination-from-Guede" issue is: the bathmat print is actually impossible to measure with any reasonable degree of accuracy. And it is certainly not able to be compared for measurement against reference prints. This is because the reference prints were made by the subjects having the soles of their feet evenly coated in a special printer's ink, then placing a clean, heavy footfall onto a smooth, hard, flat surface. In the case of the bathmat print, however, the surface onto which the print was deposited was hightly-tufted cotton pile, which also had a textured pattern making the tufts bend and give in varying amounts. And it's impossible to know the weight of the footfall onto the mat, or the spread of the dilute blod/water mix on the sole of the foot that made the print.

Alongside the impossibility of measuring the print accurately and Rinaldi's obvious bias, Raffaele's defence have previously pointed out another crucial error Rinaldi made: the recommendations for this sort of comparison state that first of all you should look at the morphological aspects of the foot or print - the form/shape/structure - to assess it for compatibility. Only if it's compatible on this level should you even proceed to comparing the measurements; after all, you might have a foot with identical width and length measurements but which is a completely different shape. For the bathmat print, Raffaele should have been ruled out straight away because his big toe is incompatible. But since Rinaldi wasn't qualified to assess this kind of compatibility (he said this himself in relation to Raffaele's 'hammer toe') he focused mainly on the measurements, with just a few token references to the shape of the print.

 

[Kaosium]

Oh, I have had that happen to me on Websleuths, and worse. My posts chopped and snipped, and I have been put on time-outs for 48 hours, for simply giving a personal opinion.....they are sort of like an "America's Most Wanted" site...

What more can you say than their tribute to 'forensic astrology' doesn't already?

 

[smkovalinksy]

What more can you say than their tribute to 'forensic astrology' doesn't already?

very true...

 

[CoulsdonUK]

Gosh; this happens in country A that happens in B (unless your name is Troy Davis, in which case no motive, DNA evidence or physical evidence was required for his execution) and in the UK everything is hunky-dory except of course the bit we never talk about in the 1970’s where the Guildford four and Birmingham six where framed. As we all know this case is taking place under Italian jurisprudence, no other country no other jurisdiction is relevant so to my rather simple mind that is the legal context!

 

[Grinder]

Is the Michelle Moore story for sure? Nadeau seems to have pulled down the tweet and Shay's is the only reference to it that I can find.

Are there any Italian stories about it?

 

[LondonJohn]

Alongside the impossibility of measuring the print accurately and Rinaldi's obvious bias, Raffaele's defence have previously pointed out another crucial error Rinaldi made: the recommendations for this sort of comparison state that first of all you should look at the morphological aspects of the foot or print - the form/shape/structure - to assess it for compatibility. Only if it's compatible on this level should you even proceed to comparing the measurements; after all, you might have a foot with identical width and length measurements but which is a completely different shape. For the bathmat print, Raffaele should have been ruled out straight away because his big toe is incompatible. But since Rinaldi wasn't qualified to assess this kind of compatibility (he said this himself in relation to Raffaele's 'hammer toe') he focused mainly on the measurements, with just a few token references to the shape of the print.

Exactly. The sequence of events should be something like this:

1) The bathmat print should be generally assessed, and a determination should be made as to how suitable it is for measurements to be made. In this instance, it's clear that precise measurements were inappropriate given the structure/texture of the bathmat. But let's suppose for a moment that it was deemed appropriate to take precise measurements.

2) If the print is deemed worthy of measurement, then these measurements should now be taken. But it's critically important that the measurements of the bathmat print are taken without access to any reference prints - in fact best practice dictates that the examiner should never even have seen any reference prints at this point.

3) After all measurements are taken, the examiner should then take out the reference prints - which should preferably be anonymised in order to minimise suspect bias. The reference prints should firstly be compared for general shape and size with the bathmat print, and included or excluded on that basis.

4) For any reference print(s) that remain included, their measurements should be compared with the previously-obtained measurements from the bathmat print.

5) The general rule is that for this type of footprint analysis - even if the crime scene print is a complete, sharp print made on a smooth, flat, hard surface - it's only possible to exclude reference prints. It's not possible to make a positive match to any one reference print - unless of course the evidence print and the reference print share a unique or extremely rare quality.

6) Therefore, any conclusions drawn from the bathmat print analysis should be making no attempt at a positive identification. But much more than this, any conclusion should be heavily caveated by the fact that the structure/texture of the bathmat makes any accurate measurement comparison extremely difficult and inaccurate.

As a short PS, would someone please tell Paddy that I am not SomeAlibiLies on Twitter, nor do I have any sort of twitter account, nor have I ever posted on twitter. Seems like his sleuthing radar need recalibrating once again. And if I had a criminal defence solicitor tweeting frequent "ROFLMAO"s and similar, I think I'd want to change my solicitor. Just sayin'.

 

[CoulsdonUK]

Not sure if this article has already been discussed http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/italy/8786940/Meredith-Kerchers-friend-Perugia-can-be-a-dark-place.html. Nonetheless it is the views of Miss Hayward who knew Meredith maybe 3 or 4 weeks longer than Amanda did. Of course some may conclude “well she would say this or that” for this reason and that reason, but unlike most of us she was actually there.