Continuation Part 3 - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case

[Rolfe]

I wouldn't put it past the ILE to ask Raffaele to write a statement (for the record) about what happened Halloween night, and then asked him to sign it, then ran over to Amanda and told her "HAHA!!! We've got you now witch".

Bingo.

Rolfe.

 

[JREF2010]

My biggest concern re confidence of acquittal is that many folk here on JREF are experts at evaluating evidence and coming to rational conclusions based on that evidence.

The evidence (or rather, utter lack of) does clearly point towards acquittal.

But JREF ain't the court.

But in this case, Judge Hellman is in the actual discussions, he is sitting with the "jurors". He has the C&V report for his deciding factor on the conflict.

Hellman wont ignore the C&V.

The other 6, only a few claim to have inside information from leaks or "people talking".

I doubt its Hellman or Zanetti.

So this leaves the 6 judges and the police guards, or even family members of the members. Then it could be a family members friend who spoke to the member of the court or police guard that told someone who then leaked it to Harry's Rag Machine secret info Inc. who wont disclose his leak.

but I admit I find the reduced sentence option, a strong possibility if politiics are involved and then its up to the Judge.

Maybe the Judges discussion room is tapped or bugged?

But this is where the camera's have placed the spotlights on this trial.

Who can convict with No Motive, No Credible Witness, and the C&V report supported by the Perfect Squads own video?

Unless of course as Commodi clearly said, "theres too much parmesan on the anchovies and the salt was distrcting of the tomatoe sauce that was maybe too much for the paste, there for not supporting the pepperoni and sausage, but even then whose to say if thick and chewy crust is better than thin and crispy?"

 

[yeti101]

does anyone know why raf didn't testify in the first trial?

different countries have different takes regarding the defendants silence in a trial. If I was innocent I'd want to get up there and give my version of events and even if I was guilty I'd get up there and try and convince the Jury like knox did.

 

[Rolfe]

If you were on trial, guilty or innocent, it's a racing certainty that your advocate would advise you in the strongest possible terms not to go into the witness box, probably sitting on your head if need be.

You seem to have no idea how a prosecution advocate can surprise apparently incriminating admissions out of perfectly innocent defendants once they start with the cross-examination.

Rolfe.

 

[CoulsdonUK]

Have you read the nauseating bilge that's being written oven on PMF? I'm being sarcastic about that.

The Kerchers seem to be a perfectly ordinary family who have had a nightmare happen to them. That doesn't turn them into saints, and John Kercher has written some pretty questionable things. So has Stephanie come to that. Sympathy indeed, I wouldn't wish their situation on my worst enemy. But still, that doesn't make them perfect.

Meredith was a student abroad, much like Amanda. The two girls seem to have been friends, even if Amanda might have got on Meredith's nerves from time to time. Meredith thought a vibrator was embarrassing. I hope she really didn't think condoms were embarrassing, because she was sleeping with her drug dealer boyfriend whom she had only known a short time. She partied with the best of them, being said to be drunk on occassion, including Hallowe'en when she came in with the milk, went to bed without taking off her makeup and slept till noon. The guilters like to hypothesise that she had a bad hangover, when that's convenient to their pseudo-scientific theories about the stomach contents. And she was smoking her boyfriend's cannabis.

See how you can make the truth sound really bad? Meredith was an ordinary student just like Amanda. She did the same things as Amanda, except Amanda seems to have had a nicer boyfriend. But by the prosecution's own standards, she also was "into sex, drugs and alcohol".

If the situation had played out only a little differently, it could have been Amanda who came home early to be raped and stabbed by Rudy Guede, and Meredith discovering the body to be accused by Miginini of murder. It could be the Knox/Mellas family we'd be supposed to be describing as "dignified" and all the rest of it, and the Kerchers whose efforts to support their unjustly accused daughter were being vilified and reviled.

Let's just be a little bit realistic here. There are no saints, and the sinners aren't necessarily who you think they are.

Rolfe.

I’m must be confused, there was I thinking that this appeal concerned Raffaele and Amanda but apparently for some it is the character of the murder victim and her family that are on trial or appeal. Okay I am curious what exactly did Meredith do to deserve a mindless brutal murder?

Who do you believe the sinners are; the murder victim and her family?

 

[yeti101]

If you were on trial, guilty or innocent, it's a racing certainty that your advocate would advise you in the strongest possible terms not to go into the witness box, probably sitting on your head if need be.

You seem to have no idea how a prosecution advocate can surprise apparently incriminating admissions out of perfectly innocent defendants once they start with the cross-examination.

Rolfe.

yeah what with those "implanted memories" & "visions" it could get messy.

 

[Rolfe]

I’m must be confused, there was I thinking that this appeal concerned Raffaele and Amanda but apparently for some it is the character of the murder victim and her family that are on trial or appeal. Okay I am curious what exactly did Meredith do to deserve a mindless brutal murder?

Who do you believe the sinners are; the murder victim and her family?

Way to completely miss the point. You might try reading for comprehension.

Rolfe.

 

[Rolfe]

yeah what with those "implanted memories" & "visions" it could get messy.

All it needs is a slip of the tongue, or an ambiguous phrase. I've seen it happen.

Rolfe.

 

[yeti101]

All it needs is a slip of the tongue, or an ambiguous phrase. I've seen it happen.

Rolfe.

i don't know about italy but in the UK the jury can take into consideration a defendant remaining silent and that's usually not in a good way. Knox testified I would have too. Let the truth set you free but of course someone whos guilty might be afraid they slip up or ramble revealing their guilt.

Knoxs performance wasn't too great to say the least maybe she should have done what raf did?

 

[CoulsdonUK]

Way to completely miss the point. You might try reading for comprehension.

Rolfe.

Please do enlighten me what were you attempting to convey with your post?

 

[christianahannah]

No matter how you twist it, Amanda DID make a mistatement on the night of November 5th, and while I do GUARANTEE that they will be acquitted of ALL the other charges:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=7619778#post7619778

the charge of slandering Patrick may stick, but ONLY if Hellmann isn't half the critical thinker that I believe he is.

Lumumba's troubles started not because of Amanda's statements, but because ILE went out and arrested him before they even did an investigation.

If Amanda's statement was what got them all arrested, then why was Raffaele arrested? He's not even mentioned in Amanda's statement.

I wouldn't put it past the ILE to ask Raffaele to write a statement (for the record) about what happened Halloween night, and then asked him to sign it, then ran over to Amanda and told her "HAHA!!! We've got you now witch",

Dave

Amanda did mention Raffaele in her 5:45 statement. It was a vague reference to not being sure if he was with her at the cottage that night.

 

[LashL]

Have you read the nauseating bilge that's being written oven on PMF? I'm being sarcastic about that.

The Kerchers seem to be a perfectly ordinary family who have had a nightmare happen to them. That doesn't turn them into saints, and John Kercher has written some pretty questionable things. So has Stephanie come to that. Sympathy indeed, I wouldn't wish their situation on my worst enemy. But still, that doesn't make them perfect.

Meredith was a student abroad, much like Amanda. The two girls seem to have been friends, even if Amanda might have got on Meredith's nerves from time to time. Meredith thought a vibrator was embarrassing. I hope she really didn't think condoms were embarrassing, because she was sleeping with her drug dealer boyfriend whom she had only known a short time. She partied with the best of them, being said to be drunk on occassion, including Hallowe'en when she came in with the milk, went to bed without taking off her makeup and slept till noon. The guilters like to hypothesise that she had a bad hangover, when that's convenient to their pseudo-scientific theories about the stomach contents. And she was smoking her boyfriend's cannabis.

See how you can make the truth sound really bad? Meredith was an ordinary student just like Amanda. She did the same things as Amanda, except Amanda seems to have had a nicer boyfriend. But by the prosecution's own standards, she also was "into sex, drugs and alcohol".

If the situation had played out only a little differently, it could have been Amanda who came home early to be raped and stabbed by Rudy Guede, and Meredith discovering the body to be accused by Miginini of murder. It could be the Knox/Mellas family we'd be supposed to be describing as "dignified" and all the rest of it, and the Kerchers whose efforts to support their unjustly accused daughter were being vilified and reviled.

Let's just be a little bit realistic here. There are no saints, and the sinners aren't necessarily who you think they are.

Rolfe.

Nail on head.

I've seen this weird phenomenon happen in my own family many years ago and I still don't quite understand it.

My sister died when she was 21 and I was 20. My sister was an awesome person and my closest friend since we were old enough to talk as we were only 11 months apart and I skipped a grade early on, so we were also in the same grade, same classes, shared a room, shared our group of friends, etc., ever since childhood. My sister was a normal person with all of the usual virtues and vices. She was lovely, smart, sophisticated, well-rounded, funny, intelligent, and well-travelled for the time and her age. She also smoked occasionally, drank occasionally, partied with the best of us, while also imparting some words of wisdom to me, her younger sister, along the way. She was very much liked, loved, and admired by peers, friends, and family.

But after she died of ovarian cancer (which was pretty rare for someone so young, and which had absolutely nothing to do with occasionally smoking or drinking and otherwise leading a normal lifestyle), my mother suddenly had a case of selective amnesia in which she would insist that my sister never smoked, never drank, never swore, never did anything other than be a virginal saint-like entity. This was complete BS and it seemed bizarre to me that my own mother would think, let alone say, such things. To me, it was as though my mother could not acknowledge my sister's true existence because my mother suddenly thought that thinking my sister anything less than virginal and angelic was somehow detrimental to her memory. I argued with my Mom about this a few times because, to me, it seemed wrong of my Mom to try to re-package my sister as virginal and saintly because there was absolutely nothing wrong with her as she was! She was a wonderful, caring, smart, sophisticated, funny, well-travelled, and well-rounded young woman - she didn't need what I saw as "re-branding" - but then I realized that it was just something that my Mom personally needed to believe for her own reasons, in order to deal with her own grief (a grief that I fully acknowledge I have no idea how I would deal with it if it happened to me - that being the death of one's child) so I decided to just let it go in order to give my Mom what she needed. That was all back when I was 20 - 22.

But I never forgot it, as it taught me a valuable lesson about how emotion can cloud one's judgement, and how it can result in an otherwise rational person feeling the need to erase and rewrite reality for his/her own purposes, and also how those purposes need not be nefarious but more of the self-preservation sort for emotional reasons.

So, I can understand the emotional need of Ms. Kercher's family to try to re-brand Meredith as virginal and saintly, even though neither is true, but this kind of thing has no place in a court of law, and it would be absolutely wrong for them to attempt to influence a court by remonstrating such in a criminal trial.

 

[Rolfe]

Please do enlighten me what were you attempting to convey with your post?

What I said. Which was nothing like what you typed.

Rolfe.

 

[js202]

Odd that you spell "fair" as "fare" and "zeal" as "zeel". I only knew one other person who did that. In any case I do not think you understand Stockholm syndrome.

My assumption is that persons who would engage in such simplistic habitual misspellings would have difficulty indeed with anything more complex than Chinese Restaurant Syndrome.

 

[Wildhorses]

It's absolutely appalling that they should be allowed to try to sway the jury with an emotional appeal. The depth of their distress, and nobody doubts that part, has absolutely no bearing on whether Knox and/or Sollecito are guilty of the murder. The idea that they can come in and say, put aside any reasonable doubts you might have and give me these people's heads on a platter because I'm missing my daughter so much, is absolutely outrageous.

Address the bench after a conviction in the matter of the sentence, yes. Try to sway a doubtful case towards a conviction by appeals to raw emotion - what are they thinking of? They must know that would never be allowed in England.

Rolfe.

Do we know this is going to happen?

It's clear what the Kerchers are thinking. The more puzzling questions is - what is Hellman thinking? Why would he allow such a thing? As you say, the blatant appeal to emotion is irrelevant in any case. But aside from that, he must realize it would be terrible for the Kerchers as well, UNLESS AK/RS are convicted.

In response to others concerned about cameras in AK's face when the verdict is announced: that's the money shot. You can be sure some papparazzo will wangle it as best as he/she can. Last time, AK's guards touchingly drew round her to block the cameras... but someone still managed to get the famous shot of her tearful face in the paddy wagon.

 

[JREF2010]

does anyone know why raf didn't testify in the first trial?

different countries have different takes regarding the defendants silence in a trial. If I was innocent I'd want to get up there and give my version of events and even if I was guilty I'd get up there and try and convince the Jury like knox did.

after speaking with you, your attorney may suggest you don't.

maybe you could pull it off.

Amanda was much more articulate than her mom. Her mom was swirled around with words and Commodi almost had her agreeing with the "aha! she called you and nothing had happened yet!" weasel play.
Looking at the cell logs of course, its obvious a lot had been found before she called her mom. Girgha mentioned there were approx 60 cell calls in a day or so, explaining how forgetting one short call could be unimportant and not critical. She called her 3 times in what? 20 minutes...

I would not want to speak as Amanda did. Here's why...

I was unfairly put in front of a judge once , up against a very well known attorney in my area and he rolled over me like a train, completely demolishing me into a confused human, momentarily retarded in my own language, due to the onslaught of the legal words and meanings only the Judge understood. It was really brutal and an unfair fight. Being bullied I soon resorted to calling them ******** and F$#%# You)()*)*&**...
I was shocked and stunned and fined. It took about 5 minutes.

I fired my lawyer for not showing up. btw. Hired a new lawyer, who did show up and the next hearing was a very different ending.

So in response to your comment, I wonder if you have ever defended yourself against an onslaught of a professional?

Another analogy, boxing. If you plan to box a professional,
better you hire a boxer to fight for you, if you are not well trained in boxing.

 

[lionking]

What I said.

You mean this?

But now the PMF.org have decided they are the ones who are going to raise the money for their "dignified", perfect, saintly family to fly to Italy. Even people who themselves are living hand to mouth are volunteering their widow's mite.

I wonder if the Kerchers will have the grace to be embarrassed?

I can understand your back pedalling.

ETA, Your comment was dripping with sarcasm and disrespect.

 

[yeti101]

My assumption is that persons who would engage in such simplistic habitual misspellings would have difficulty indeed with anything more complex than Chinese Restaurant Syndrome.

impressive zeal levels.

 

[christianahannah]

<snip>

So, I can understand the emotional need of Ms. Kercher's family to try to re-brand Meredith as virginal and saintly, even though neither is true, but this kind of thing has no place in a court of law, and it would be absolutely wrong for them to attempt to influence a court by remonstrating such in a criminal trial.

I don't think the Kercher family has attempted to re-brand Meredith in the way you describe (or re-brand her at all).

 

[Dougm]

I will let others decide based on your words "dignified, perfect, saintly" expressed in such a sarcastic way as well as your call for them to be embarrassed.

Clear denigration.

Me thinks you are so invested in what Rolfe was criticizing that you don't see what he was actually saying. The post was about the PMF lionization of the Kerchers. Not about them. It was about what is being written about them, and how weird it is.