Continuation Part 3 - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case

[Machiavelli]

Yes, that's true. The 1:45 and 5:45 statements, and perhaps the accompanying oral interrogation, were deemed to be continuous elements of a single calunnia. If Massei had believed that the crime of calunnia ocurred outside of the bounds of the night of November 5-6, then he would not have specified that the crime occurred in that timeframe; he would have used a broader timeframe.

Therefore, the statements that Massei used as the basis for his calunnia conviction are precisely the statements that were obtained illegally.

I find these comments really silly. So you think that the calunnia is not proven by the written note, because Masai says "night" ? The subsequent evidence of calunnia are not valid evidence? The evidence out of that night ceases to exist because of your interpretation of Massei's wording?
And by the way, since the hand written note was written before 7:30, before Knox was brought to jail, at what time did the sun rise that day?

 

[Kaosium]

Starting from the conviction for calunnia going down. There is enough to fill several pages to show and describe the incredible number of proven lies.

Which you've said repeatedly and always demurred when we asked you to list them. We both know the reason for that: virtually no one who isn't passionately convinced of Amanda's guilt would term them 'lies.' The most notorious is what happened as the door was about to be broken down.

You can call anything that doesn't turn out to be true a lie if you want to. Going through these threads, both of us could find a plethora of 'lies' from each other under that standard. However if one wants to have the word 'lie' mean more than someone's mistake, confusion or delusion, it ought to be defined as something akin to a willful misrepresentation of the truth, and of those some are benign, notably the ones akin to what one answers when asked by many women 'how do I look in this dress?'

Are you normal Kaosium? Even if Raffaele had fish blood on his hands, would a normal person write about this in a paper that she gives to the police to provide them evidence on a murder investigation? The false accusation consists in the act of writing it down into a communication note meant to be an element in a murder investigation. That was written in an doubtful "open" form, so designed to be read as possible human blood, casting suspicion on Raffaele. The lie consists in the doubt and in the suspicion-creating function of it.

No, I'm not entirely normal Machiavelli.

I'm one of those guys when someone insists there's only one way to do something or look at something my mind naturally says 'like HELL there is!' There usually is, you know. In this case I think this obvious, you are reading only one side of the 'conversation.' Being as we don't have the tapes of that interrogation, we don't know what she might have been referring to. My guess is that during the interrogation that came up and she included it in her note. As she never tried to pin blame on Raffaele during the interrogation as per the Statements--or the rest of the note itself for that matter--it suggests she wasn't trying to do so there, either. A further indication that she didn't mean it the way you take it is that she never tried to blame Raffaele for the murder afterward. Note: writing how ridiculous the scenario would be for the knife to have been used by Raffaele and have her DNA on it too is her employing a little 'satire,' not trying to frame Raffaele.

I will never trust a person who says thinks about "the best truth". This is one more self-discrediting statement among the many.

Oh. Dear. have you been spending time in the Shower Stall? (Seamus O'Reilly's)

If so, I'll suggest to you this: irrespective of his views on Amanda's guilt, (incidentally has he learned yet that Raffaele was supposedly involved too?) that guy is a clown. You won't learn anything from him, his 'analysis' of the case is akin to Donald Trump's. Personally I wonder if that system isn't responsible for crimes itself. Remember how it was developed? In the Sixties as I recall in order to 'assess' signs of molestation. I wonder how many 'recovered memories' it was used to 'discover' in children who got dirty a lot and/or had fastidious caretakers?

What if she didn't mean it the way you think she does? What if she meant she was still so confused and didn't know for sure and wrote it out the best she could, which is what I take from the context of the rest of the note?

Again, it seems you are going around old and tiresome tricks, I find this reasoning dishonest.
Amanda was accused by Meredith of not being clean in their common envionment. Meredith's opinion and her complaints were reported by her friends and the roommates, who are all credible witnesses.
What Meredith complained about is the first thing that matters, rather than how clean Knox actually was.
It was reported that Meredith complained with her of having left blood stained tampons in their common bathroom, and for having left the toliet dirty (as well as for not respecting the house cleaning shifts, and for leaving objects in their common bathroom which Meredith disliked, and other reasons).
Moreover Knox herself admitted of having left the toiled dirty with feces; and also blood drop of Amanda was actually found in the bathroom and the defence had long claimed that it was mentrual blood.

LOL @ 'accused.'

I am impressed, you have certainly done your studying on this issue! I'd read most of them before but had forgotten just how meticulous the prosecution was in developing this entirely worthless 'evidence.' I suppose this must have been a result of having his 'refer-madness and comic book motive' slapped down by the Supreme Court and he tried to develop a motive for Amanda to murder Meredith because of these momentous concerns.

Aka: the lie consists in throwing back on Meredith the same blaming which, in fact, was the accusation Meredith made against her.


Time wasting questions: we know for certain Amanda was actually perceived by Meredith as being not very clean.
Amanda knew Meredith had this opinion about her.
Amanda also already knew whether she herself had bleeded or not; because everybody knows if they happened to have a blood loss the day before.

This adds further blame on Amanda.
She manages however to imply that the blood is probably menstrual blood left by Meredith. She says "we are very clean", then sets an exception "but probably Meredith had menstrual issues"; aka: we are both clean, but I am the cleanest, probably the other one made the mess. This is a way to say the other is the dirty one, which is exactly what Meredith had told her.

She takes a revenge, retributes Merediths by calling her dirty, just the way Meredith had called her dirty before.

Meeeeowwww!

That's pretty clever, I'll give you that, but still it's hardly the only possible explanation. Another is that Amanda knew it hadn't been her and the most likely candidate was Meredith being as they shared the space and had nothing to do with a catfight over the bathroom. Incidentally, did Meredith actually speak to Amanda about this? That's how they did it in the movie, but I can't remember coming across anything like that from something official.

I wonder...were I to poll the dorms downtown occupied only by females who shared a bathroom, what percent do you suppose would think the other didn't clean up in the bathroom as much as they should, and if paired off, how many of them would both think the other was less clean?

From personal experience I've found every woman should have her own bathroom and no one else should be allowed inside at the pain of piddled pants. Sometimes discretion is the better part of valor!

 

[charlatan]

The hangers-on will mostly disappear into the night but the lifers will go ballistic. Be prepared for a cacophony of goalposts being moved all over the place. Wait for the motivations report. Wait for the supreme court. Did the FOA get to Hellmann? Amanda's guilty in a moral sense that no earthly court can adjudicate. And so on.

Did I call it or did I call it? Already we're hearing Hellmann is the agent of a grand conspiracy that reaches the highest levels of political power in Italy -- the motivations report, which will be damning, will be criticized on this basis much like the C&V report was. The nature of this commentary is so post-rational I don't think it merits further discussion.

And what's the end game anyway? If the wildest dreams of the pro-guilt faction come true and the supreme court voids Hellmann's ruling, there must still be a review of the evidence introduced to date before a final ruling. Additional review isn't going to magically restore the integrity of the forensics; in fact, it will likely poke holes in other aspects of the prosecution's case.

To paraphrase Marx: when you negate powdered wigs, you are still left with unpowdered wigs.

 

[Ammonitida]

_________________

Let me try the translation, John,........

Based on the evidence presented in my court them lovebirds had nothing whatsoever to do with the murder of Meredith Kercher.

///

His evasion on this issue confirms the translation as a 503.1. That means the "strong circumstantial evidence" touted by Comodi didn't amount to crap in the jury's eyes.

 

[Machiavelli]

By the way, Machiavelli, how are you doing on that cite for the section of the criminal code (or any other legislation) which indicates that the verdict from a completed trial can be used as probative evidence in a different trial of a different defendant(s)?

Since you made explicit reference to the existence of such a written codification or law, it shouldn't be very hard for you to proved proof. And you don't ever write things that aren't true or accurate, do you? So can we see the written proof, old chap?

LJ, how about admitting that you were wrong in claiming that "non avere commesso il fatto" means - with "axiomatic" certainity - that the paragraph is 530.1, and that you were teaching false things on topics that you don't know?
What about admitting that the above statement is proven?

My position is - the same as before - that I don't know what kind of sentence this was, i don't know if it's 530.1 or 530.2. I stress the concept that I don't know, the same thing that I said earlier.
I also have the position that 530.1 would be rather in contradiction with the conviction of calunnia, more in contradition than with 530.2, and writing such a sentence would be a kind of suicide. I also note that you had the same position: in fact you were the first to state this:

But the point is not that it is possible for Knox to be totally innocent (you know, under 530.1) of the murder, yet still guilty of criminal slander against Lumumba. The point is that there is clearly now reasonable doubt that she willfully falsely accused Lumumba, given that she was exonerated of the murder. ....
..... The main plank of the case any for willful false accusation - that Knox was culpable of the murder, and therefore deliberately chose to falsely accuse an innocent man as an attempt to evade justice - is now gone. Therefore the criminal slander guilty verdict is impossible to justify on a "beyond a reasonable doubt" test now.

So, you were the first one to state 530.1 and calunnia here appear incompatible (you use the word "impossible").
I do not go myself so far to say that a calunnia is totally incompatible in the abstract with a 530.1 acquittal on another charge. But here you see how the logical links are structured so that calunnia and innocence of murder require the building of two arguments pointing in different directions, where their own points of strenght weaken each other. This is one of the reasons why I think it would be a suicide to write a sentencing report with such architecture.
Apparently you used to have the same opinion on the logical inconsistence of the whole.

For the question about the use of giudicato penale as a piece of circumstantial evidence I can address you to jurisprudence in Italian, but also I think you should be able to find it easilly by yourself.

 

[Diocletus]

You are inventing the law.

1. False. Knox right to have appointed a lawyer is immediate. Knox right to counsel is subject to a possible 48 hours delay since the judicial decree of arrest due to her status of suspect under isolation, until the meting with the judge.

2. True.

3. False. A right to appoint a lawyer. Not her right to counsuel. Moreover, the police arrest ("fermo") was signed at 1:45. But the judicial arrest was signed at 8:00 am. Both the police and the judiciary can "keep" each one the suspect for 48 hours. The police does this only if it's night or if there are involuntary delays; the judiciary can decide isolation before the GIP hearing for investigation purposes.

4. The interrogation was made by the police. The spontanepus statement was taken by the magistrate. Both are considered perfectly legal in all instances; they are in fact among the trial acts. The police wrote the verbale of the interrogatorio as it is always done. The spontaneous statement was redacted together with an interpreter along with Amanda's oral speech. An officer wrote the text after the interpreters words t the presence of the magistrate. This is done with verbalized judicial acts when they are not recorded.

5. 6. already answered

7. False. And there exists no act by which you may corroborate your assertion that the statements were taken illegally. The statements were taken legally.

Mignini says that you are wrong:

0’48’’ CNN: You didn’t interrogate Amanda?

0’50’’ Mignini: Oh, the police interrogated her. I was told about it. I wanted to explain this. I remember that I had gone to sleep and the director of the flying squad, Dr. Profazio, called me, because he tells me: “There are developments; Raffaele in fact has denied what he had said before”. So I went down* [Translator’s note: This seems to imply Mignini was not sleeping at home but instead somewhere on a higher floor at the Questura.] and the head of the flying squad told me what had happened. At some point they tell us that Amanda has made this statement.
And thus her interrogation as a person informed of the facts was suspended by the police in compliance with Article 63 of the Italian Code of Criminal Procedure [c.p.p. - Codice di Procedura Penale], because if evidence appears that incriminates the person, the person being questioned as a person informed of the facts can no longer be heard, and we must stop. “Everyone stop! There must be a defense attorney [present]”.

Further

1. As soon as she was a suspect, then the police were prohibited from interrogating her unless she had counsel or had waived the right to counsel. They did interrogate her and persuade her to sign documents and this was illegal.

3. She was suspected and in custody as soon as she made what the poice deemed to be incriminating statements. The time of the arrest warrant does not matter, since she was in fact already arrested. As soon as she was suspected and in custody, she had a right to counsel and the police were prohibited from interrogating her without counsel. They did so illegally.

4. The 5:45 statement was not spontaneous. The Supreme Court has already decided this. This doesn't even make sense. The police wrote out the statement and then asked Knox to sign it--hardly a spontaneous act.

7. Amanda Knox was a suspect prior to 1:45, and as soon as she was a suspect, she had a right to counsel (or to waive counsel), and a right to remain silent in the absence of counsel. The police and Mignini violated her human rights and acted illegally when they persuaded her nonetheless to sign the documenst that they drafted.

The interrogations were illegal.

 

[Kaosium]

I will not anyone free of writing "many people in my town thinks he is mentally unstable". I think who one writes this, has to prove it.

I think this should happen. Mignini said he'd never been to a mental-health professional, I think he should be examined by three randomly selected from a list of qualified ones from Rome. My guess is that would resolve that particular calunnia charge...

 

[Diocletus]

I find these comments really silly. So you think that the calunnia is not proven by the written note, because Masai says "night" ? The subsequent evidence of calunnia are not valid evidence? The evidence out of that night ceases to exist because of your interpretation of Massei's wording?
And by the way, since the hand written note was written before 7:30, before Knox was brought to jail, at what time did the sun rise that day?

"Really silly"? Then I think you should have a talk with Massei. What do you want me to do--rewrite his report for him? The report says what it says--that the calunnia occured on the night of November 5-6. It does not say that the callunia kept on going for some indeterminite period of time.

I'm sorry, but 7:30 am is not the "night". It is the morning.

 

[snook1]

Machiavelli, what do you think will happen when the case will go to the Supreme Court? What, in your opinion, will be the final outcome and why?

 

[Kaosium]

I've come to the conclusion that any "sources" whether they be Italian lawyers or Deep Throat himself are complete figments of the PMF/TJMK imaginations as they've been completely wrong about everything, most notably the outcome of the appeals.

I think it more likely Quennell is facebook friends with Maresca and perhaps one of the other lawyers involved in the civil parts in this case. That's the 'Italian lawyers.'

 

[Malkmus]

"Really silly"? Then I think you should have a talk with Massei. What do you want me to do--rewrite his report for him? The report says what it says--that the calunnia occured on the night of November 5-6. It does not say that the callunia kept on going for some indeterminite period of time.

I'm sorry, but 7:30 am is not the "night". It is the morning.

Which makes sense since only the typed statements are the ones that actually state Patrick did anything. The written note specifically says the events in her statements the night prior "could have" happened, not that they did happen.

 

[Katody Matrass]

for not having commited the act

For anyone interested here's the interview in which Hellmann states explicitly that he didn't use 530.2.

He says that the prosecution case was not only insufficient, but it's elements were contradictory.

 

[LondonJohn]

How's this for a particularly unpleasant stance to be taking - made all the more nasty because it's cloaked in the language of "pity" for Knox:

I am actually starting to have more pity for Amanda out of jail than in. She's going to be bought and sold over and over and over. She'll be talked about by revolting men on the internet, and pimped out to radio stations and have burgers named after her for a long while yet. She really has become a commodity, hasn't she. It's not 'her' story, they won't even be her words, or 'her' explanation, but a manufactured confection for the people who buy this sort of thing. It is a pitiful way to live. I think it is worse than prison. It's more degrading, and in many ways she has less freedom. But she can never, never tell the truth. Not even hint at it. 'I was there, I was there, I can't lie, I was there...' Whatever her role, she was there.

It doesn't take a genius to understand the subtext of this post: "I am glad when I imagine that Amanda is suffering far more now than when she was in prison. My disgust at her release is more than mitigated by my new belief that she is destined to live a tortured and damaged life out in the world".

I have to say that I find this particular individual (the one who wrote this post) particularly pernicious, unpleasant and obnoxious. She presents a very thin facade of equanimity, compassion and care. But behind the facade lurks a nasty, vindictive, misanthropic human being. I wish that she would get some help with her passive-aggressive proselytising. But I suspect that she's so far gone that she doesn't even realise who she is any more.

 

[Keeper]

The claim by Graham Johnson, that only the weakest evidence was reviewed in the trial, seems to have gained some traction and has been quoted on many forums and news comments discussions.

Reminder (point 9)...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-15157384

Assuming this hasn't been completely fabricated, presumably it is an interpretation of something that is accurate?

 

[HumanityBlues]

The claim by Graham Johnson, that only the weakest evidence was reviewed in the trial, seems to have gained some traction and has been quoted on many forums and news comments discussions.

Reminder (point 9)...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-15157384

Assuming this hasn't been completely fabricated, presumably it is an interpretation of something that is accurate?

Graham Johnson is an idiot who had made up dialogue in his book. To boot, he also think the motive for the murder had to do with the "missing money". Guy is a joke.

 

[Scorpion NITE]

Daily Mail Interview with John Kercher today 7th Oct. 2011.


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...rong-capitalise-murder.html?ito=feeds-newsxml

 

[LondonJohn]

For anyone interested here's the interview in which Hellmann states explicitly that he didn't use 530.2.

He says that the prosecution case was not only insufficient, but it's elements were contradictory.

I repeat, for the sake of our friend Machiavelli, that the language of Hellmann's verdict statement on Monday night made it absolutely clear that the acquittals were under 530.1. Apart from the small group of individuals who had a vested interest in pretending that the 530.1/530.2 issue was "unclear" (i.e. Mignini, Comodi, Maresca and Machiavelli), everyone inside and outside Italy knew full well that they were 530.1 acquittals.

As I said before, I know enough about Italian law, and this issue in particular, to have been able to attach a certainty to my belief in 530.1 acquittals long before Hellmann's implicit confirmation. That certainty was not some sort of bet (i.e. if I'm right, then its all good, but if I'm wrong, then I'll either hide for a bit or try to worm my way out of it). I stated I was certain because I knew I was right.

When Hellmann publishes his motivations report, it will be abundantly clear just how damning his court was about the case presented to it, and about Massei's court's judgement in the first trial. I wonder also when we will find out what the majority was. That Morsels guy on twitter claimed it was a unanimous verdict, but I have no idea whether that was based on any concrete information. My guess (not a certainty...) is that it was indeed unanimous.

 

[Scorpion NITE]

How's this for a particularly unpleasant stance to be taking - made all the more nasty because it's cloaked in the language of "pity" for Knox:

It doesn't take a genius to understand the subtext of this post: "I am glad when I imagine that Amanda is suffering far more now than when she was in prison. My disgust at her release is more than mitigated by my new belief that she is destined to live a tortured and damaged life out in the world".

I have to say that I find this particular individual (the one who wrote this post) particularly pernicious, unpleasant and obnoxious. She presents a very thin facade of equanimity, compassion and care. But behind the facade lurks a nasty, vindictive, misanthropic human being. I wish that she would get some help with her passive-aggressive proselytising. But I suspect that she's so far gone that she doesn't even realise who she is any more.

Every single word about that disgusting post.

EVERY single word that you have written there LJ.

I agree with.

 

[charlatan]

Assuming this hasn't been completely fabricated, presumably it is an interpretation of something that is accurate?

It's completely illogical when you consider that Hellmann himself said the C&V report was the turning point in his perception of the case.

 

[LondonJohn]

The claim by Graham Johnson, that only the weakest evidence was reviewed in the trial, seems to have gained some traction and has been quoted on many forums and news comments discussions.

Reminder (point 9)...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-15157384

Assuming this hasn't been completely fabricated, presumably it is an interpretation of something that is accurate?

This is wrong in so very many ways that it's worth re-addressing what that moron Johnson wrote:

The Italian appeals process offers more guarantees to defendants than any other legal system in the world, whereby only the weakest evidence is treated, not the whole case. Knox's team only had to attack the DNA evidence against her to undermine the whole edifice of the original trial. Italy has one of lowest prison populations in the world because of its lenient appeals process.

Where Johnson gets this ridiculous idea that "only the weakest evidence is treated, not the whole case", I have no idea. Everything about it is wrong. Firstly, the entirety of the evidence is assessed in the appeal trial. Secondly, the appeal judge has the power to admit new evidence (including recalls of witnesses or re-examination of existing evidence) if (s)he feels that doing so would clarify or expand the evidence base for the appeal court in a substantive and significant way. That's why Hellmann allowed the independent re-assessment of the DNA evidence, the recall of Curatolo, and the testimony of the convicts. But Hellmann's court reached its verdict on the entirety of evidence: this new evidence, plus all the evidence from the Massei trial and Guede's trials.

And where Johnson writes that "Knox's team only had to attack the DNA evidence against her to undermine the whole edifice of the original trial", hes also talking total nonsense. The fact is that the DNA evidence was the only half-decent evidence the prosecution ever had (if one took it at face value, that is). If there had been other strong evidence of Knox's/Sollecito's participation in the murder, the refutation of the DNA evidence might have had no effect at all. But there was no other strong evidence.

Lastly, Italy doesn't have a "lenient appeals system". Instead, the remarkable rate of modifications or reversals of verdicts only goes to show that there is a serious problem with the first trial in the Italian process. The likelihood is that courts in the first trial prefer to find for guilt in even marginal cases, so that the appeal court can take a closer look at the case. Even Italian judges realise the philosophical and jurisprudence problems of finding someone not guilty in the first trial, but guilty in the appeal trial. Far better, in their view, that someone be found guilty in the first trial and not guilty in the second trial: that "looks and smells" much, much better and fairer, doesn't it?

Johnson's article - and this part of it in particular - betrays him as an ignorant and biased commentator on the case.