Continuation Part 3 - Discussion of the Amanda Knox case

[Chris_Halkides]

let the punishment fit the crime

Here's a good primer on the DNA 'evidence'.

http://arstechnica.com/science/news...edand-then-rescued-amanda-knox.ars?comments=1

Justinian2,

Thanks. The author of that article, John Timmer, should be sentenced to a lifetime of writing about science.

 

[Kaosium]

In my opinion, the worst that could happen is that some dumb person actually pays Maresca for any work he has done. The reality is that Amanda will never set foot in an Italian prison again nor ever pay a dime to the cops that put her there.

I'm still interested in that case though, I'd hate to see her convicted in absentia which is one of the charming features of that system.

 

[AmyStrange]

@ Machiavelli
I cant believe you would compare your experience and how you handled it as a man from Italy - to a young woman visiting your country from America. As if she should behave like you would. Ridiculous !

Whats more amazing is how your actually willing to admit she was probably slapped as though it's no big deal, let's just move on to how she acted afterwards.

Seem's to me at that point she had begun to learn her lesson in Italian Justice and was starting to accept the new truth she was being programed for. A few more slaps to the head and you could have gotten her to blame her parents for the murder.

If only they knew about Rudy they could have cut off her finger and made some real progress.

Bottom line: After the very first slap this meeting is over!! I don't care how you veiw her actions afterwards. Calling Rose ugly only reflects more on your ill behavior towards woman. You must not have any sisters/daughters to realize how we see this.

-

Spot on Grey,

you hit the proverbial nail on the head,

It's like, she's really not guilty of murder until after the SC (Supreme Court), but she really is guilty of lying regardless of what happens with the SC.

I love you Machiavelli, but come on dude. You have to at least be consistent with your arguements.

Regardless, glad you are here. That's important. Not many people would brave a firestorm of the "jump on the new guy" game that we all love to play here, but look at all the attention you're getting. I think it's time for a group hug.

Just be a little more consistent M. I know you know what I mean. You can try using semantics or objecting on some technicality or pretend like you are stupid and don't know what I mean, but you are not stupid and you know exactly what I mean by being consistent.

It's almost like one of the first laws, if not THE first law, of critical thinking. Is it consistent (with)...? Am I wrong here?

A SHOUT OUT to JOHN KERCHER. Seriously dude, you need to talk to RON HENDRY,

Dave

 

[Justinian2]

Reading PMFdotNET. It's hard to have vitriol for that site. I mean, they are ridiculously funny. Look at this post by their admin:

"A few may have noticed that I've been a little quiet these last couple of weeks. That wouldn't matter of course, whether I speak or not, were it not that I'm Administrator of the site. I needed a couple of days to absorb the verdict and immediate fallout..and then after that, observe and understand the change in the weather, how the wind was blowing. To understand it, you have to observe it and before you understand it it's not wise to talk about it and I don't like talking about anything beyond a superficial level unless I know what I'm talking about, or at least believe I do. So, for the past two weeks I've been standing back drinking everything in and assessing. I'm gutted about the verdict, most especially because I'm old fashioned and give a damn about values such as truth and justice which have nowadays been replaced by sound bites and spin. There is no substitute for truth and the moment we start believing there is, not only truth but what truth stands FOR is lost. And truth, stands for something important.

Numerous legends speak of the destruction of human kind. The most famous is the legend of Atlantis, swamped and buried by tidal waves and earthquakes. Exciting, scary and romantic stories that may or may not have some basis in truth. The real apocalyptic danger for us is not the destruction of mankind, but the destruction of humanity...or our concept of it. What will destroy the human race better then any wave, but in a less glamorous way, is our disposal of truth, ethics and morals. When humanity is sacrificed, there is no longer a human race. We won't go out with a bang, rather it'll just be a cancer and we'll be slowly eaten away, as is happening now. There's nothing glamorous about that kind of destruction. Envy Atlantis."

Brings a smile to my face. One of the funniest few paragraphs I've read during this case and that is saying a lot. What planet are these people from?

ETA: Might have to change my signature to "Numerous legends speak of the destruction of human kind". Classic.

Are we the people that replace "truth and justice which have nowadays been replaced by sound bites and spin". We, the appeal court and the media of late are the sound bytes and spin?

Or has the administrator had a sudden epiphany and realizes that her site is replacing truth with 'sound bytes and spin?' Is this too much to hope for?

 

[HumanityBlues]

Are we the people that replace "truth and justice which have nowadays been replaced by sound bites and spin". We, the appeal court and the media of late are the sound bytes and spin?

Or has the administrator had a sudden epiphany and realizes that her site is replacing truth with 'sound bytes and spin?' Is this too much to hope for?

I don't have an answer. But I do think we need a Michael/Fulcanelli's greatest hits tribute page. He's had some great ones.

 

[Grinder]

I don't have an answer. But I do think we need a Michael/Fulcanelli's greatest hits tribute page. He's had some great ones.

I would encourage the guilt blog page to convert into this greatest hit page but -drumroll- how about reuniting the moderators and publish their greatest hits side by side.

From a trip to the fun house I learned that AK opened a bank account and that must mean that she has made some media deal. Why else would she need a bank account, debit or credit card?

 

[Chris_Halkides]

imagination inflation

At Huffingtonpost Dylan Evans makes some good points. Nothing earth-shattering for long-time students of the case, but a good introduction to some of the issues, especially to imagination inflation: "Yet psychologists have long known that merely imagining an event can lead to false memories. The phenomenon is known as "imagination inflation," and has been documented in dozens of studies."

 

[charlatan]

It's like, she's really not guilty of murder until after the SC (Supreme Court), but she really is guilty of lying regardless of what happens with the SC.

Before acquittal: She's a convicted killer! How can you question the wisdom of Massei? You have no respect for Italian law.
After acquittal: She's a convicted liar! Just you wait for the supreme court on that other stuff. Hellmann's judgement is questionable.

 

[UnrepentantSinner]

But that was not severe torture. That was just harrassing. There were also forms of torture but that was in another barrack compound.
And you understood: my point is not standing torture. My point is what you claim.
A person under harassment doesn't develop false memories. May well lie when under threat, but immediately after the phisical threat is over tells the truth and claims having been mistreated, reporting all factual details.

Wow, just wow. There are numerous cases of coerced false confessions in the U.S. Not all these cases are analagout to the Knox case - primarily because both the police and charged spoke English, but I think you're poo pooing the pressure that people can feel while incarcerated and being interrogated. The reality show Take the Money and Run featured adults, who knew they were participating in a game show, who were interrogated much less harshly than Amanda was, and, again, who had English speaking interrogators. About half the time they broke and told the police where they had hid their prize money just by virtue of incarceration or mild interrogation alone.

People will admit to a lot of things to make the interrogation stop. To suggest otherwise, or to suggest that after many hours of interrogation you memories can become conflated or even invented is nonsense.

 

[Mary_H]

Not to mention "his" experience is a fictitious delusion that never really even happened.

Oh, it happened, all right. It's just that the police were questioning him about why he parked in a loading zone, not whether he witnessed a murder.

 

[Mary_H]

Amanda should have been more like Machiavelli and she would've won over the police: "But you see officers, I am right because of a datum. But anyways, I am not interested in such things. I am innocent because I am right. There is no other explanation."

Too perfect.

 

[Mary_H]

Demonstrated?
Wait at least for the motivation report. And maybe for the final verdict(s).
And, anyway by now we can see she has been convicted for calunnia, a malicious lying.

Typical GuilterSpeak. "The part of the judge's decision we disagree with bears further examination. The part we agree with is something on which we base all our arguments."

"The part of Amanda's statements that we agree with are true, that is, she was there. The parts we don't agree with are lies, that is, Patrick was not there."

 

[zeb]

confession

Judge Hellmann give amanda three years for slander against Amanda and E22.000 fine.
I think he as done this so that Amanda could leave Italy.
Deep down I feel he will know that there is a very good chance, it will be over ruled in the ISC, for the fact there was no confession as ruled by the SCI.
We will see

 

[RoseMontague]

Reading PMFdotNET. It's hard to have vitriol for that site. I mean, they are ridiculously funny. Look at this post by their admin:

"A few may have noticed that I've been a little quiet these last couple of weeks. That wouldn't matter of course, whether I speak or not, were it not that I'm Administrator of the site. I needed a couple of days to absorb the verdict and immediate fallout..and then after that, observe and understand the change in the weather, how the wind was blowing. To understand it, you have to observe it and before you understand it it's not wise to talk about it and I don't like talking about anything beyond a superficial level unless I know what I'm talking about, or at least believe I do. So, for the past two weeks I've been standing back drinking everything in and assessing. I'm gutted about the verdict, most especially because I'm old fashioned and give a damn about values such as truth and justice which have nowadays been replaced by sound bites and spin. There is no substitute for truth and the moment we start believing there is, not only truth but what truth stands FOR is lost. And truth, stands for something important.

Numerous legends speak of the destruction of human kind. The most famous is the legend of Atlantis, swamped and buried by tidal waves and earthquakes. Exciting, scary and romantic stories that may or may not have some basis in truth. The real apocalyptic danger for us is not the destruction of mankind, but the destruction of humanity...or our concept of it. What will destroy the human race better then any wave, but in a less glamorous way, is our disposal of truth, ethics and morals. When humanity is sacrificed, there is no longer a human race. We won't go out with a bang, rather it'll just be a cancer and we'll be slowly eaten away, as is happening now. There's nothing glamorous about that kind of destruction. Envy Atlantis."

Brings a smile to my face. One of the funniest few paragraphs I've read during this case and that is saying a lot. What planet are these people from?

ETA: Might have to change my signature to "Numerous legends speak of the destruction of human kind". Classic.

Wow, just wow.

Amazing that it only took him a couple of weeks to come up with this one. I look forward to his next analysis. I hope it includes some unicorns and fairies.

 

[bri1]

Wow, just wow.

Amazing that it only took him a couple of weeks to come up with this one. I look forward to his next analysis. I hope it includes some unicorns and fairies.

Wow indeed
I haven't been contributing much to the board recently because of my other commitments (handing in my PhD within the month ) but I have been reading the thread and I don't think there's anything more to talk about in terms of the interrogation.

The bottom line for me is this:

1. To people such as Machiavelli, who deny the veracity of the psychological phenomena behind false confessions, (such as confabulation, the 'elasticity' of memory etc) which have been scientifically established: you need to either explain how the experimental data is suspect by providing clear criticisms of methodology, or explain some compelling reasons to think that the results do not pertain to Amanda's situation.

2. To people who allow that the results of psychology are sound, but argue that Amanda's account of the interrogation is false, because she's a liar: you're begging the question (in the technical sense), and you would have to prove that independently of the interrogation, Amanda lied (and vagueness and confusion which can be reasonably attributed to a normal margin of error compatible with no intent to deceive doesn't count as proof of a lie).

3. To people who argue that the police are telling the truth about the content and nature of the interrogation, therefore there literally were not the coercive elements, and hence Amanda gave her statements voluntarily.
The behaviour of the police in this case (in terms of bending the truth to cover themselves) means that we just can't take them at their word in the light of contradicting accounts (from Amanda).
Until they produce recordings which corroborate their version, we have very compelling reasons to disbelieve their account, and to believe Amanda's account.
These are: general knowledge of (often abysmal) interrogation techniques used by police all over the world, the 'overzealous' nature of police behaviour in Patrick's arrest (violence, name-calling etc), the fact that there is no evidence that Amanda lied (discounting this interrogation) but that there is evidence of police lies, plus the fact of the 'confusion' around if the interrogation was not recorded, why it wasn't (3? different versions given- budget cuts, just forgot, weren't required to).


Until pro-guilters meet these challenges, it is beyond reasonable doubt that Amanda's statements during the interrogation were the results of coercion, and amount to a (at least partly internalised) false confession, which Amanda retracted as soon as she was able. We can only assume that the Supreme Court will recognise these facts and rule accordingly.
One thing is for sure, and that's that while someone is arguing along the lines of the first point, and rejecting scientific data for no good reason, it's impossible to get anywhere and the conversation is pointless.

 

[bri1]

general knowledge of (often abysmal) interrogation techniques used by police all over the world,QUOTE]

I'd just like to add that I think this is an important point.
The fact is that police forces all over the world need to be educated (if they're interested in the truth, and in justice rather than just getting someone (anyone) to confess to a crime) on the risk factors for false confessions.
Are we supposed to believe that the Italian police in this case conducted an interrogation that completely avoided all of these risk factors, when this is a problem for most other police forces in the world?!

In terms of things to avoid, there's all the obvious ones: violence, lack of legal representation, lack of a good interpreter doing their actual job, allowing 'comfort breaks' and food and drink. Then there's the less obvious: not undermining the suspect / witness's memory, not lying to suspects (or using this technique in a very controlled way, only under certain circumstances), only allowing a couple / few officers to take part in the interrogation.
In terms of what kind of witness / suspect one has to be very careful with:
1. Those who've never been in trouble with the law, and are likely to trust authority, and are predisposed to being as helpful as possible
2. Those with low IQs and /or mental deficiencies / learning difficulties / mental health problems.
3. Young people.

Here's a very interesting and timely (4 days old) article which highlights the need to educate police on this issue:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/oct/09/false-confessions-sean-hodgson-courts
It includes this statement: 'However, Gudjonsson added: "It is a myth that only people with mental illness or learning disabilities make false confessions to serious crimes. Interrogators do on occasions elicit false confessions to serious crimes from normal individuals. Greater awareness and improved police interview training are important in reducing the risk of police-induced false confession." '

 

[Grinder]

I would like to suggest that the PGP consider taking up the case linked below:

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2016472707_pedersen12m.html

this is the case of a couple (man and woman) that killed a number of people on the West Coast. Included in the victims are the mother and father of the man. I hope that even though the mother was 69 years old that Peg and Pete will consider dedicating web pages to her memory.

 

[Grinder]

More bad reporting on the case

http://www.hannibal.net/opinions/x1...ty-overshadows-facts-in-Amanda-Knox-acquittal

Here are a couple of Wendy's points for guilt:


2. Knox’s DNA was found mixed with the victim’s blood in many different locations at the murder scene where Knox had lived with Kercher for only a few weeks before the crime took place. Knox told cops there was no blood from either her or Kercher in any of the rooms where the mixtures were found prior to the night in question. Without an innocent way to explain this DNA evidence, Knox’s involvement in the crime cannot be doubted.

3. Knox changed her story several times, initially claiming she was at Sollecito’s apartment at the time of the crime –– until cops told her that other evidence, including phone and computer records, disproved her alibi. Knox then confessed that she was present at the murder and could hear the victim screaming –– but she couldn’t recall much because she was under the influence of drugs. Many of the details she could recall about the crime were correct and could only have been known by someone who was there because the facts had not yet been publicly released.

 

[RoseMontague]

More bad reporting on the case

http://www.hannibal.net/opinions/x1...ty-overshadows-facts-in-Amanda-Knox-acquittal

Here are a couple of Wendy's points for guilt:


2. Knox’s DNA was found mixed with the victim’s blood in many different locations at the murder scene where Knox had lived with Kercher for only a few weeks before the crime took place. Knox told cops there was no blood from either her or Kercher in any of the rooms where the mixtures were found prior to the night in question. Without an innocent way to explain this DNA evidence, Knox’s involvement in the crime cannot be doubted.

3. Knox changed her story several times, initially claiming she was at Sollecito’s apartment at the time of the crime –– until cops told her that other evidence, including phone and computer records, disproved her alibi. Knox then confessed that she was present at the murder and could hear the victim screaming –– but she couldn’t recall much because she was under the influence of drugs. Many of the details she could recall about the crime were correct and could only have been known by someone who was there because the facts had not yet been publicly released.

Wendy really reveals her ignorance of the facts and just sheer stupidity with this nonsense.

 

[smkovalinksy]

Reading PMFdotNET. It's hard to have vitriol for that site. I mean, they are ridiculously funny. Look at this post by their admin:

"A few may have noticed that I've been a little quiet these last couple of weeks. That wouldn't matter of course, whether I speak or not, were it not that I'm Administrator of the site. I needed a couple of days to absorb the verdict and immediate fallout..and then after that, observe and understand the change in the weather, how the wind was blowing. To understand it, you have to observe it and before you understand it it's not wise to talk about it and I don't like talking about anything beyond a superficial level unless I know what I'm talking about, or at least believe I do. So, for the past two weeks I've been standing back drinking everything in and assessing. I'm gutted about the verdict, most especially because I'm old fashioned and give a damn about values such as truth and justice which have nowadays been replaced by sound bites and spin. There is no substitute for truth and the moment we start believing there is, not only truth but what truth stands FOR is lost. And truth, stands for something important.

Numerous legends speak of the destruction of human kind. The most famous is the legend of Atlantis, swamped and buried by tidal waves and earthquakes. Exciting, scary and romantic stories that may or may not have some basis in truth. The real apocalyptic danger for us is not the destruction of mankind, but the destruction of humanity...or our concept of it. What will destroy the human race better then any wave, but in a less glamorous way, is our disposal of truth, ethics and morals. When humanity is sacrificed, there is no longer a human race. We won't go out with a bang, rather it'll just be a cancer and we'll be slowly eaten away, as is happening now. There's nothing glamorous about that kind of destruction. Envy Atlantis."

Brings a smile to my face. One of the funniest few paragraphs I've read during this case and that is saying a lot. What planet are these people from?

ETA: Might have to change my signature to "Numerous legends speak of the destruction of human kind". Classic.

OK, now they have lost it. Big time. Absolutely pathetic. When your delusions do not pan out, shift to even more grandiose spheres.