Continuation Part 4: Discussion of the Amanda Knox/Raffaele Sollecito case

[Bill Williams]

It still seems that the staging is a diversion from the basic facts that no evidence of the kids was found tying them to the murder and there is plenty tying the Rudy. Rudy could have broken in, he could have thrown the rock and then gone in with Meredith or he could have staged it because he thought Meredith had talked about their date. We will never know unless somebody talks.

The theorizing of a staged break-in is only a diversion from the facts once Rudy enters the scene. Before that, it belongs to the fog of war.

I have read both Dempsey and Burleigh, and when one stretches out what was known and when it was knowable on to a timeline - up until Guede enters the scene, the police would have been incompetent NOT to at least afford a staged break-in as one of the possibilities.

The first "official" surmise that the break-in might have been staged (acc. to Dempsey's book) was when the Flying Squad chief, Profazio, arrives on the scene a bit before 1:45 pm on Nov 2nd. He concludes that the break-in might have been staged, because to his eye-ball no one could have done it "without injury", which I take to mean that it was unlikely that whoever it was could have skinnied through the window without leavig some blood trace on a shard somewhere.

Note what Profazio implies - he implies that the break-in was otherwise very doable. Very doable! It's just the the absence of blood makes him cautious about that. Profazio implies neither the "impossibility" that the present group of PGP do (ie. Kermit's ridiculous powerpoint on the subject) or the "too much effort" Massei concluded, requiring Guede to have scaled the wall multiple times.

None of those things seem particularly problematic to Profazio, on the scene within 2 hours of the discovery of the horrible crime. He seems to make no mention of the significance of no marks on the outside wall.

As an aside, I just found out that since the horrible day, the cottage was broken into twice more through upper windows, even as it was behind police tape. I have a picture of one of those windows!

The investigative line Profazio draws from this assumed staging, though, is that those with keys to the front door should be watched - namely, Romanelli and Knox. Knox, particularly, because she had admitted to having been in the cottage before the murder was discovered. How was Profazio to know, truly, that Knox found the front door open when she had got there at 10:30 am?

As suspicion focused on Knox and Raffaele because they were always seen together, neither had the actual capacity or background to actually break-in, so the theory of the staging did not need amending. Yes, yes, yes, I know WHY Knox and Sollecito were always together, so please do not argue about that. It's just that to the police, it made Sollecito look like a confederate.

Most certainly, whatever you think of the method by which Lumumba gets unjustly dragged into this - police misconduct during interrogation - that does nothing to challenge the status of the staging theory.

It is when Guede enters the picture that the light bulb SHOULD have come on. There is actually NO reason now to hold Knox (or Sollecito) any further - as a keeper of one of the two keys Profazio was originally suspicious about on the 2nd, someone should have reminded Mignini about keeping his eyes focused on the basic simplicity of this horrible crime.

He should have reasoned that since there had, in fact, been no reason to suspect EITHER Romanelli OR Knox apart from them being key holders, that there might also be something wrong with holding two people where NO OTHER forensics pointed to them!

The rest is tragic history for two more innocents, the first innocent being Kercher herself.

As an aside, acc. to Dempsey, Filomena goes into her room and "tromps around" on two occasions on the 2nd of Nov, after the police had declared the place a crime scene - as had Knox each into their own rooms.

For Filomena to declare that the broken glass was located only on top of her strewn clothes, assumes she was in the room actually lifting the clothes to look(!). Talk about disturbing a crime scene.

Incredibly, she manages to slip in AGAIN past police to get her laptop from her room(!!!!!!!). When she brings it to her questioning that night down at headquarters, the investigators almost have apoplexy. They chide her for interfering with a crime scene, but leave it at that. No one is fired for missing that a suspect was allowed to tamper with evidence - a laptop for Jesus, Mary, and Joseph's sake!

As one of the two key holders, I believe that Filomena herself was in investigative peril at that time, and very well it could have been her at the infamous Nov 5-6 interrogation fingering some random name in the list of her text messages. I'm not kidding about that.

When her laptop was eventually returned, acc. to Dempsey, the harddrive had been messed with, but I am unclear how badly. Enough, though, for Filomena to notice and complain.

I do not begrudge the police in the early "fog of war" from focussing on the key holders, as long as this did not blind them to other possibilities which may have been unknown (ie. copied keys to boyfriends, etc.). One of those "other unknown possibilities" was precisely Guede!

Where the police REALLY screwed up was not dropping suspicion of the original two key holders once Guede was know. The rest is a tragic disrespect to none other than Kercher herself, as the investigation went completely off the rails.

 

[Bill Williams]

I don't see anything like this in Vogt's twitter. I call shenanigans Such Galati's announcement would be all over the news by now, if it existed. I'm afraid TJMK made it up.

I am one who always gets suckered in that Peter Quennell might sometime, somewhere, sone how post something that makes sense or is germane to the Kercher murder.

I am off to confession about it. Keeps the priest busy. The priest confesses to being bored, has actually started the confession with, "Look if I hear that you've been suckered by that Quennell guy again, I'm coming over there and smacking you."

 

[Skind]

Is it theorized that they walked around the house and then picked that window?

As I understand it, the theory is that they simply picked the room without bars on the window.

All the while ignoring the big doors directly opposite the murder room......

 

[Fine]

According to Dempsey, Filomena complained to the landlord a week before the crime that her shutters did not close properly and blew open. If this is true it explains why that window was chosen: Rudy may have seen the shutters open and all the lights out. Indeed, I think this is very likely because it is probably very difficult to open locked shutters from the outside without some serious equipment and Rudy is unlikely to have just gambled on finding a set of closed, but defective shutters.

This is important because it answers one of the big questions in the case: why did Rudy choose that window?

_________________

Hmmm. A strange wind in Perugia. It blows open Filomena's shutters but doesn't blow her shutters closed? It wasn't the wind doing this it was Rudy as peeping tom. He'd been up the wall below Filomena's window multiple times. Openning the exterior shutters afforded him the opportunity to view scantily-clad Filomena---and if her bedroom door were open---scantily-clad Meredith, Laura, and Amanda in the kitchen, too. The girls had complained about seeing an unidentified stranger---at night--- in the cottage yard just a week before the murder. (No mention of whether the stranger had brought popcorn.) Rudy chose that window because he was familiar with it, its shutters---interior and exterior---and its latching mechanisms. Or is Rudy just too nice a guy to have been a peeping tom?

///

 

[RWVBWL]

<snip>
He should have reasoned that since there had, in fact, been no reason to suspect EITHER Romanelli OR Knox apart from them being key holders, that there might also be something wrong with holding two people where NO OTHER forensics pointed to them!
<snip>
As one of the two key holders, I believe that Filomena herself was in investigative peril at that time, and very well it could have been her at the infamous Nov 5-6 interrogation fingering some random name in the list of her text messages. I'm not kidding about that.

Greetings Bill Williams and everyone else,
Have you ever rented an house and when you moved in, changed the entrance locks and not told the landlord?
I have...

How do we know that only Filomena, Laura, and Amanda had the keys to the place? What about previous tenants? Did the landlord change the door locks when she rented it to Filomena and Laura? I doubt it from what I have read.
Did the landlord have a key to the place also, both upstairs and downstairs?

Though I doubt that anyone else came inside using keys to the place,
I personally do know a guy who kept a copy of a key to a place he used to live in and he did come back and "borrow" something that did not belong to him. When confronted, he, being the wuss that he is, admitted it and his old room mate, bro, and landlord told him he'd beat his arse if he ever came inside again and "borrowed" something. Yes, they are still bro's...

Just a thought to keep in mind as you discuss who might have had keys to the place.
See ya, RW

 

[Bill Williams]

How do we know that only Filomena, Laura, and Amanda had the keys to the place? What about previous tenants? Did the landlord change the door locks when she rented it to Filomena and Laura? I doubt it from what I have read.
Did the landlord have a key to the place also, both upstairs and downstairs?

I think that misses the point. Aside from the fact that you may be correct, at the very least Knox and Romanelli are KNOWN to have keys. The jope is that police would also do due diligence on who might also have a key, but from day one, Knox and Romanelli are known to have them.

And it should not be claimed that on Nov 2 that Profazio himself was locked into a staged break-in theory. That first day he is NOT developing theories, he's trying to narrow down am investigative who's who - and his reasoning may have been, "Well, without blood evidence on the shards it very well could be a staged break-in, therefore we'd better follow people we know who are in possession of keys." He's not a crimescene theorist, he's developing an investigative framework that he knows, from experience, will have a lot of dead ends, but one or two good leads.

By 1:45 pm on Nov 2, there's no way to tell what's what on that score, so developing the investigative lead "follow those known to have keys" is something police SHOULD have done and would have been incompetent not to do.

And of course, the next command is, "find out when the last time those locks were changed, and find out if there's a list of returned keys, and just in case, go ask each former tenant if they ever copied a key....." But Knox and Romanelli are known right now, so follow them.

The staged break-in doesn't necessary get "locked in" until Lumumba enters the scene, and there are three people with no burglary background and perhaps without the physical ability to do it - then, it should get locked in as staged, because with those three what other possibility is there?

Well, there's the oooooooooops. Guede. That the break-in doesn't get locked out at that point is the head scratcher.

 

[codyjuneau]

An even better reason Massei was wrong: Someone (let's call him "Guede" ) could have climbed up and opened them first, unless they were locked shut, which was not possible. Wind or no wind, the shutters were not an impossible barrier.

.
True Doug, but did not Massei explain to us that Guede would not do that because it was rather a bother?

 

[codyjuneau]

RW and Grinder

I have a thought about the alcohol.

Meredith had the key for the downstairs apartment so she could look after the cat while the boys were away. Do you think it might be possible she stopped in there first and helped herself to a drink when checking on the cat? I would be very surprised if four college student types did not have lots of booze available.

If Meredith did then I suppose she would have also discovered the cat's ear was bleeding again. I wonder what her actions would be then?

By the way, this is another of those events in Rudy's story that could conceivably parallel the truth. I believe he mentioned hearing a noise from downstairs while he was sitting on the can.

 

[codyjuneau]

_________________

Hmmm. A strange wind in Perugia. It blows open Filomena's shutters but doesn't blow her shutters closed? It wasn't the wind doing this it was Rudy as peeping tom. He'd been up the wall below Filomena's window multiple times. Openning the exterior shutters afforded him the opportunity to view scantily-clad Filomena---and if her bedroom door were open---scantily-clad Meredith, Laura, and Amanda in the kitchen, too. The girls had complained about seeing an unidentified stranger---at night--- in the cottage yard just a week before the murder. (No mention of whether the stranger had brought popcorn.) Rudy chose that window because he was familiar with it, its shutters---interior and exterior---and its latching mechanisms. Or is Rudy just too nice a guy to have been a peeping tom?

///

Hi Fine

I think the stranger seen lurking in the yard was never given the attention it deserved. Apparently the sighting made Meredith very nervous. Rightly so, tragically.

 

[Antony]

It still seems that the staging is a diversion from the basic facts that no evidence of the kids was found tying them to the murder and there is plenty tying the Rudy. Rudy could have broken in, he could have thrown the rock and then gone in with Meredith or he could have staged it because he thought Meredith had talked about their date. We will never know unless somebody talks.

That is manifestly clear from every other detail of the "investigation", which shows that the cops and prosecution were following an agenda from early on.

The obvious reading of the sequence of events is that the police knew they were completely out of their depth from the moment they arrived at the scene, but they also felt they had to come up with a "solution" to the crime as soon as possible. They did what police forces in this situation do frequently: they chose to "solve" the crime the easy way by arresting some random, near-at-hand "suspects" and manipulating the evidence to fit their scenario.

"Ah ... the broken window. Our reconstruction doesn't include a break-in. How do we fit it in? Of course, the scoundrels broke the window themselves to make it look like a break-in!"

 

[anglolawyer]

The exterior shutters did not lock.

I know, but that is not something which would be visible to passing burglars. The fact, if it is a fact, that they tended to blow open as well is more important because that is visible and, as I said, explains 'Guede's' choice of window.

 

[anglolawyer]

_________________

Hmmm. A strange wind in Perugia. It blows open Filomena's shutters but doesn't blow her shutters closed? It wasn't the wind doing this it was Rudy as peeping tom. He'd been up the wall below Filomena's window multiple times. Openning the exterior shutters afforded him the opportunity to view scantily-clad Filomena---and if her bedroom door were open---scantily-clad Meredith, Laura, and Amanda in the kitchen, too. The girls had complained about seeing an unidentified stranger---at night--- in the cottage yard just a week before the murder. (No mention of whether the stranger had brought popcorn.) Rudy chose that window because he was familiar with it, its shutters---interior and exterior---and its latching mechanisms. Or is Rudy just too nice a guy to have been a peeping tom?

///

Not buying. It would be enough for the wind to blow them open and closed.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

more nonsense on DNA

Chami, who claims to have been connected with DNA research for many years. wrote,
“2. The purpose of the gloves is to prevent contamination from your own self. I do not believe that the same glove was used after six weeks, as you have written. I checked my gloves and they are not sterile. It is just provides a barrier between you and the sample. Yes, it is part of the good laboratory practice to change gloves often [SNIP]

4. DNA fingerprinting is almost perfectly "black and white" but depending on the number of peaks matched, we can assign some probabilities. I am not going to lecture you on the details but the idea is simple.

5. One of the beauties of the technology is that it is rather difficult to screw up (your words, not mine!) the results unless the operator is some one like you! [SNIP]

7. Sample collection is a branch of mathematics (statistics) and is closely related to probability theory. For example, with some data and some additional information, I can calculate the probability that the DNA sample collected in the bathroom are deposited together or both are from blood or one (DNA) from blood and the other (DNA) from skin cells. It is not a classroom and you should think before you write.”

These statements are misleading at best:
2. Changing gloves between samples also prevents one item from contaminating another.
4. When a single individual’s DNA is present and gives a full profile, the results are easy to interpret. When a partial profile is found or when a mixture is present, there is considerable room or subjective interpretation. A technique known as sequential unmasking is one way to lessen the chances of investigator bias. As Dan Krane said, the science of DNA profiling is sound, but not all DNA profiling is sound science.
5. Ask Russell Gesah, Farah Jama, Ms. P., Profile N., or Gary Leiterman how easy the technique is to mess up. There are also documented cases of samples being mislabeled, and the wrong individual almost being convicted on that basis.
7. The writer did not indicate what type of information he or she needed. However, there is no way to date the time of DNA deposition. Full stop. Moreover, there is no way to tell what tissue provided the DNA unless one tests for those tissues. If the writer would care to name the textbook or journal article that supports this point, I would love to read it. Until then, I judge it to be utter nonsense.

 

[smkovalinksy]

I double your call and raise you a malarkey

Did they actually say Vogt had tweated that?

Yes, they do. And I do hope they are lying, as I have not seen anything of the kind.

 

[smkovalinksy]

I am one who always gets suckered in that Peter Quennell might sometime, somewhere, sone how post something that makes sense or is germane to the Kercher murder.

I am off to confession about it. Keeps the priest busy. The priest confesses to being bored, has actually started the confession with, "Look if I hear that you've been suckered by that Quennell guy again, I'm coming over there and smacking you."

LOL. Yes, I have been suckered in by Quennell et al, too, in the past, prior to the pending Hellmann verdict: Their insistence that Knox and Sollecito HAD to take the stand, their prediction that if they got 10 years shaved off their sentences, the defense would consider it an enormous victory....yada, yada, yada....

 

[smkovalinksy]

Breaking News: Perugia Chief Prosecutor Galati......

This exchange I had with Malkmus on Websleuths Forum is very enlightening regarding the "Breaking Story" about Chief Prosecutor Galati in Perugia getting his appeal ready:

Originally Posted by SMK
Well, someone on PMF has said that TJMK has heard that Chief Prosecutor Giovanni Galati is preparing his appeal report---yet someone on JREF said that if this were true, it would be in the news. So we still know nothing....

Malkmus:
There is something strange about this "breaking story" on TJMK. They cite Vogt's twitter account as the source but oddly don't quote the actual tweet. On PMF, someone has translated an Italian news story about the chief prosecutor potentially taking action... but it's from September. And I did a Google News search for Giovanni Galati (the CP) and the only story is one from today in which he is at the center of a reform movement for the way trials are carried out - primarily making sure the public is given access to all information, and not rely on false information in the press. Apparently PMF seems to think this is in regards to the "Knox PR supertanker". To which I think they need to reassess their evaluation of such news, because that particular supertanker had no affect on the Italian press.

http://www.websleuths.com/forums/showthread.php?p=7513905&posted=1#post7513905

 

[Grinder]

Bill PMF Catnip posted this link to old Mail stories from back in the beginning.

I think many that weren't following the case from the beginning and are now reading the various books may get some incites into the case by checking out the contemporaneous reporting

Try this link

Hope the link worked.

It is revealing to read what the ILE seemed to releasing at the time.

 

[geebee2]

Apologies. The alcohol question is important but I have not posted in reply to you because I don't understand it. Is it certain she consumed alcohol? If so, we need to identify all possible sources of alcohol in the apartment. Maybe she took a swig of something, I don't know. I can't imagine why Rudy would tidy up after her if she did. What are your thoughts? Maybe we can zero in on a plausible explanation - once it is clear she definitely, or anyway probably, consumed alcohol.

It's my understanding that Meredith did not have any alcohol on the day she was murdered. There was a test that showed a large amount of alcohol, but it seems that this should crtainly be discounted - it was certainly a mistake in the testing.

From Massei

He then went on to detail the outcome of the alcohol level test. He recalled that the level of alcohol found in Perugia at the Institute of Forensic Medicine was 0.43 grams per litre; the [level] that had been [152] detected in the blood, however, at the headquarters of the expert report commissioned for the pre-trial hearing [incidente probatorio] was 2.72 grams per litre. On the basis of such contrasting results, a check was carried out on the alcohol percentage in other regions: in the gastric content and then in the liver. A value substantially of zero had been found in the gastric content and, he stressed, ‚in the gastric content the quantity of alcohol is frighteningly greater than in the blood‛ (page 106). In the liver too a very slight quantity had been detected, equal to 0.2, which was comparable from the pharmacokinetic point of view with the 0.43 verified by Dr. Lalli at the Institute of Forensic Medicine of Perugia, rather than with the value of 2.72. He concluded on this point that that was no pharmacokinetic condition which could justify all three of these values, that is zero in the stomach, 2.72 in the blood and 0.2 in the liver. On the basis of these elements they had concluded that Meredith was not in a condition of alcoholic intoxication.

He could not indicate why the analysis of the blood had given a particularly high value, ‚close to ethylic coma,‛ (page 108) other than in terms of a simple hypothesis: the exchange of samples; a contamination with the passage of alcohol to the sample, taking place when the exhibit was in the refrigerator.

 

[Bill Williams]

It seems that the slutty journalists who tried their best to invent a Foxy Knoxy character out of a, then, 20-year-old socially awkward, Seattleite hippy-type have claimed another victim. This from Candace Demspey's blog, who was one of the few to actually portray things as they were - her book is amazing in its frankness and clarity....

Meanwhile, Raffaele’s alma mater, the University of Perugia faces closure because of falling enrollment and rising bills. ‎”The city has been portrayed as a place of perversion,” a college official says. “Perugia is not Sodom and Gomorrah, is a regional capital and as such deals with many problems. The clamor that the Kercher crime has caused in Italy and abroad has not helped the image of our city. But Perugia is quite another thing. Whoever comes here notices that immediately,” he adds, despite the city’s massive drug problems and problems with break-ins and street crime. Just skim the headlines in the local press.

See: http://blog.seattlepi.com/dempsey/

Congratulations Barbie. You must be proud.

 

[smkovalinksy]

uh oh

Not good from PMF:

Tweeted by Andrea Vogt:

For those asking: court sources say deadline for #Perugia prosecutors/Kerchers to file #amandaknox cassation appeal is Feb. 18.

This is a little later than the deadline of the end of January that's been mentioned here. And it's good - it gives the prosecutors that much more time to shred the Hellman report.