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

[bookworm]

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.

It makes sense even to anyone who knows nothing about DNA transfer that changing gloves prevents contamination from yourself and anything else. What she is saying is tantamount to saying a cook can go in the restroom and use the toilet and then go back to the kitchen and cook without a need for washing his hands as long as he had gloves on. Because he's wearing the gloves to prevent germs from his own body from getting in the food.

I wonder if this person would be hired in a new DNA research position if this point of view about changing gloves was known to the person doing the hiring?

 

[Dougm]

Humbled to see that an argument of mine from so many pages back is still worthy of being resurrected to be a subject of current posts.

Please direct attention to that the portion of the above post that I have taken the liberty of bolding.
I have done so only to assist readers.
My intent is only to ameliorate apparent past difficulties in 'following what I say' here.

May I humbly suggest that a merry myriad of convicted incarcerated murderers throughout the universe are happily hacking away in Prison Law Libraries even as we speak.
They are gleefully copying the conclusion that I have bolded above.

These convicted murderers are doing so because IMHO, that bolded conclusion has some very significant implications for them all.
That conclusion is precisely why many have opined that this unique, radical approach to dna should not be allowed to stand.
Many feel that if allowed to stand and be accepted by jurists other than Hellmann, the C&V unique 'anything is possible' very academic and hardly functional approach to dna would logically then set thousands of convicted murderers and other convicted lawbreakers free
This because of the obvious inherent 'reasonable doubt'.

What you, and others commenting PG, seem to not understand is that when C&V said "anything is possible", it was in response to a specific question asked about this specific case. If the DNA collection and testing in all the other cases everywhere were done as incompetently as in this one, yes, they should all be thrown out. Of course, that is not the case.

No one is saying that because the DNA on the knife and bra clasp are not reliable that means that DNA forensics are unreliable in all other cases. That is a logic leap I have only seen one other place, and that is in Massei's verdict.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

liver alcohol levels

The professor's testimony was that .2 was consistent with .43 blood.

Also, I would assume you would have long ago found any science out there to refute the Massei conclusion on the alcohol content.

If you are testing my inventiveness or Google capabilities, I guess given that alcohol moves quickly from the stomach to the blood system and then is processed by the liver The amount of alcohol in the liver being only related to the amount in the blood but at a lower measurement number.

Why do you think?

Grinder,

In a previous message I listed some peer-reviewed articles in the hopes that someone would pick up the ball and run with it (I need to focus on DNA and confirmatory blood testing). However, I took a break from DNA long enough to turn this up:
J Forensic Sci. 1995 Jul;40(4):611-3.
Distribution of ethanol in postmortem liver.
Jenkins AJ, Levine BS, Smialek JE.

"Abstract
The analysis of multiple specimens for ethanol has become a necessary and accepted practice in postmortem forensic toxicology. The correlation between blood and various body fluids has been well documented. However, there is little data on the distribution of ethanol in specimens such as the liver. In postmortem cases where blood is unavailable or contaminated, liver may be used for alcohol and drug analyses. This study reports the analysis, by head space gas chromatography, of heart blood and liver specimens for ethanol from 103 postmortem cases. The average liver/heart blood ratio in cases with a blood alcohol level (BAC) > or = 0.04 g/dL was 0.56, SD = 0.30, with a range of 0-1.40."

Therefore, it seems that Meredith's having a higher level in the blood than in the liver is within expectations. However, this study does not address the question of whether either one is reliable, a topic of a few of my previous comments. My position is still that unless Meredith's bladder or vitreous alcohol levels were determined, little can be said about whether she did or did not have any alcohol on the afternoon or in the evening of 1 November.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

Peter Gill in the New Scientist

SNIP
Here an article Bad DNA results

Grinder,

Thanks for an interesting article. Here is a quote from another:

"I think that when we're dealing with very low levels of DNA we need to report that a DNA profile matches, but as to how and when it got there we just don't know," says [Peter] Gill [former principal scientist at the UK's Forensic Science Service]."

 

[geebee2]

I don't get your post. The quote from Massei clearly says that she had .43g/l as measured by Lalli and verified by the liver test.



The quote indicates that she had been drinking but wasn't as smashed as the 2.72 would indicate.

Ok, sorry, I have to confess that I didn't properly comprehend everything there.
So yes, the tests seem to indicate she may have consumed one glass of wine.
Against that is the testimony that no wine was consumed at the meal.

The question then seems to be whether the 0.43 figure can be regarded as reliable, and what the possible error is in that figure. I have no opinion on that, and Massei doesn't appear to address it either.

Could she have consumed alcohol earlier in the day, or could there have been alcohol left from heavy drinking the previous evening? That would help resolve the conflicting evidence, I have no idea on whether either of these explanations is plausible.

So the state of our knowledge seems to be that she might have consumed one glass of wine ( or equivalent ), but this is contrary to testimony. I'm left thinking, "something is wrong here", but I don't know what.

 

[Dougm]

Well, I am slightly surprised at that, but not willing to go to the scaffold on the point because the staging is a good deal less likely than the burglary.

I think we agree on that point. I am just saying that the burglary is more likely than staging, no matter what the wind was doing that night.

 

[anglolawyer]

Grinder,

In a previous message I listed some peer-reviewed articles in the hopes that someone would pick up the ball and run with it (I need to focus on DNA and confirmatory blood testing). However, I took a break from DNA long enough to turn this up:
J Forensic Sci. 1995 Jul;40(4):611-3.
Distribution of ethanol in postmortem liver.
Jenkins AJ, Levine BS, Smialek JE.

"Abstract
The analysis of multiple specimens for ethanol has become a necessary and accepted practice in postmortem forensic toxicology. The correlation between blood and various body fluids has been well documented. However, there is little data on the distribution of ethanol in specimens such as the liver. In postmortem cases where blood is unavailable or contaminated, liver may be used for alcohol and drug analyses. This study reports the analysis, by head space gas chromatography, of heart blood and liver specimens for ethanol from 103 postmortem cases. The average liver/heart blood ratio in cases with a blood alcohol level (BAC) > or = 0.04 g/dL was 0.56, SD = 0.30, with a range of 0-1.40."

Therefore, it seems that Meredith's having a higher level in the blood than in the liver is within expectations. However, this study does not address the question of whether either one is reliable, a topic of a few of my previous comments. My position is still that unless Meredith's bladder or vitreous alcohol levels were determined, little can be said about whether she did or did not have any alcohol on the afternoon or in the evening of 1 November.

Chris, the only part of your post I understand is the last sentence. Could you please simplify for the scientifically challenged? This topic is important because, the way I see it, the story of what happened changes quite a bit if she consumed alcohol after returning home.

 

[Grinder]

Chris, the only part of your post I understand is the last sentence. Could you please simplify for the scientifically challenged? This topic is important because, the way I see it, the story of what happened changes quite a bit if she consumed alcohol after returning home.

I know I'm not Chris but the basics are that there is a better test using liquids from the eyes that are not subject to any post mortem alcohol production by the body itself. The liver test is not as accurate as the eye liquid but does line up with the blood alcohol test Lalli did.

There is nothing in the record we have that puts doubt into Lalli's work.

She could have had a flask with her at the movie. She could have had a shot when she returned home either from something downstairs or upstairs with someone or not.

I find that this finding was made by the forensic people working the case but totally ignored by the prosecution's scenarios is significant.

 

[anglolawyer]

I know I'm not Chris but the basics are that there is a better test using liquids from the eyes that are not subject to any post mortem alcohol production by the body itself. The liver test is not as accurate as the eye liquid but does line up with the blood alcohol test Lalli did.

There is nothing in the record we have that puts doubt into Lalli's work.

She could have had a flask with her at the movie. She could have had a shot when she returned home either from something downstairs or upstairs with someone or not.

I find that this finding was made by the forensic people working the case but totally ignored by the prosecution's scenarios is significant.

Thanks Grinder. I don't mind at all who answers my questions. I am very grateful when they are addressed. I am still behind the curve on this subject, which I agree with you is important, so will take a backseat and watch you gentlemen slug it out. I will go look the film to see what's in the fridge. Maybe there's a carafe or something ...

Or maybe that was gin in the glass on the nightstand. No? Me neither.

 

[anglolawyer]

I think she is too vapid to have a strong opinion. My complaint isn't that she has an opinion, it's that she gets things wrong. She still says there was mixed blood of MK and AK with no evidence of such. I also don't believe that she talked to ten forensic experts as she claimed.

The SBS Australian Dateline show doesn't seem to be available but if someone has a link it gives a good incite into the key reporters on the case.

I don't know whether she still says it, but her book still says the purchase of the bleach was on 04/11/2007 at 8.15 and a timed receipt was found. That's pretty amazing. It means the clean-up was still going on 2 days after the crime was discovered and that Quintavalle was incorrectly coached, resulting in considerable personal embarrassment for the poor chap.

Ach! Details, details.

 

[Grinder]

I've wondered why the PGP are so resistant to the obvious earlier TOD. It isn't as if the 10:15 TOD makes it impossible for the kids to have been involved even if it does reduce the window.

What I think makes it so hard for thePGP to accept the earlier TOD is that it takes away a key "lie" and makes Amanda's change of time of dinner look very innocent. She at the end of questioning said dinner could have been at 11. The PGP grabbed that and said she said that to cover the TOD. Of course, had she been involved she would have known the TOD and said they ate at a time that would give them an alibi from the beginning. She would never have said they ate at 9 or 10 if the death occurred at 11 if she were lying.

On another topic: why would anybody still be making the ridiculous claim that contamination must be proven to exist? How can anybody be so dense as to not realize that it goes the other way? The people making the DNA claims need to show that they have followed protocols that assure no contamination was possible.

I marvel at why someone would have so much vitriol that they would continue to post such garbage. Why would they post bs about the appeal to the Corte Suprema di Cassazione? Is it possible AV pulled her tweet?

 

[Chris_Halkides]

ratio of alcohol levels

Chris, the only part of your post I understand is the last sentence. Could you please simplify for the scientifically challenged? This topic is important because, the way I see it, the story of what happened changes quite a bit if she consumed alcohol after returning home.

anglolawyer,

The study I quoted indicates that the level of alcohol in liver is usually lower than that in blood, which is consistent with what was found for Meredith on autopsy. The study reported considerable variation the liver-to-blood alcohol ratios from one autopsy to the next, and I do not know the reason.

I would put more stock in the vitreous alcohol level, because it is unlikely that microbes could ferment sugar to alcohol in that tissue. However, this number is not in the Massei report, and it may not have been obtained. The possibility of Meredith's consuming a small portion of alcohol while in the boys' flat is one that had not occurred to me until someone brought it up here.

 

[theRealBob]

Thanks Grinder. I don't mind at all who answers my questions. I am very grateful when they are addressed. I am still behind the curve on this subject, which I agree with you is important, so will take a backseat and watch you gentlemen slug it out. I will go look the film to see what's in the fridge. Maybe there's a carafe or something ...

Or maybe that was gin in the glass on the nightstand. No? Me neither.

She may have had a few drinks before going to her friends, and the recorded trace could be the diluted result a few hours later

 

[Grinder]

She may have had a few drinks before going to her friends, and the recorded trace could be the diluted result a few hours later

Sure, but if she arrived at the English girl's place at 5:30 and died at 9:30 she would have needed to have about 4 drinks in the hour before arriving for the movie.

If we accept the .43g/l, it is most likely she either was drinking during the movie or had something when she returned to the cottage.

The possibility of Meredith's consuming a small portion of alcohol while in the boys' flat is one that had not occurred to me until someone brought it up here.

Halides - someone please

 

[smkovalinksy]

I still don't see where PQ is getting his information from. Vogt seems to be responding to some questions about it, probably due to the TJMK article.

My reading of the criminal code is that Maresca can prepare and file an official request for appeal to the AG or Prosecutor of the appeal trial but it is up to them to file the appeal with the SC (or not). Have either of the two Italian legal experts at PMF commented on this? The code is a bit confusing with Google translation making it even more difficult.

Yes, I am confused as well. Thank you for taking the time to address this post, as when all is said and done, it is the court of cassation which will have the final word.

It was my understanding that only the new chief prosecutor (Giovanni Galati) could file, and has shown his support to Mignini et al by appearing in the Hellmann court toward the end, and speaking ill of the C & V expert report.

I suppose an urging from Maresca should be taken for granted.

And now that I leave off weekends and holidays, Feb. 18 is in fact 45 days from the release of the Hellmann report, so there is actually no extension.

 

[smkovalinksy]

@RoseMontague
I meant to add, Quenelle is so vague, it is surely more of his bravado. There had been no clear announcement of the appeal: It is an assumption. We have until the 18th of next month to see what pans out...

 

[Charlie Wilkes]

On another topic: why would anybody still be making the ridiculous claim that contamination must be proven to exist?

The people making such claims have chosen to ignore important information and thereby nurture the ignorance that enables them to believe things that are not true, like the statement above. Fortunately, the information is easily available to anyone who wants it. Some time ago, Chris Halkides posted the following link:

http://www.nacdl.org/Champion.aspx?id=1537&terms=tarnish+on+the+'gold+standard'

It is one of many sources discussing DNA evidence contamination, which has emerged as a huge problem in criminal investigations, because the technology for analyzing DNA is extremely sensitive, and residue containing DNA is easily spread around.

 

[Bill Williams]

On another topic: why would anybody still be making the ridiculous claim that contamination must be proven to exist? How can anybody be so dense as to not realize that it goes the other way? The people making the DNA claims need to show that they have followed protocols that assure no contamination was possible.

Think of it this way. PGP who argue for the proof that there had been no contamination, are actually arguing that there is no need need for anti-contamination protocols.

I mean that.

The whole and only reason to have anti-conamination protocols is so that the prosecution is in a position, at trial, to prove that no contamination was possible as an explanation of the results.

With the Kercher murder trials, once the anti-contamination protocols were put to the proper scrutiny, you saw even the Flying Squad people at the murder scene with their own hair exposed - would have been a great cover-story if by some remote chance one of the Flying Squad members themselves had committed the gruesome murder!

But the whole real TO HAVE protocols is so that contamination can be ruled out.

However, if the protocols were not followed, and contamination cannot be ruled out the evidence is worthless. It's as simple as that.

It is bizarre in the extreme to have anyone argue that one has to have proven that contamination in fact DID happen. Anyone who argues that way surrenders their right to comment on the rest of the Kercher murder.

 

[anglolawyer]

anglolawyer,

The study I quoted indicates that the level of alcohol in liver is usually lower than that in blood, which is consistent with what was found for Meredith on autopsy. The study reported considerable variation the liver-to-blood alcohol ratios from one autopsy to the next, and I do not know the reason.

I would put more stock in the vitreous alcohol level, because it is unlikely that microbes could ferment sugar to alcohol in that tissue. However, this number is not in the Massei report, and it may not have been obtained. The possibility of Meredith's consuming a small portion of alcohol while in the boys' flat is one that had not occurred to me until someone brought it up here.

Thanks. Now I get it. I hope you succeed in persuading everyone that what was detected was post mortem fermentation as that fits better.

On the downstairs flat thing can you please cast your mind back to your own college days and tell us how much watering cannabis needs? From the CSI vids those look like pretty big and thirsty plants and Giacomo will have been sure to have given precise instructions so as not to lose his valuable crop.

We should remember the cat also. Someone may have thought to arrange for it to be fed. In one of the 02/11/2007 videos you can see what I assume are its paw prints in blood on the stairs leading down to the boys' apartment (they are small rings, about the right size but with no 'paw' shape or detail - which is odd but that must be the way cats make this type of print because there's nothing else they can be). Unless there is a cat flap or an open window there was no way for the cat to get inside, yet it did so, as we can see from the blood it tracked all over the place, including on an unmade bed, suggesting it had access after they had gone away for the weekend.

I need some help looking into this and I know just the man for the job, over at IIP. I'll be back.

 

[geebee2]

With regards to the contamination issue, at least with respect to the bra-clasp, I don't think it occurred.

Rather Stefanoni interpreted noise as data, and coerced the data to fit Raffaele's profile. This was reported by Perugia Shock, and I give my understanding of this here http://www.injusticeinperugiaforum.org/post28408.html#p28408

“Your own profile, President, could likely be found in that DNA”, Vecchiotti told Hellmann.

The alternative explanation (which seems quite unlikely to me) is that there were at least 8 people's DNA on the bra clasp, which would indicate contamination, but I think it's much more likely the LCN "data" was just noise.

Whether this is also the case with Meredith's DNA on the knife I'm not sure - it could again just be noise, because the amount reportedly detected ( 5 picograms IIRC) is way, way below the normal limits. I think LCN is anything below 200 picograms. Noise or laboratory contamination in this case seems of minor interest, because we now know that in fact there was starch on the blade, not blood, and laboratory contamination can happen very easily, which is why controls are essential.