The Massei/Mignini Conspiracy Theory

[RandyN]

Follains main source of information is Mignini...I don't think he even tries to hide that fact. As a reminder of how stupid Mignini actually is... one only needs consider that Mignini found a need to file charges against Amandas parents for slander but failed to file charges against the newspaper that carried the story or the author (Follain) who wrote the story.

The only false stories Mignini was exasperated about were the ones that didn't follow his rule book. Mignini was not use to having reporters questioning his side. And look...he files charges against almost everyone who attempted to tell the story from an objective other than his.

Mignini is a lot of things but an innocent bystander is not one of them. He is in it early and up over his neck as well. I present his ridiculous claim to be "only a notary" for the 5:45 statement on Nov 6th as an example.

Supernaut says...

"In England (and all judiciaries that are based on it, which after the expansion of British colonial power includes a great many) the principle of 'habeas corpus' (no imprisonment without charge) has been a principle in law since the Magna Carta. No such equivalent exists in Italy.

Perhaps more critically (and extraordinarily) the principle of 'sub judice' doesn't exist there either. The police and prosecutors appear to be able to say whatever ever they want, to release any information they please to the media with practically no restraints at all.

The combination is toxic."

Yes that would be enough to be more than a toxic combination... but then you must add the calunnia weapon Mignini uses in all these sub cases which makes it an impossible feat to get any sort of a fair trial if a mad man happens to get you in his legal sights.

Now not only can Mignini say all sorts of false things about you but there is no free press to ask any questions about any strange problems with your theories and presentments.

So not only is it amusing to watch these "children" lie and spin the unbelievable tale but they are also blatant enough to threaten their 5 best friends to lie also and they do this right in front of you too...What amazes me is that they can keep straight faces!...oh and did we mention we burnt the hard drives and forgot to tape the interrogations and forgot to supply the lawyers but then once we did...we denied access to the lawyers even longer and so kept up this charade for days longer...but you understand right?

 

[anglolawyer]

Ultra-conspiracy theorising (double DNA knife)

This will be a long post setting out the reasons why I believe Patrizia Stefanoni's conduct should be investigated with a view to criminal proceedings for giving false evidence to the Perugia court. It concerns only the 'double DNA' knife.

Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito did not murder Meredith Kercher. For one thing, they had no motive, for another they did not know Guede, it is very likely Meredith was attacked very soon after reaching home when computer records not destroyed by the cops show they were at Raffaele's place, Guede himself has been caught and his guilt completely accounts for everything at the crime scene. Finally, the crime scene contains no forensic evidence implicating the two.

So what? We all know this. Well, it means the knife taken from Raffaele's kitchen on 06 Nov 2007 (the day of the arrest) was never anywhere near the apartment or Meredith's body. Yet, the prosecution claimed to have discovered a trace of Meredith's blood ('presumed haematic substance') on the blade. There are only three possibilities which could account for this discovery, announced to the world on 14 Nov 2007:

1 inadvertent contamination of the blade in transit or of the sample taken from the blade or of the equipment used to generate the DNA profile;
2 misinterpretation of the result
3 fraud

We can discount 2, I think. Unlike the result for the bra clasp the egrams plainly show Meredith's unique DNA profile. *So, which of the other two is it?

Putting the science to one side, consider the circumstances first. The knife was the only one the cops tested. There were other knives at both apartments which were not tested. The knife is not compatible with the wounds or with the print in Meredith's blood which was found on the undersheet on her bed. At the hearing on 08 Nov 2007 before judge Matteini, when the prosecution was seeking authorisation for the continued detention of Amanda, Raffaele and Patrick, it was said that Raffaele's possession of a flick knife with an 8.5 centimetre blade which was 'compatible' with the wounds inflicted was among the inculpatory reasons. The kitchen knife had an 18 cm blade, twice as long. Used to its full length it would have created an exit wound. Added to all the other factors is the absurdity of the idea that either of them would have taken that knife out with them that evening or any other time.

It was said at the hearing before Matteini that Raffaele had more than one of these flick-knives and later on in the case, the suggestion was that he may have encouraged Amanda to carry a knife for her protection. Why wouldn't he have lent her his other flick knife in that case?

So the idea this knife was used to murder Meredith Kercher is already outlandish before any tests on it were carried out.

Now, let's look at the science. I am not a scientist myself but I think I have a handle on the major problems with the evidence. What I want anyone who has read this far to think about is what this knife tells us about the integrity of the prosecution. The dates I gave above are important. Remember the knife was seized on the day of the arrest and the results announced before Guede replaced Lumumba (i.e. before the case was solved).

The knife profile is 'low copy number'. The peaks on the graph (egram) are very small. Contamination is an acute issue in such cases and the battle between prosecution and defence largely revolved around this issue. It needs to be understood though that this was the battlefield only because of the nature of the proceedings. The defence teams had only to show a reasonable doubt to succeed. Contamination is far easier to argue than corruption and, fortunately, the gross inadequacies of Stefanoni's procedures afforded ample scope for such arguments. If Stefanoni instead had been on trial for perjury or perverting the course of justice the issues would have looked very different.

Let's work back from the egrams, of which there are two, showing the results of two runs. On the IIP public forum we recently had this from dna forensic consulting, responding to a question from geebee about the discrepancies between these two runs:

Well, the discrepancies between the two run results are not consistent with the same amplified product being run twice even if on different instruments and on different days. The inversion in peak heights simply should not occur if the same thing is being run multiple times. The results actually look more like different amplification products. In my experience, contamination of DNA from previous runs has never been an issue with capillary electrophoresis. The design of the instruments provides excellent safeguards from this. Of course, anything can occur. The best environment for something like this to happen would be if prior to the knife blade sample being run, a sample with a very high level of Kercher’s DNA was run. It’s hard say what is going on here, but for many other reasons the data is essentially useless.

I have highlighted the words which suggest, to me, the means by which these runs might have been fraudulently produced. First run a sample with a very high level of Meredith's DNA, to contaminate the machine, and then run the supposed sample.

Bear in mind when thinking about this that the machine which performs the electrophoresis retains an integral digital record of the process. This is crucially important. It is this internal record which produces the egram. The record can be copied and passed around, like any other digital information. I believe it is absolutely standard in the US and the UK for the defence to have access to the so-called electronic data files (EDFs) the egrams themselves being merely a photoshopped product of the underlying data.

Three different negative controls are run at the same time as the sample being tested. IIUC the machine has four capillary tubes through which the sample and the three controls are run at the same time. The EDFs would contain information about the sample and the controls. It would show, for example, whether any controls were run and very much more besides, like the fried hard drives and missing recordings.

Stefanoni has never handed over the EDFs nor satisfactorily demonstrated that she performed the controls, although it would have been easy to have done so. Apart from suppressing information Stefanoni was also prepared to lie to the court. I will come back to that but mention one lie here. If DNA forensic consulting are right then she lied about these two runs, saying they came from the same sample. According to DNSFC, this is not so, Credit to geebee for raising it with them.

In a comparable case, which is in fact far less egregious, the FBI dismissed one of its own scientists for consistently neglecting one particular negative control over a two year period. It treated the entirety of her work as invalid and was forced to re-test all of it. Legal systems may differ from place to place but science is the same everywhere. The idea that some completely different standard can legitimately apply in Italy is absurd.

Still working backwards towards the sampling of the knife, Stefanoni did not know the quantity of DNA run through the electrophoresis machine, despite the fact this is an essential requirement in the interpretation of the result.

Further, she did not amplify the supposedly sampled DNA enough times. If you double the number 2 28 times you get a very large number. DNA extracted from blood or skin or whatever is amplified by doubling, normally over 28 cycles. Low copy number DNA should be subjected to 31 cycles to obtain a reliable result. Stefanoni used only 28, despite knowing the correct number. I have not worked out why she didn't simply lie about this. Maybe someone can help here.

Before amplification, the DNA must be quantified. Stefanoni told the court she used a procedure called quantitative PCR (qPCR) to do this, but this was not true. As she was discussing a key piece of evidence it seems reasonable to impute dishonesty rather than a poor memory, especially as this was coupled with another falsehood, that the quantity of DNA sampled amounted to several hundred picograms (a respectable amount). qPCR is extremely sensitive. It can measure DNA down to below 10 picograms. One human cell weighs 6 picograms. This machine also has internal electronic records which can be consulted to verify what she said. It is therefore significant that she did not, in fact, use qPCR. On the defensive, she claimed to have quantified the DNA with another machine, the Qubit Fluoremeter. This machine has two key differences from qPCR:

1 it retains no internal records. Like a pocket calculator it just gives a read out.
2 it cannot quantify very small quantities of DNA.

I am suggesting she did not use the Qubit Fluorometer either, as she had no extracted dna to quantify and knew she didn't. She said she used this device because of the unfalsifiability of the claim. Her story about what she did just doesn't add up. She said she sampled both sides of the blade, samples B and C. Both samples supposedly failed to register in the Qubit Fluorometer, each yielding a 'too low' result. The C sample was discarded, she said, but for no reason yet discerned, she claims she continued to test sample B with the results we have seen and to extract and amplify DNA from it.

Before supposedly quantifying sample B she supposedly tested it for blood, with negative result and also subjected it to a human species test, again with negative result. To the amazement of Conti and Vechiotti, she did not conduct any test to see what it was she sampled. I visualise this as putting the sample under a microscope and looking at it. It is possible I am wrong about this but pretend for a moment I am right (there will be an equivalent but perhaps less intelligible process of some kind). Imagine sampling something and not looking at it to see what it is. It's not pure DNA but some cellular material from which the DNA is extracted later. Stefanoni described at as 'presumed haematic substance'. Blood cells, perhaps, but not worth looking at? Why?

Stefanoni explained she sampled an area of the blade which had barely visible 'striations' (scratches). MWhen asked to locate these striations later she was unable to do so, nor could any of the defence experts do so.

That's about everything that is comprehensible to me. Attending the entire operation is a wholesale disregard for documentation and anti-contamination precautions (which I would rely on as showing a lack of professionalism rather than as suggesting contamination because I don't think inadvertent contamination is the explanation for all this).

Let's go back to 06 Nov 2007 and hypothesise that the prosecution just wanted a knife, any knife, with Meredith's DNA on the blade and Amanda's on the handle, so long as it was collected from Raffaele's apartment. That way it kills two birds with one stone. Let's further hypothesise a criminal conspiracy between the police and Stefanoni, formed on or around that date. A really simple one. Here Stef, 'find' DNA on that!

In this scenario, there is no sampling, no testing, no quantification and no amplification. There is a run through the electrophoresis device of a massive amount of Meredith's DNA, taken from somewhere else, followed by a run of an empty sample which shows up a low copy profile simply because of the previous run. No negative controls either. Why bother?

Now, what lies do you have to tell to support the big lie? I suggest they are the lies she actually told until further questions elicited new ones.

Q. How did you quantify the sample?
A. With qPCR
Q. And what was the quantity?
A. A few hundred picograms
Q. Let's have a look at your results
A. Sorry I used the Qubit, now I think about it, so there is nothing to look at
Q. Oh, what was the read out?
A. (thinks, can't say the Qubit's minimum threshold because then I would have to explain what became of the extract and I am not going to have anything left, so ... ) Too low
Q. What tests did you perform on the sample?
A. (thinks, I can't say 'nothing') er, blood and human species, both negative.
Q. Really? And what was it you sampled?
A. (thinks, i have nothing to show as there was never anything in the first place) I don't know, I didn't look to see.
Q. Oh. Why did you choose that part of the blade?
A. I saw a scratch.
Q. Can you point it out?
A (thinks - sh**!) strangely, no.
Q. You conducted negative controls of course.
A. Of course.
Q. Where are the results?
A. They are in the court file.
Q. No, they are not.
A. I assure you they are.
Q. We have not been able to find them unfortunately. May we see the EDFs?
A. No, the request is unprecedented and highly irregular
Q. You were dealing with low copy number DNA?
A. Yes
Q. What special precautions did you take *to prevent contamination?
A. None. But contamination cannot account for the result obtained.
Q. Agreed.

The whole thing being a set up from the beginning, there is no reason to suppose any of the steps Stefanoni says she took were actually taken, in the absence of objective evidence such as the EDFs would contain. An incompetent but essentially honest and diligent forensic scientist would have told a different story.

I am sure this can be improved in many ways but hope the broad outline is clear.

 

[Kaosium]

Wow, that was awesome!

The whole thing being a set up from the beginning, there is no reason to suppose any of the steps Stefanoni says she took were actually taken, in the absence of objective evidence such as the EDFs would contain. An incompetent but essentially honest and diligent forensic scientist would have told a different story.

Very much so, and I think that's part of the key: we know she lied because she did: she said things that were provably not true and she had to know it. TMB negatives, 'a few hundred picograms with Real Time PCR,' 'mixed blood "hypothesis," only Raffaele and Meredith on the clasp with more than a dozen 'stutters' that were really alleles, the magical 'scratch' that appeared and disappeared and couldn't be photographed, it permeates the entire forensic case.


We also know she try to hide it because she did and got caught, and tried to hide everything until the end, refusing to comply with the requests of the court's experts until judicial intervention, then dumping just some of the stuff on the very last day of their commission, which then had to be extended a month. She pulled the same stunt during the original trial, but got away with more. Some very important things (negative controls, EDFs) she never turned over but pretended she did, then got caught trying to press the wrong documents in court.

She needs to be asked some tougher questions.

I am sure this can be improved in many ways but hope the broad outline is clear.

I hope she gets caught!

 

[anglolawyer]

Wow, that was awesome!

Thanks. If I end up in jail, I hold you responsible.

Very much so, and I think that's part of the key: we know she lied because she did: she said things that were provably not true and she had to know it. TMB negatives, 'a few hundred picograms with Real Time PCR,' 'mixed blood "hypothesis," only Raffaele and Meredith on the clasp with more than a dozen 'stutters' that were really alleles, the magical 'scratch' that appeared and disappeared and couldn't be photographed, it permeates the entire forensic case.
)

A possible problem with my theory is the 'too low' document. It ought to be a fake if my hypothesis is correct. That's why I have been trying to find a clearer copy. If someone could locate and send me the original that would be swell
Conti-Vechiotti discuss it here:

http://knoxdnareport.wordpress.com/...egarding-item-36-knife/quantification-of-dna/

It's worth re-reading this section. I don't find it easy to tell whether the too low doc was attached to the RTIGF report. My surmise is that it wasn't but I may be wrong. This extract seems to suggest it wasn't and it is difficult to see how it could have been given she was cross examined on her report and claimed to have used qPCR. So it would be interesting to know something of the genesis of the 'too low' document.

From this, it can be inferred that what is reported on page 78 of the RTIGF (and confirmed in the GUP questioning, page 178, where it is claimed that quantification was performed using Real Time and that quantification of the Y [chromosome] was not carried out) is not consistent with what was performed in reality. In fact, the tables show that quantification of the DNA extracted from all the samples taken from Exhibit 36 was carried out using the 770 Sequence Detector ABI PRISM™ equipment (Applied Biosystems); in contrast, it is apparent from the attached cards that the aforementioned method was only performed on samples D-E-F-G. A different method was employed for samples A-B-C using the Qubit Fluorometer™, and not mentioned in the final Technical Report, as would have been due and correct.

She needs to be asked some tougher questions.
I hope she gets caught!

Same here. The EDFs should do her in good and proper - unless they have gone the same way as the hard drives and the recordings.

 

[anglolawyer]

Conspiracy theory #2

This is a sketch of a conspiracy theory concerning the interrogations. If it has already been articulated and done to death here or elsewhere:

a) I shalln't be surprised, and
b) would someone please let me know.

It's a sketch because I haven't done the legwork it deserves. The theory is that Mig and the cops were in possession of a fully-formed crime theory by the time AK & RS arrived at the Questura in the evening of 05 Nov. Thus, they already thought they knew Lumumba was the killer and Amanda let him in and/or took him to the apartment to have sex with Meredith.

Bill and Grinder are having a good debate about this on the moderated thread but seem to have veered off into a separate discussion about Candace Dempsey. I would like to continue the original discussion here.

These are the main elements of the theory:

1 Mig and the cops thought from the start the burglary was staged;
2 a dark-skinned male was involved (evidence needed)
3 telephone surveillance was at the heart of the investigation (the misinterpretation of which played a key part in the cops' thinking)
4 the law required Mig and the cops to maintain a pretence that Amanda was not a suspect in order to deprive her of her rights.

On point 1, I am perfectly happy to have the argument about the cops' thoughts on the burglary but the point which follows if it is correct is crucial: there was no forced entry and no signs of struggle outside Meredith's room. Nor was Meredith raped, even though there was sexual activity. It seemed to the cops to follow that she knew her killer. Hence their interest in her sex life, promiscuity and the considerable importance of the virgins' information, accepted by Matteini (on 08 Nov) as showing that Meredith was not likely to have slept with many men or strange men or to have been unfaithful, unlike Amanda.

On point 2 I have nothing except press reports on which I am no expert. But if it is correct then the cops were looking for someone Meredith knew with dark skin. Already, that is a pointer to Lumumba, the link to whom ran through Amanda. It is highly significant that in her 1.45 statement Amanda said Lumumba 'frequented' the apartment. If you are a PGP you will have worked out a brilliantly devious piece of reasoning for this misdirection but, if not, you have to ask what it's doing in Amanda's statement. It disappeared by 5.45. I believe the cops got Amanda to confirm what they themselves believed at the beginning of the evening.

Point 3 is crucial. It is not questioned by anyone that the cops tapped Amanda's and Raffaele's phones from 02 Nov onwards. It is simply not credible they did not access and read their text messages too, including texts from the night if 01 Nov. Kindlekitten has said over at IIP this would have been technically perfectly feasible, subject only to legal impediment.

The Italian Criminal Code has this to say (source: Wikipedia)

During the preliminary investigations, a Judge only seldom intervenes. The Giudice per le Indagini Preliminari (Judge for the Preliminary Investigations) controls the actions of the Pubblico Ministero, when the personal rights of the indagato are at stake. No indagato can be wiretapped, unless the Judge for the Preliminary Investigations has authorised it. All measures must be adopted by the Judge with an order, and he must also publish written explanations of his decisions.

Indagato = suspect.

This is highly inconvenient for the cops and is discussed further below. Just bear in mind suspects have rights that witnesses don't (because mere witnesses don't need the rights in question).

(OK, you spotted that's the law on wiretapping, not on reading text messages but I said I hadn't done the legwork.)

What follows if these not very outlandish speculations are correct? It means the cops knew Amanda texted 'see you later' to a dark-skinned man Meredith knew at about 8.30 p.m. on 01 Nov. Think about that. It's the key to the whole saga.

They also 'knew' Amanda and Raffaele switched off their phones that evening and switched them on again at an hour in the morning when they claimed they were sleeping - except they didn't know any such thing. Kindlekitten says it is not possible to know this unless one is monitoring a phone in real time, which on 01 and 02 Nov the cops weren't doing. The phones might have been switched on or off at the various times or not. Maybe they just went out of range, into a part of Raffaele's apartment with no coverage, I don't know. The main thing is the cops knew about this interruption of activity and considered it suspicious and they had the information before the interrogations began.

Finally on the phones, Lumuma changed his phone at some time after 01 Nov and the cops thought this significant. We know this because Matteini records it in her judgment as a suspicious circumstance.

Point 4 concerns the law and the importance of the distinction between witnesses and suspects. Suspects have these crucial rights:

When a person who is neither an indagato (suspect) nor an imputato (defendant), interrogated by the police or the prosecutor, reveals pieces of information that might lead to his incrimination, the interrogation must be immediately stopped, the person must be invited to nominate a lawyer and be warned that the information disclosed may render necessary an investigation. These self-incriminating statements are inadmissible in court.[12]
The police or the prosecutor summon the indagato, during the preliminary investigations, and inform him precisely of the actions he is alleged to have committed (not yet technically a charge); they also inform him of the evidence so far gathered against him, if this is not detrimental to the investigations; the indagato is also invited to defend himself, if he so wishes; the police or the prosecutor can also ask him questions, that he may refuse to answer.[13]
The indagato, when interrogated, must be free of all undue influence, both psychological and physical. He must be willing to provide information (animus confitendi). The police or the prosecutor cannot use on the indagato any methods or techniques that may influence his right to self-determination or alter his memory or his capability to evaluate facts. This prohibition applies even if it was the indagato who asked that these methods or techniques were used. Before the interrogation begins, the indagato must be informed that his statements can be used against him in court; that he can choose not to answer the question, but that the investigations will proceed nonetheless; that, if he provides information concerning someone else's criminal responsibility, he will assume, as far as this responsibility is concerned, the office of witness.[14]
If evidence should be gathered in violation of these principles, it would be inadmissible in court.

What an inconvenience these rules must be! Imagine if you have already amassed a compelling case against someone such that you suspect them. You have to afford all these annoying rights! The solution is to pretend to know less than you do so as to be able to continue to treat the suspect person as a witness. I believe this is the game Mignini and the cops were preoccupied with in the period 02-05 Nov. It was thus necessary to pretend to disover the text on Amanda's phone in order to be able to interrogate her without according the rights which would otherwise have severely inhibited the enquiry.

Katy_did makes the most profound objection to all this. She says if the cops suspected Lumumba they would have hauled him in for questioning at once. She makes her point better than I can so hopefully she will come and develop it, but my answer is: why rush? Unless the guy is going to up and leave the country (easily preventable) what's wrong with building the case first before lifting him. This is where Bill is right. Raffaele was used as a lever to put pressure on Amanda who was used as a lever to get Lumumba. Where he's wrong, in my respectful opinion, is in thinking there was no prior plan.

In sum, Lumumba was their killer before the interrogations began.

 

[anglolawyer]

Meta- conspiracy

So, I have two conspiracy theories running and, from the absence of dissent, assume they have been passed nem con.

As Marx pointed out, everything is related to everything else. Therefore these two theories must be connected. They are (1) that the cops knew all about Lumumba and the texts prior to the interrogations and planned to confront Amanda with what they 'knew' to make her crack so they could go and arrest Lumumba, the killer and (2) the knife DNA was deliberately fabricated from the start.

Actually, I haven't got this worked out yet, except I am sure there is a thought process going on. It's important to note Lumumba was arrested and the fake knife collected both on 06 Nov. If the cops were sure they had their man (so much so they weren't bothering to wait for the forensic evidence to confirm their theory) why start fabricating evidence against Amanda and/or Raffaele? Why start fabricating evidence at all?

It could be a bluff, as Kaosium suggested, but why not sit back complacently when you have such an ironclad theory that the forensics must bear it out, given time?

As we know, they didn't, and large chunks of the case fell away as a result, as shown in the list below, which is the case as presented to Matteini with the stuff which fell away struck through.

1 postal police arrived at 12.35 on 02 Nov (no inferences drawn from this fact so far as can be discerned from the translation)
2 Raffaele withdrew her alibi for 01-02 Nov (admissible against Amanda but not Raffaele)
3 Amanda's statements of 1.45 and 5.45 (admissible against Raffaele Iand Patrick but not Amanda)
4 shoe prints compatible with Raffaele's Nike trainers found at crime scene ('a grave indication of culpability')
5 Raffaele's possession of an 8.5 cm knife compatible with the possible murder weapon
6 Amanda was the only person in possession of a key to the apartment, the door to which had not been damaged.
7 no receipts issued at Le Chic before 22.29 on 01 Nov
8 Patrick named 'Usi' as his only alibi witness but could give no contact details despite describing him as a friend.
9 witness Pasquale noticed Le Chic was closed at 19.00 on 01 Nov and again 'much later' that evening when returning after having a pizza (statement provided 07 Nov)
10 discrepancy between Amanda's and Patrick's versions of his text (she said she was told Le Chic was closed, his version being that it was quiet)

'This may appear to be a circumstance of little value when in reality it is not, being of itself a substantial difference between the two messages; it is probable that Patrick had had the intention, effectively, of not opening the locale thinking that he might be able to spend the night with Meredith, and then, seeing how events unfolded, considered it opportune to open the pub to create an apposite alibi for himself.'

11 Patrick customarily arranged meetings in Piazza Grimana
12 Meredith's and Amanda's sexuality contrasted (the one demure the other promiscuous)
13 Patrick changed phone numbers
14 Filomena saw Amanda wearing a sweatshirt on 01 Nov which she never saw her wearing again and was not part of the clothing paced under sequestration.

This list makes it graphically clear how muh of their narrative they were willing to ditch to keep Amanda in the frame. The whole story about meeting Patrick in Piazza Grimana is gone.

Maybe I need a third conspiracy theory, or rather a refinement of theory (2): if we knew the date on which the cops knew Lumumba was going to have to be replaced by someone else and if that date preceded the electrophoretic runs on 13 Nov that might fix it, but it wouldn't explain why that knife was seized on the 6th (maybe for use as a control? No, Stefanoni does not do negative controls).

Help required.

 

[Bill Williams]

Big holes in the twin conspiracy theories. The holes show why the cops were chasing the evidence they thought they had rather than a proactive manufacturing of it.

Why no planted evidence against Patrick? In your scenario they certainly had time to prepare it!

 

[anglolawyer]

Big holes in the twin conspiracy theories. The holes show why the cops were chasing the evidence they thought they had rather than a proactive manufacturing of it.

Why no planted evidence against Patrick? In your scenario they certainly had time to prepare it!

Could you point out some holes Bill? That's a bit too cryptic for me.

Up to the 6th there was no planted evidence against anyone. There was a complete crime theory which awaited forensic confirmation. I suspect unexpected results may have started coming in, a timeline for which would be helpful. We know the cops replaced Lumumba with Guede but not exactly when the penny dropped nor what the thought process was which led to them continuing against the other two, despite the demolition of their theory.

For my combined conspiracy theory (CCT) to work I accept I need an explanation for what happened with the knife. On 06 Nov I think the cops genuinely believed they had it figured. On 08 Nov they were talking about Raffaele's two knives to Matteini, much better candidates for an accident at the lab than the litchen knife.

I have Kaosium's bluff theory (but why not run that with one of Raffaele's knives, seized and tested at the same time IIUC?) and my 'penny dropped' theory, which needs a date for the realisation that Lumumba was innocent.

ETA maybe you cannot frame someone with a lock knife as such a knife cannot readily be cleaned so as to offer up only LCN DNA which would be consumed by testing.

ETA(2) as at 6th Nov they really had nothing on Amanda. She had 'confessed' to what? Hearing thuds? Big deal. Hence the knife. Facts are facts. There is only a small chance the knife evidence resulted from inadvertent contamination and the benefit of the doubt should not go to Stef until she coughs up those EDFs

 

[Bill Williams]

Could you point out some holes Bill? That's a bit too cryptic for me.

Up to the 6th there was no planted evidence against anyone. There was a complete crime theory which awaited forensic confirmation. I suspect unexpected results may have started coming in, a timeline for which would be helpful. We know the cops replaced Lumumba with Guede but not exactly when the penny dropped nor what the thought process was which led to them continuing against the other two, despite the demolition of their theory.

For my combined conspiracy theory (CCT) to work I accept I need an explanation for what happened with the knife. On 06 Nov I think the cops genuinely believed they had it figured. On 08 Nov they were talking about Raffaele's two knives to Matteini, much better candidates for an accident at the lab than the litchen knife.

I have Kaosium's bluff theory (but why not run that with one of Raffaele's knives, seized and tested at the same time IIUC?) and my 'penny dropped' theory, which needs a date for the realisation that Lumumba was innocent.

ETA maybe you cannot frame someone with a lock knife as such a knife cannot readily be cleaned so as to offer up only LCN DNA which would be consumed by testing.

ETA(2) as at 6th Nov they really had nothing on Amanda. She had 'confessed' to what? Hearing thuds? Big deal. Hence the knife. Facts are facts. There is only a small chance the knife evidence resulted from inadvertent contamination and the benefit of the doubt should not go to Stef until she coughs up those EDFs

You read right past the big hole without seeing it....

.... why no planted evidence against Lumumba which came with him to the station on the morning of the 6th?

Acc. to the conspiracy, they knew about Lumumba from the git go, because the theory says they cracked Knox's (and probably Lumuba's) phone messages.

Yet, on the 6th, they're STILL trying to figure out the implications of what Knox had beaten out of her on the 5th/6th, the most pressing of which was, "How does Rafffaele fit in..." So they go get a knife from Raffaele's, so that they can implicate him either way... if he needs to drop out they just say Knox took it when Raf was asleep....

And they're telling (like you say) Matteini.

They've done no such thing with Lumumba, still caught flatfooted on him. Heck, if they were "so prepared" at 10:30 pm on the 6th with a "working hypothesis" that ended up being the 1:45 am memorandum, why hadn't they yet checked Lumumba's receipts for the night of the 1st.

They could have done that ANY time before 10:30 pm pn the 5th, under the guise of, "We are checking to see who left your club before 9 pm, or who arrived after 10:30..." and when they saw that all the receipts had been posted at once, then the receipts would have made it into Lumumba's interrogation room on the morning of the 6th, the way Knox's phone had been used against her earlier.

This dog is not hunting. Everything shows that they were "making this up as they went along," and the starting gun was the "see you later" misunderstood SMS.

 

[Dan O.]

Point 3 is crucial. It is not questioned by anyone that the cops tapped Amanda's and Raffaele's phones from 02 Nov onwards. It is simply not credible they did not access and read their text messages too, including texts from the night if 01 Nov. Kindlekitten has said over at IIP this would have been technically perfectly feasible, subject only to legal impediment.

Once a text message has been received by the phone, there is no need for the message center to retain a copy. All the police would have is the record that the text messages had been exchanged. They had this information in the late afternoon or early evening of the 2nd so they had plenty of time to figure out who Patrick was and work up a theory of how he fit in.

It's technically feasible to record all message texts. It's technically feasible to record the content of every phone call too. But only the record of where the call went is retained unless a wiretap is in place. Even though they are a quasi police state, this invasion of privacy would be over the top and even the Italians wouldn't stand for it. The same rules apply to web browsing in Italy. They record what sites you visit but they don't record what you were doing there.

 

[anglolawyer]

Once a text message has been received by the phone, there is no need for the message center to retain a copy. All the police would have is the record that the text messages had been exchanged. They had this information in the late afternoon or early evening of the 2nd so they had plenty of time to figure out who Patrick was and work up a theory of how he fit in.

It's technically feasible to record all message texts. It's technically feasible to record the content of every phone call too. But only the record of where the call went is retained unless a wiretap is in place. Even though they are a quasi police state, this invasion of privacy would be over the top and even the Italians wouldn't stand for it. The same rules apply to web browsing in Italy. They record what sites you visit but they don't record what you were doing there.

Thanks. Is there any way for them to have known before the interrogations began and without looking at her phone whether Amanda had deleted Lumumba's text?

Have you a source for the highlighted part?

Gotta say Dan O there seems to be plenty of stuff out on the internet suggesting that text messages are retrievable, at last for a period of time. I am pretty useless at internet searches but if you google 'are text messages retrievable' you get plenty of results suggesting things are not so simple. Mostly, its people trying to retrieve their own texts but I imagine the security apparatus of a major western state which is fighting 'the war on terror' probably has ways and means.

 

[anglolawyer]

CCT

You read right past the big hole without seeing it....

.... why no planted evidence against Lumumba which came with him to the station on the morning of the 6th?

Acc. to the conspiracy, they knew about Lumumba from the git go, because the theory says they cracked Knox's (and probably Lumuba's) phone messages.

Yet, on the 6th, they're STILL trying to figure out the implications of what Knox had beaten out of her on the 5th/6th, the most pressing of which was, "How does Rafffaele fit in..." So they go get a knife from Raffaele's, so that they can implicate him either way... if he needs to drop out they just say Knox took it when Raf was asleep....

And they're telling (like you say) Matteini.

They've done no such thing with Lumumba, still caught flatfooted on him. Heck, if they were "so prepared" at 10:30 pm on the 6th with a "working hypothesis" that ended up being the 1:45 am memorandum, why hadn't they yet checked Lumumba's receipts for the night of the 1st.

They could have done that ANY time before 10:30 pm pn the 5th, under the guise of, "We are checking to see who left your club before 9 pm, or who arrived after 10:30..." and when they saw that all the receipts had been posted at once, then the receipts would have made it into Lumumba's interrogation room on the morning of the 6th, the way Knox's phone had been used against her earlier.

This dog is not hunting. Everything shows that they were "making this up as they went along," and the starting gun was the "see you later" misunderstood SMS.

I read this and thought it all looked very familiar then realised I answered it at IIP already! Here is the reply FWIW.

http://www.injusticeinperugiaforum.org/post37236.html#p37236

 

[Bill Williams]

I read this and thought it all looked very familiar then realised I answered it at IIP already! Here is the reply FWIW.

http://www.injusticeinperugiaforum.org/post37236.html#p37236

'Twas me who missed it on IIP.... see the piece over there. Also, please note the invitation - will that be cash or Visa?

 

[Kaosium]

Thanks. If I end up in jail, I hold you responsible.

A possible problem with my theory is the 'too low' document. It ought to be a fake if my hypothesis is correct. That's why I have been trying to find a clearer copy. If someone could locate and send me the original that would be swell

It's interesting it's dated in November of 2007 but stamped 30 July 2009. I wonder if this 'document' was the result of the defense demanding more data during the trial, as documented in Massei circa pages 245-246? That was when the quantification 'error' was uncovered, which this seems to directly relate to. Thus this being a fake is not impossible, she needed to extricate herself from the quandary of claiming she did 'Real Time PCR' and had '2-300 picograms.'

Incidentally, I think you're probably right about Massei making an error with the dates, it probably should read 'December' and not 'November' where I highlight below:

On November 12, laboratory testing commenced on the material acquired up to then; on November 22 a second phase of laboratory operations began, and continued on November 27. Another start was made on December 10, 2007, and continued on December 14, 2007.

On November 18, 2007, there was a further search at the house at via della Pergola 7, and the laboratory testing relative to the results of this search started on December 21, 2007. The whole operation ended with the official viewing [presa visione] of the results by the technical consultants on May 20, 2008. Subsequently, Dr. Stefanoni handed in the technical report and the printout of all the analytical results obtained from the analysed findings. The report was dated June 12, 2008 and it was deposited with the Office of the Public Prosecutor (page 39 and following of the transcripts).

Conti-Vechiotti discuss it here:

http://knoxdnareport.wordpress.com/...egarding-item-36-knife/quantification-of-dna/

It's worth re-reading this section. I don't find it easy to tell whether the too low doc was attached to the RTIGF report. My surmise is that it wasn't but I may be wrong. This extract seems to suggest it wasn't and it is difficult to see how it could have been given she was cross examined on her report and claimed to have used qPCR. So it would be interesting to know something of the genesis of the 'too low' document.

Same here. The EDFs should do her in good and proper - unless they have gone the same way as the hard drives and the recordings.

As my excerpt above notes, the RTIGF was done long before that paper was stamped, that date of 30 July 2009 is long past when her technical report was due! I cannot think of why she'd be getting papers stamped with that date, I can only guess they're to indicate when the documents were admitted to court or something, they couldn't have anything to do with her DNA work which should have been long done by then.

 

[Kaosium]

What an inconvenience these rules must be! Imagine if you have already amassed a compelling case against someone such that you suspect them. You have to afford all these annoying rights! The solution is to pretend to know less than you do so as to be able to continue to treat the suspect person as a witness. I believe this is the game Mignini and the cops were preoccupied with in the period 02-05 Nov. It was thus necessary to pretend to disover the text on Amanda's phone in order to be able to interrogate her without according the rights which would otherwise have severely inhibited the enquiry.

I strongly suspect you're right, and that Italian Law allows for liberties to taken against witnesses that aren't allowed with suspects has caused them to adopt strategies to 'adapt and overcome' that inconvenience.

Katy_did makes the most profound objection to all this. She says if the cops suspected Lumumba they would have hauled him in for questioning at once. She makes her point better than I can so hopefully she will come and develop it, but my answer is: why rush? Unless the guy is going to up and leave the country (easily preventable) what's wrong with building the case first before lifting him. This is where Bill is right. Raffaele was used as a lever to put pressure on Amanda who was used as a lever to get Lumumba. Where he's wrong, in my respectful opinion, is in thinking there was no prior plan.

In sum, Lumumba was their killer before the interrogations began.

My guess is initially they wanted the 'goods' on Patrick before they brought him in, a witness statement from someone who 'was there' sufficed nicely. Unlike Raffaele and Amanda, Patrick was not a young college student (as) likely to be intimidated by police and willing to forgo a lawyer and his rights.

The biggest problem with assuming no premeditation on the part of the cops the night of the interrogation is their actions that night and afterward. They had Raffaele and Amanda come in after 10:00 PM, they immediately went after Raffaele about Amanda's alibi, having a signed statement timestamped a mere twenty-five minutes after they walked through the door, having confronted Amanda already and started her interrogation. Then for the next three or so hours they will go after Amanda about someone else with Raffaele just cooling his heels in another room and never ask him about the murder! Here his shameless cuddling of Amanda will shock the press of three nations, but it never occurs to police (at this point in the evening) that Raffaele might be the man involved in the murder?

Something doesn't fit, there's a piece of information missing that explains why they were interested in another male outside Raffaele, and why they never even questioned him about the murder. It may very well be they had something that indicated that a man of African heritage was involved, a 'black man's hair' or the CCTV camera capture that suggests to some a person of African heritage, but since they sure as hell don't want anyone remembering that Amanda's statements 'matched the facts they knew to be correct' that information has remained obscured.

 

[anglolawyer]

It's interesting it's dated in November of 2007 but stamped 30 July 2009. I wonder if this 'document' was the result of the defense demanding more data during the trial, as documented in Massei circa pages 245-246? That was when the quantification 'error' was uncovered, which this seems to directly relate to. Thus this being a fake is not impossible, she needed to extricate herself from the quandary of claiming she did 'Real Time PCR' and had '2-300 picograms.'

Yes, the stamp must mean 'received in evidence' I guess. Why I want to see a clear copy is because there seems to be other stuff on it, not to do with sample B, which might be interesting. We could use a hearing-by-hearing chronology of these entire proceedings to get the sequence of events nailed. I read a post recently about the defendants having the right to attend (by sending their own experts) forensic examinations and that this did not occur with the knife . It would be nice to know more about that.

 

[Kaosium]

Yes, the stamp must mean 'received in evidence' I guess. Why I want to see a clear copy is because there seems to be other stuff on it, not to do with sample B, which might be interesting. We could use a hearing-by-hearing chronology of these entire proceedings to get the sequence of events nailed. I read a post recently about the defendants having the right to attend (by sending their own experts) forensic examinations and that this did not occur with the knife . It would be nice to know more about that.

This is an interesting one too. I'm not as familiar with it as some, but apparently the prosecution gave the defense (almost) no notice, but just said the tests were being conducted in a few hours, and the defense couldn't get their consultants to congregate in time. Thus the prosecution just told them they were out of luck or somesuch.

 

[Bill Williams]

I strongly suspect you're right, and that Italian Law allows for liberties to taken against witnesses that aren't allowed with suspects has caused them to adopt strategies to 'adapt and overcome' that inconvenience.

My guess is initially they wanted the 'goods' on Patrick before they brought him in, a witness statement from someone who 'was there' sufficed nicely. Unlike Raffaele and Amanda, Patrick was not a young college student (as) likely to be intimidated by police and willing to forgo a lawyer and his rights.

I'm beginning to suspect that the biggest surprise the police got - remember, I'm clinging to my own theory of no premeditation here - is that they never in 1 million years thought they were going to be, in 8 1/2 hours, kicking down Lumumba's door.... because.....

The biggest problem with assuming no premeditation on the part of the cops the night of the interrogation is their actions that night and afterward. They had Raffaele and Amanda come in after 10:00 PM, they immediately went after Raffaele about Amanda's alibi, having a signed statement timestamped a mere twenty-five minutes after they walked through the door, having confronted Amanda already and started her interrogation. Then for the next three or so hours they will go after Amanda about someone else with Raffaele just cooling his heels in another room and never ask him about the murder! Here his shameless cuddling of Amanda will shock the press of three nations, but it never occurs to police (at this point in the evening) that Raffaele might be the man involved in the murder?

Something doesn't fit, there's a piece of information missing that explains why they were interested in another male outside Raffaele, and why they never even questioned him about the murder. It may very well be they had something that indicated that a man of African heritage was involved, a 'black man's hair' or the CCTV camera capture that suggests to some a person of African heritage, but since they sure as hell don't want anyone remembering that Amanda's statements 'matched the facts they knew to be correct' that information has remained obscured.

Yes, something doesn't fit.

So try this on for size.

What if the first and third domino, acc. to police premeditation at 10:30 pm, was the same. My theory was that you break Raffaele, so as to break Knox, so as to go out and get an unknown third person, whoever it is who Knox is protecting, even if unwittingly...

What if at 10:30 pm they called in Raffaele with the theory that the Nike shoeprint was his.... but when Knox unannouncedly came along they shifted gears.

Instead of putting the boots initially to Raffaele, they decided that they'd first break them up as far as alibi's were concerned. Then they go into Knox's room, to confront her with Raffaele no longer supporting her.

They think the, "he's bad, he'd bad," is her assessment of Raffaele at first. Yet they have the "See you Later" as well... now the game changer for them is that to them Knox is now implicating a third person, a person connected with this SMS text.

They had not planned on accusing Raffaele of murder just yet, just as Lumumba would later report that he'd been beaten for literally hours until it occured to him that he was being accused of killing Meredith....

..... just like Knox had only put 2 and 2 together late in the game that she was being accused of killing Meredith.

So, if it holds to form, they are not going to outright accuse Raffaele of the crime.... even though they think they have his Nike print there. They're not going to mention that to Raffaele until they can return with a signed confession from Knox.

Only - the "confession" names someone else!

In fact, what if the sleeping-thought-experiment was getting out of hand - what if it was, "Look Raffaele, we have your girlfriend in a room next door. We're about to ask her how she knows YOU didn't leave your apartment all night... after all SHE was asleep, so how would she know?"

Raffaele says, "Well, then the same would go for me, wouldn't it?"

"Would you be willing to sign to that, that you really don't know where she was all night?'

How it got into the 9 pm to 1 am timeframe as being part of what they wanted Raffaele to claim is beyond this fiction I'm spinning, but what if the plan at 10:30 pm was to simply put it to Raffaele alone, that they thought he was the murderer - they had his Nike print?

And when Knox did accidentally came along, they thought they'd got two for one, could play them off.... "Let's look at your phone, maybe you did send a text to Raffaele at the scene of the crime......."

Anyway, it's an interesting thought.

As it sits, how else to explain the cops' nonchalant attitude towards interrogating Raffaele, when they very well could have had Meredith's killer in the room next to Knox?

"Something doesn't fit, there's a piece of information missing that explains why they were interested in another male outside Raffaele, and why they never even questioned him about the murder."

It's because the imaginings encouraged by the cops caught the cops completely off guard.

 

[anglolawyer]

I strongly suspect you're right, and that Italian Law allows for liberties to taken against witnesses that aren't allowed with suspects has caused them to adopt strategies to 'adapt and overcome' that inconvenience.

One of the larger underlying contributory factors to this whole disaster may be that Italan law accords too many rights to suspects. Cops like winning, especially when they know someone's guilty.

This is wikipedia on suspects' rights (I have highlighted the juicy bits):

When a person who is neither an indagato (suspect) nor an imputato (defendant), interrogated by the police or the prosecutor, reveals pieces of information that might lead to his incrimination, the interrogation must be immediately stopped, the person must be invited to nominate a lawyer and be warned that the information disclosed may render necessary an investigation. These self-incriminating statements are inadmissible in court.[12]
The police or the prosecutor summon the indagato, during the preliminary investigations, and inform him precisely of the actions he is alleged to have committed (not yet technically a charge); they also inform him of the evidence so far gathered against him, if this is not detrimental to the investigations; the indagato is also invited to defend himself, if he so wishes; the police or the prosecutor can also ask him questions, that he may refuse to answer.[13]
The indagato, when interrogated, must be free of all undue influence, both psychological and physical. He must be willing to provide information (animus confitendi). The police or the prosecutor cannot use on the indagato any methods or techniques that may influence his right to self-determination or alter his memory or his capability to evaluate facts. This prohibition applies even if it was the indagato who asked that these methods or techniques were used.

What does this bit mean? Lie detector test? Water boarding? It's not particularly relevant to our discussion but it's interesting.

Before the interrogation begins, the indagato must be informed that his statements can be used against him in court; that he can choose not to answer the question, but that the investigations will proceed nonetheless; that, if he provides information concerning someone else's criminal responsibility, he will assume, as far as this responsibility is concerned, the office of witness.[14]
If evidence should be gathered in violation of these principles, it would be inadmissible in court.

This is pretty restrictive compared to England and Wales where, usually, evidence obtained irregularly is not normally thereby automatically rendered inadmissible. Just as much as one must understand Stefanoni's environment so is the same necessary with Mignini's, as the constraints surrounding his work will have controlled his decisions.

My guess is initially they wanted the 'goods' on Patrick before they brought him in, a witness statement from someone who 'was there' sufficed nicely. Unlike Raffaele and Amanda, Patrick was not a young college student (as) likely to be intimidated by police and willing to forgo a lawyer and his rights.

Excellent point. Another one is that he is their killer. They don't want to be going before Matteini without a good, compelling case for detention pending investigation.

The biggest problem with assuming no premeditation on the part of the cops the night of the interrogation is their actions that night and afterward. They had Raffaele and Amanda come in after 10:00 PM, they immediately went after Raffaele about Amanda's alibi, having a signed statement timestamped a mere twenty-five minutes after they walked through the door, having confronted Amanda already and started her interrogation. Then for the next three or so hours they will go after Amanda about someone else with Raffaele just cooling his heels in another room and never ask him about the murder! Here his shameless cuddling of Amanda will shock the press of three nations, but it never occurs to police (at this point in the evening) that Raffaele might be the man involved in the murder?

I was unaware of this time frame. You make a compelling point. Despite the apparent lack of focus on Raffaele and my previous comment another thought is forming (see below).

Something doesn't fit, there's a piece of information missing that explains why they were interested in another male outside Raffaele, and why they never even questioned him about the murder. It may very well be they had something that indicated that a man of African heritage was involved, a 'black man's hair' or the CCTV camera capture that suggests to some a person of African heritage, but since they sure as hell don't want anyone remembering that Amanda's statements 'matched the facts they knew to be correct' that information has remained obscured.

On the first highlighted part - agreed. I still don't get this dark-skinned or African meme. Maybe it's something really crass. A video shot showing Guede marching towards the apartment (at a time when Raffaeke and Amanda have an alibi ). I don't get the second highlighted section. Can you explain your thinking?

Anyway, I was wondering whether they already planned to nail both Amanda and Raffaele for murder when they walked in but for legal, tactical and psychological reasons did not want to put it to them directly. I think they knew Raffaele was not the only male present e.g. because of the faeces - he was too well bred for that.

They had his Nike shoe print, believed he called the carabinieri after the posties arrived, he carried knives, was there the morning after and switched off his phone (they thought) the night of the murder and on again early next morning. So he was in their sights but had to be kept only a witness as long as possible while they worked on Amanda.

 

[Bill Williams]

the "See you Later" test

Anglo - in my book any claim that Ficarra's testimony rendered in English as, we did not know who Lumumba was," is at least going to have to pass the "See you later" test, something I am unqualified to do.

When what is translated says, "We did not know Lumumba," means they didn't know he existed strains credulity. Ficarra was a narcotics officer, Lumumba a bar owner.

My bet is that there should be an "of" inserted between "know" and "Lumumba" in the sentence to capture its meaning - then again I am at the mercy of Italian speakers to confirm.