Continuation Part 5: Discussion of the Amanda Knox/Raffaele Sollecito case

[RandyN]

Leave it to a poor or dishonest lawyer to define the law as such.

A great and honest lawyer tries to simplify the law and arguments. For example, take Gary Spence. He is considered to be the the best American trial lawyer in the country. He is deliberate in being direct, straight forward and attempts to simplify the law and the arguments as much as possible. You are doing the opposite. You are trying to use the law and make arguments that are designed to deceive and confuse.

But maybe that is the difference. In America a trial like this would be before a jury of the defendants peers. Average everyday lay people who almost always are trying to drill down to the truth. Spence and trial lawyers in the US are focused on their audience which are lay people. They take what is complex and complicated and break it down so their audience understands. Your method seems to be an attempt to appeal to the professional jurists as they lead the jury. You turn the simple into the complicated and complex.

It's as if the purpose is to create a veil of complexity to veil the truth. Above all do not let the common man know what is happening. Because if they did they would hang you all!!!

Not that important but I think you mean Gerry Spence.

As for Yummi/Mig...you know the saying....If you cant dazzle them with brilliance, then baffle them with BS.

 

[acbytesla]

It is perfectly OK to defend a guilty client even if they tell you they are guilty but the way you do it is controlled by ethical rules. You can't put them on the stand and elicit lies nor put to a prosecution witness suggestions you know to be false. All of which follows from the fact the burden is on the prosecution to prove the case BRD. The defence is not only not obliged to help but is entitled to obstruct, provided certain principles are observed.

Of course it is, but the question at hand is what does a lawyer do when he believes his clients are guilty and they tell the lawyer they are innocent? Do you approach that case any differently than if you believe them to be innocent? There has to be personal ethical dilemmas facing attorneys in that situation, particularly if it is a violent crime.

And I'm not talking about lawyer ethics, I'm talking about personal ethics. How would you feel if you got a violent criminal acquitted of a crime you were sure they committed even though they said they were innocent? Isn't that the flip side of sending someone to prison for something they didn't do?

 

[Mary_H]

I completely agree and can prove that if you will simply study this photo...
<snip>
Sorry in advance to Mary ...its an adolescent joke I stole from someone on FB.

It's okay, Randy; we're all friends here. I do think it is worth considering, though, that many of the forums about the case eventually do become male-dominated. This one has been for many months. It's just something to ponder.

 

[RandyN]

Of course it is, but the question at hand is what does a lawyer do when he believes his clients are guilty and they tell the lawyer they are innocent? Do you approach that case any differently than if you believe them to be innocent? There has to be personal ethical dilemmas facing attorneys in that situation, particularly if it is a violent crime.

And I'm not talking about lawyer ethics, I'm talking about personal ethics. How would you feel if you got a violent criminal acquitted of a crime you were sure they committed even though they said they were innocent? Isn't that the flip side of sending someone to prison for something they didn't do?

Not sure about the UK but I think US lawyers are required by law to put forth the best possible defense. Personal ethics must certainly be put aside. How else could Baez defend Casey Anthony?

 

[RandyN]

It's okay, Randy; we're all friends here. I do think it is worth considering, though, that many of the forums about the case eventually do become male-dominated. This one has been for many months. It's just something to ponder.

See I knew better and understood completely that I would get ripped a "new one"...by you and in less than 15 words.

Its just that it fit so perfectly with what Rose said in his post;-)

 

[acbytesla]

Not that important but I think you mean Gerry Spence.

As for Yummi/Mig...you know the saying....If you cant dazzle them with brilliance, then baffle them with BS.

You're right. thanks. and you just stole my line...actually my dad's line. I heard that thousands of times growing up.

 

[Sherlock Holmes]

That was the whole point. This is why the Police 5 months later went back to the cottage because they had evidence of what Amanda was wearing on November 1st. Popovic and Filomena told them. The missing clothes were NOW FOUND!! Except they clearly weren't missing. Now according to Sherlock Popovic didn't see what she was wearing. That she never saw Amanda that day.

Sherlock says he has an open mind, but no matter how high you pile the evidence that exonerates Amanda and Raffaele, he/she refuses to give them the benefit of the doubt.

Really, that is what you got out of my post, and yet your on here trying to make sense out of this case. Dan see's footprints that don't exist and you see all kinds of written things that don't exist. Let's look at this just a bit differently, both you and Dan have said that there is perhaps a 50/50 chance that Amanda is guilty of the murder if the SC overturned her appeal that set her free, well, that's what happened so how do you fell now?.

 

[Mary_H]

See I knew better and understood completely that I would get ripped a "new one"...by you and in less than 15 words.

Its just that it fit so perfectly with what Rose said in his post;-)

Her.

 

[acbytesla]

Not sure about the UK but I think US lawyers are required by law to put forth the best possible defense. Personal ethics must certainly be put aside. How else could Baez defend Casey Anthony?

I'll be honest with you. I would have acquitted Casey Anthony of the crime as well. Not that I didn't think she was guilty. Just that I don't think the prosecution prove it's case beyond a reasonable doubt. To me the bar has to to be pretty high to send someone to prison for a lot of years. I'd rather acquit a guilty person than convict an innocent one.

The Knox situation is far different for me. I don't think Amanda and Raffaele are guilty with some heisitation, and I don't think they are innocent. I know they are innocent. I have ZERO..absolutely ZERO doubt that Amanda and Raffaele are 100% innocent.

From my perspective the prosecution has presented only two pieces of evidence that might give one pause. And that is the two pieces of DNA evidence. But nothing about the knife is logical, and the bra was so contaminated and the chain of evidence is broken. I can't really consider that. All the other evidence overwhelmingly points to their innocence.

Nothing about the accusation of Amanda and Raffaelet makes sense

 

[Mary_H]

Really, that is what you got out of my post, and yet your on here trying to make sense out of this case. Dan see's footprints that don't exist and you see all kinds of written things that don't exist. Let's look at this just a bit differently, both you and Dan have said that there is perhaps a 50/50 chance that Amanda is guilty of the murder if the SC overturned her appeal that set her free, well, that's what happened so how do you fell now?.

After reading the ISC's motivations, we now know that nobody, PGP or PIP, should ever say they will go with any court's future decision in this case. These "judges" are seriously in over their heads.

 

[acbytesla]

Really, that is what you got out of my post, and yet your on here trying to make sense out of this case. Dan see's footprints that don't exist and you see all kinds of written things that don't exist. Let's look at this just a bit differently, both you and Dan have said that there is perhaps a 50/50 chance that Amanda is guilty of the murder if the SC overturned her appeal that set her free, well, that's what happened so how do you fell now?.

I NEVER EVER, EVER, EVER said that there was a 50/50 chance that Amanda was guilty of murder and I know Dan never said that either. You might have confused guesses about how the Italian courts might rule. That seems to be a crap shoot in Italy.

I THINK THERE IS ZERO percent chance that Amanda is guilty of murder. ZERO POINT ZERO!!!!

 

[Sherlock Holmes]

I NEVER EVER, EVER, EVER said that there was a 50/50 chance that Amanda was guilty of murder and I know Dan never said that either. You might have confused guesses about how the Italian courts might rule. That seems to be a crap shoot in Italy.

I THINK THERE IS ZERO percent chance that Amanda is guilty of murder. ZERO POINT ZERO!!!!

Oh, I'm sorry, did I quote you on something that you never even said, amazing, how does it feel........

 

[anglolawyer]

Of course it is, but the question at hand is what does a lawyer do when he believes his clients are guilty and they tell the lawyer they are innocent? Do you approach that case any differently than if you believe them to be innocent? There has to be personal ethical dilemmas facing attorneys in that situation, particularly if it is a violent crime.

The thing to remember, AC, is that the lawyer is not the jury. The client is entitled to have guilt determined by the latter. You may think your client is guilty but unless s/he tells you or there is some overwhelming evidence, you can't know. If you do know or strongly believe but the client maintains their innocence you confront them with the problems to see if they change their mind, pointing out the advantages of a guilty plea etc but, when all that is done, you do your best to get them off.

And I'm not talking about lawyer ethics, I'm talking about personal ethics. How would you feel if you got a violent criminal acquitted of a crime you were sure they committed even though they said they were innocent? Isn't that the flip side of sending someone to prison for something they didn't do?

I would feel great. The same as a doctor would feel fixing Hitler's ruptured appendix. And no, it's not the flip side of anything. Not in my opinion anyway. If an innocent person goes to prison it may well be the system failed but if a guilty person goes free the system has worked. The moment defence lawyers stop doing their job is the time to be afraid that it will be your or your friend's turn next to be framed or wrongfully convicted due to some botch-up at the lab.

 

[anglolawyer]

Not sure about the UK but I think US lawyers are required by law to put forth the best possible defense. Personal ethics must certainly be put aside. How else could Baez defend Casey Anthony?

When I was a young lawyer there was a very good firm (I mean in terms of the quality of their work) nearby which had 'personal ethics'. Thus they would not act for:

husbands in divorce
accused rapists
landlords

Anyone see anything wrong with that? I do. I don't think being a lawyer entitles you to decide who deserves to be represented or not or to interpose your doubtful moral judgments between particular individuals and their legal rights.

How did we get on to this? We were discussing whether the lawyers for Amanda and Raffaele had to convince themselves of innocence before they would take certain steps or make various moves. My point is that once instructed by the client of their innocence, the lawyer's personal opinion is neither here nor there and, to be frank, I don't think experienced criminal practitioners spend a lot of time worrying about it. The case is a contested one, so you act accordingly. It does not follow from this that you would advise your client to instruct you to ask for the semen stain or the sweatshirt to be tested (for example). You might and you might not but the advice should not turn on personal beliefs which really have no place save insofar as they assist in identifying potential problems.

ETA there is a human rights lawyer of the year award here and it usually goes to a with-it left wing firm for some noble work on behalf oppressed minorities etc (and nothing wrong with that) but there was one year when it should have gone to the firm that represented General Pinochet in successfully resisting extradition from the UK to Spain. They successfully appealed a House of Lords ruling to a 7-judge panel of the same house after spotting that one of the judges in the first appeal had links with Amnesty International. Now, Pinochet may have been some right wing fascist whom many would love to have seen stand trial for all sorts of unpleasantness in Chile but, from a professional perspective, I thought those lawyers did a damn fine job.

 

[Dan O.]

Really, that is what you got out of my post, and yet your on here trying to make sense out of this case. Dan see's footprints that don't exist and you see all kinds of written things that don't exist. Let's look at this just a bit differently, both you and Dan have said that there is perhaps a 50/50 chance that Amanda is guilty of the murder if the SC overturned her appeal that set her free, well, that's what happened so how do you fell now?.

There goes Sherlock with another lie. Whoops, make that 2 lies and probably more if I finish reading the post. But let's look at the mind of Sherlock exposed by this post. He apparently believes that if you cannot see a footprint it doesn't exist. If he were following a set of tracks and the tracks came to an end would he believe that the person making those tracks similarly came to an end? I said quite clearly in multiple posts that there should be another footprint past the last one in the series that ILE placed markers for. That we cannot see that next print is a result of the failure of ILE to fully document the scene. Sherlock himself was so flustered by this argument that he has put me on ignore. His mind just cannot cope with the realities of this case.

Sherlock is following in the footsteps of Mignini. He is not following the evidence to find the truth but using his own perverted sense of the truth to interpret what the evidence must be saying. Just look at what he did with the cloths on the bed. It's reminiscent of Mignini's double body swap.

 

[Dan O.]

After reading the ISC's motivations, we now know that nobody, PGP or PIP, should ever say they will go with any court's future decision in this case. These "judges" are seriously in over their heads.

This line of though was brought up before the appeal verdict came out. It seems like the PGP were in lock step saying that they will accept the ruling of the judge even if the judge said the kids were innocent. And they were asking if the PIP would similarly accept a guilty verdict. It's like they totally cannot fathom anyone reaching their own conclusion. They need an authority to tell them what the truth is. But then when the authority doesn't give them the answer they want they turn on that authority. It seems in the end that their only truth is finding cause to hate.

 

[Grinder]

Really, that is what you got out of my post, and yet your on here trying to make sense out of this case. Dan see's footprints that don't exist and you see all kinds of written things that don't exist. Let's look at this just a bit differently, both you and Dan have said that there is perhaps a 50/50 chance that Amanda is guilty of the murder if the SC overturned her appeal that set her free, well, that's what happened so how do you fell now?.

Sherlock you are the one that says footprints that don't exist must exist if Rudi returned to the murder room. You insist that once Rudi'shoes picked up blood they would show up under luminol returning to the Meredith's room. If no luminol prints, no Rudi.

Dan O shows you where the prints ran out of blood to be found.

Waiting now for Dan O's correction.

 

[Dan O.]

Dan O shows you where the prints ran out of blood to be found.

Waiting now for Dan O's correction.

But I don't disagree completely. The proper application of luminol would have been able to detect the faint trace of blood left by Rudy's shoe on the return trip even where those prints were not visible. What I have pointed out is that the ILE baffones did an atroscious job of applying the Luminol and recording the results.

Now we've also learned that they destroyed the sequence information of the photos taken in December. Were there other Luminol photos that they choose to exclude from evidence?

For comparison, here you can find an example of what a luminol print should look like.

 

[anglolawyer]

Has anybody heard about the whistle blower letter that showed up on Raffaele's facebook page? This is said to have been sent to Conti and Vechiotti in October 2011 from someone in Stefanoni's lab. Rose has google translated it. Could use a proper translation. Here it is as posted at IIP earlier:

TO THE PRESIDENT OF THE COURT OF PERUGIA
EXPERTS IN THE COURT OF PERUGIA AND DR DR rather old. ACCOUNTS
ADVISERS TO THE PARTIES TO THE COURIER DELL'UMBRIA 20/09/2011
No Protocols?? Ouch, ouch, ouch ...
In relation to the letter signed by the Director of the Scientific Police and the way of working used by them throughout Italy, it may interest him to know that:
1. The letter addressed to the Court of Perugia was perhaps taken from the proceedings of the conference in
which was attended by the same author in Urbino in May 2011? Already tells them that "this could lead to obtain a DNA profile in more complex cases where even today the outcome is negative" is, in a way that jamming even more.
2. The numbers of visits ("4500") may not be reported to the scientific police in Rome (too many), but not to the entire scientific Italian (too few) and then you do not understand what they are reported. This is not surprising because there are no programs for the collection and counting of the data on the whole territory. The collection of data is not uniform in fact, it lacks an operational protocol, and no verification data arriving from all over Italy.
3. There are no uniform procedures and restrictive even for the collection and preservation of traces easier. There is no checklist of any kind. Facts are not cross-checks on the same samples, so as to verify the reliability of the data provided by a laboratory with respect to another. On any type of analysis, not only for DNA.
4. In the letter, the Director of Scientific Police said as laboratories and offices are equipped with certificates of quality, pointing to evidence the presence of "252 regulatory documents and audits conducted by external specialist firms also European level." The Director may forget (or do not know) that the documents contain prescriptive requirements, ie the corrections to be made to have the required certification, the procedures because there is something wrong.
5. "The scientific - also wrote in the letter Angeloni - is equipped with a computerized traceability of the findings, are cutting-edge technical equipment and staff has many years of experience." This statement is meaningless, for two reasons: a) the finds are plotted only when they arrive in Rome and before you know nothing about them, even if they were closed when collected, or shortly before being received (because if opened are not accepted, not to know what happens before and discharge all liability). When on the findings must be made more tests (eg residues of the shot, ballistic, biological, fingerprints, etc.). Practice is that they open the boxes or containers in which the material was packaged and proceed before the coming of the fixed date of commencement of operations, the "household waste" of the findings, as though they were in different cases. In this way, the high possibility of losing important information about exhibits that maybe someone decides to allocate to the ballistics analysis rather than the residues of the shot.
6. Then he says, "Never in the past have been advanced surveys of this nature, which here invests the work of forensic science," but even that is not true. The problems are always there when there is a comparison, when there are consultants with whom we must also confront the scientific domain. In fact, when they invent analysis not internationally standardized (as for example the analysis with carbon-14 on
 Pizzini most famous in Italy), perhaps valid but lacking any scientific scrutiny, it is
clear that you can say what you want!
7. The Scientific Police of the periphery is equipped with standard equipment. Just
think of the fridge / freezers in use: those food! The same protective equipment and safety are not bought for lack of funds. The suits? They are used only when there are cameras. Masks and headphones? You wear only if there are experts and lawyers! The gloves? We must not waste them and the recommendations are to use them until they break!
8. The chain of custody of evidence (of any kind, think of what happened with the case of Unabomber) is not guaranteed. In addition there are enough security envelopes and boxes to contain the material that is collected when you make a site visit. Anyone can play around with the exhibits.
9. The refrigeration of the finds is not assured, nor traced. Often, disorganization and bad information that specialists (but what?) Dispense with the dropper to those who work on the road, do not make the proper collection of the specimen itself that ends up moldy. In most specimens, when picked up by the police, are taken away are always open and then dried in unsuitable premises. There are in fact supplied to the various offices certified equipment for drying artifacts, which are allowed to dry near each other on the drying racks household in work rooms.
10.La cleaning tools and surfaces for DNA is normally carried out only with alcohol and never checked with the white control. White people lack even whenever you fetch a DNA sample ... and beyond.
11.When the biological result is not as hoped, the amplification of the track (?) Is pushed beyond a reasonable indication scientific and proceed until you find something (?). It will be also the reason why the result is always the presence of mixed unknown?
12.Il consultant of the prosecution, during the operations of the experts noted that the cycler is not under the hood, as opposed to how it is in the police lab. This is not the right place, because the probability is very high that there is no contamination when placed under a hood any.
13.La defined instrumentation as "highly specialized" by the director Angeloni is in many cases without any service contract and, if dead, left idle for months and months.
14.Il biological sampling is always completely destroyed, without ensuring the repeatability of the investigation, most of the time as possible, as is the case in all civilized countries of the world.
15.Va fashion solving cold cases. It 's easy assigning profiles to deceased people or doing become useful fingerprint of the fact that at the time were found to be not useful.
16.La police they say science is not equipped with adequate library and does not provide for those who work in different sectors, the possibility to obtain information on international scientific journals. Just see which one is the formation of the Director Angeloni. And 'perhaps a scientist? And 'maybe a researcher? And 'perhaps a specialist in the field?
17.In short, there are clear guidelines on any topic that reference work methods recognized by all scientific investigators worldwide.
The icing on the cake ... What does the police? Premia investigators and scientists (who have "solved" in their own way the Kercher case with accolades and praise! Just Bravi!!)

I wonder whether there will be more of these. I do happen to believe in the mega-conspiracy and it is a prediction of my theory that consciences will be pricked and/or that knaves will fall out even though it may take as long as it did for the secret plan to discredit the family of Stephen Laurence to emerge in the UK (20 years)

 

[Grinder]

Anglo perhaps you could expand on this whistle-blower letter a bit. It is very hard to read as is.