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

[acbytesla]

Briars, this irrational belief of yours discredits everything you say.

You nailed it Antony, Briars's argument is irrational. In fact contrary to his point the shape of the valley would do the opposite of what he is suggesting. The valley walls would direct the the sound away not back at them. You're not going to hear an echo of ANY KIND yelling at the top of your lungs from the back side the cottage. That would break the laws of physics. Sound bounces or it is absorbed depending on the hardness of the materials it encounters

Briars's analogy that he can hear a barking dog across the valley demonstrates the point. The sound is moving toward him with no obstruction. He said he can't hear the sounds from the middle of town. Duh!!!! there are walls obstructing the sound just as the walls of the cottage obstruct the sound from Meredith's bedroom.

This particular argument by the guilters makes me angry as it is easy to disprove yet they argue it repeatedly. There is a real science to sound and acoustics and this prosecution argument violates the science.

Here is another analogy. Ever come up to a car that has their stereo blasting with the windows up? You can't hear the high frequency sounds at all. All you can hear is the muddled low end

Briars talks about hearing a police siren at a distance. If I took a police siren and put in inside as opposed to outside the patrol car all you could hear would be a low rumble from the siren for a couple of blocks.

I'm not doubting that Nara and Monaccia heard something, maybe they did. Who knows? But what they didn't hear was A HIGH PITCHED SCREAM FROM INSIDE THAT COTTAGE. They heard cats fighting or having sex outside or a tire squeal or the tow truck or a fan belt squealing or even a woman OUTSIDE somewhere screaming.

 

[RoseMontague]

But this is only one of the pieces; there are also other data. And the judge drew the obvious reasonable conclusion.

Well, lets look at some of the other reasons he lists it could not have been a single attacker to see how "obvious" and "reasonable" his conclusion is.

A first indication to be taken into account is Meredith's physical build: the photographs of her body and the data of her approximate height and weight reveal a physique with "normotrophic muscular mass and normally distributed subcutaneous fat" (cf. declarations Lalli p. 3), a slim physique which would have permitted Meredith to move with agility. To this must be added the declarations of the parents and the sister of Meredith. Her mother, Arline Carol Mary Kercher, recalled that Meredith had practised football and karate (p. 7 hearing 6 June 2009), and her sister, Stephanie Arline Lara, stated that Meredith also did boxing, if only the once, and that "physically she was very strong" (p. 20, hearing 6 June 2009). Also her father, John Leslie Kercher, declared that his daughter was quite strong and had taken a course in karate (p. 23 hearing 6 June 2009).

Massei is saying that Mereidith would have been able to repel Rudy (armed with a knife-if he was by himself). That is not only not obvious or reasonable, it is just stupid and idiotic.

Furthermore, it is impossible to imagine in what way a single person could have removed the clothes that Meredith was wearing (shoes, pants and underwear), and using the violence revealed by the vaginal swab, could have caused the resulting bruises and wounds recalled above, as well as removing her sweatshirt, pulling up her shirt, forcing the bra hooks before tearing and cutting the bra.

LOL. Massei finds something impossible to imagine. Dumb judge.

The breaking of the bra alone, from which a small piece of material with hooks (photos 140, 119, 118 and 117) was cut off and thrown to the floor, by an act which was necessarily conducted from behind Meredith (one cannot see in what other way the bra could have been thus forced), requires the following observation: such an action would occupy both hands of the attacker, and thus Meredith would have had her hands free, and in that situation she could have attempted some action in self-defence (for example trying to run out of the room and attempt to flee, in other words reacting towards her attacker by getting away from him), whereas in fact there is no trace of such a thing, and it seems inexplicable unless it is admitted that several attackers were present, with a distribution of tasks and roles: either holding Meredith and preventing her from any significant defensive reaction, or actually performing the violent actions (and here one must recall that a biological trace of Rudy was found on one of the cuffs of Meredith's sweatshirt, which appears to be the sign of having gripped Meredith in order to prevent any reaction, any defence). Also the diverse morphology of the injuries and their number and distribution lead one to consider that those participating in this criminal action were more than one.

Double LOL. Rudy's DNA on the cuff means to Massei there was more than one attacker.

Conversely, considering the neck wounds sustained, it must be believed that Meredith remained in the same position, in a standing position, while continuously exposing her neck to the action of the person striking her now on the right and now on the left. Such a situation seems inexplicable if one does not accept the presence of more than one attacker who, holding the girl, strongly restrained her movements and struck her on the right and on the left because of the position of each of the attackers with respect to her, by which it was easier to strike her from that side. One of these attackers was Rudy and the others were those who allowed Rudy to enter the house and who were with him in the house and who, in order to lead the investigations astray, then organised the staging of the broken window and the mess in Romanelli's room: Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito, according to all that has already been shown.

This is more than just stupid. Talk about an exaggeration. For a man full of could haves, might haves, maybe so's, and possible and even probables, he has an amazing penchant for not being able to imagine anything that could lead to innocence and makes a huge leap of faith based on this multiple attacker theory.

There is a ton of reasonable doubt here, Mach. More than reasonable, in my opinion.

 

[Antony]

You nailed it Antony, Briars's argument is irrational. In fact contrary to his point the shape of the valley would do the opposite of what he is suggesting. The valley walls would direct the the sound away not back at them. You're not going to hear an echo of ANY KIND yelling at the top of your lungs from the back side the cottage. That would break the laws of physics. Sound bounces or it is absorbed depending on the hardness of the materials it encounters

Briars's analogy that he can hear a barking dog across the valley demonstrates the point. The sound is moving toward him with no obstruction. He said he can't hear the sounds from the middle of town. Duh!!!! there are walls obstructing the sound just as the walls of the cottage obstruct the sound from Meredith's bedroom.

This particular argument by the guilters makes me angry as it is easy to disprove yet they argue it repeatedly. There is a real science to sound and acoustics and this prosecution argument violates the science.

Here is another analogy. Ever come up to a car that has their stereo blasting with the windows up? You can't hear the high frequency sounds at all. All you can hear is the muddled low end

Briars talks about hearing a police siren at a distance. If I took a police siren and put in inside as opposed to outside the patrol car all you could hear would be a low rumble from the siren for a couple of blocks.

I'm not doubting that Nara and Monaccia heard something, maybe they did. Who knows? But what they didn't hear was A HIGH PITCHED SCREAM FROM INSIDE THAT COTTAGE. They heard cats fighting or having sex outside or a tire squeal or the tow truck or a fan belt squealing or even a woman OUTSIDE somewhere screaming.

From reading others' posts here it seems that Briars is a "she". And it's ridiculous - even without the issues you raised, the prosecution never remotely had evidence to suggest that the reported scream(s) were connected to the murder; taking basic school physics into account, it's pretty much impossible.

But it's not just Briars; all of the PGP make assertions that don't stand any kind of scrutiny. Sherlock seems to accept all the bogus prosecution "evidence" at face value (without claiming that it means A&R were the killers), and tries to make out that the multiple DNA traces on the bra hook make contamination less, not more, likely (duh ...). Machiavelli claims that the police lab had no means of keeping it from rusting.

That's the PGP contingent who have been active here recently; no doubt we can all think of other examples.

 

[Briars]

The apartment is far above the above the cottage in a position where sounds carry upward. The dog barking was not obstructed by the back of the cottage , one small building in an open bowl does not block noise. The picture posted hear up thread doesn't show the surrounding hills, including those at the back which have a rock base. Keeping in mind that an honest discussion about sound and how it amplifies is second to nullifying what witnesses heard , I'll stick with my first hand " she" experiences in Perugia.

 

[Grinder]

OK for everyone's enjoyment ....especially Yummi/Mach...here is the days article produced by the Independent Expert Doctor... (yep she is an actual real doctor not a fake one like Mignini or Galati) Carla Vecchiotti.

This stellar analysis with cites is proof positive that the case against AK and RS was made by a corrupt police force and prosecuted by a corrupt judiciary who wouldn't know logical or legal if it smacked them in the face...which it will soon enough do ;-)

http://www.frontiersin.org/journal/10.3389/fgene.2013.00177/full

It would be nice for one of the DNA experts here to rewrite the article in more simplified English. I think it misses the basic break from standard DNA and LCN in that the standard was used to identify evidence while LCN is used to identify DNA on items that aren't evidence until the DNA is found.

I know that wasn't well written but it's very early here .

The knife was just a knife as it didn't match a knife they were looking for. It would have been nothing without the alleged DNA found on the blade. Even without testing positive for blood or being from a human source, it became evidence because of a few alleged cells of Meredith.

In the old days the knife would have been "the knife" and then DNA testing would look for the killer not the victim.

People think that LCN testing is just better testing and don't realize how it has fundamentally changed how evidence is presented.

 

[Diocletus]

This is more than just stupid. Talk about an exaggeration. For a man full of could haves, might haves, maybe so's, and possible and even probables, he has an amazing penchant for not being able to imagine anything that could lead to innocence and makes a huge leap of faith based on this multiple attacker theory.

There is a ton of reasonable doubt here, Mach. More than reasonable, in my opinion.

I think that this Massei guy was just too weak and decrepit: he can't even imagine how someone could climb in through a window or subdue a 100 pound girl and forcibly disrobe her. Even, gasp, ripping her bra off with brute strength. Did he actually believe that one person could have picked up the 9-pound rock? That's HEAVY!

Hopefully they have stronger judges in Florence.

 

[Diocletus]

Lies and Damn Lies

Let's add a few new lies to our prosecution lie list:

1. "We produced all of the controls." Lie.

2. "It's cat's blood." Lie.

3. Hiding exculpatory DNA tests from Judge Matteini. Lie.

4. We produced all of the Egrams. Lie.

5. The PCR machine broke down. Lie.

6. We gave you all of the records that you need, including the amplification records for 36b. Lie.

7. You won't see anything in the EDFs that you need and/or don't have. Lie.

8. There has never been contamination in the lab. Lie.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

She thinks not

Maybe she writes because she is just a journalist. I mean not one of those rich paid mercenaries from the media show. Maybe she reports and write about these things, not because she is aiming at money or other advanteges or part in the CNN-style infoshow, but instead maybe, just because these things are the truth.

Ms. Vogt recommended that readers go to a site with obvious falsehoods. That is not the mark of a good journalist.

 

[Grinder]

Barking dog arguments are specious or just plain spurious.

Nara's testimony is a red herring. She doesn't know the time, had the date wrong and couldn't tie any of her experiences to any person.

Two people months after the scream had been in press, say that they heard a scream sometime in that part of the year at some time at night. So what?

I say let barking dogs lie.

 

[anglolawyer]

Well it is the native language of the Kercher family. Which - while I did not mention them - I did not forget.

I also think I understand English enough to realize that there is no difference between the two languages - English and Italian - on this particluar phrase (Io ero li - I was there) they make a perfect match, three words that can be overlayed in a perfect superimposition in identical structure and semantics, a translation that does not allow ambiguities: you don't "loose" anything in both ways. "I was there" cannot be translated in two ways, nor can "Io ero li".

The rest of the dialogue lines: were they talking about Raffaele's place? Did they explicitly mention that? Was that the "obvious" context?
If you think so, prove it. Quote the transcript and show this mentioning of Sollecito's apartment as the clear context.

I have not been able to locate the complete transcript of this call (if anyone has it, please post) but I have looked at WTBH, Amanda's evidence transcript, Massei and Cassazione. In her book (from which, unfortunately, I cannot copy and paste) at location 2891 of 5843 she says she meant she was at Raffaele's apartment. She says the police 'seized on' the comment which they had on a tape and then released a 'convoluted' version of it to the press (I am sure Grinder can find it - Daily Telegraph, December 2007) which ran it as:

'dramatic new evidence has emerged that may help prove that Amanda Knox ... was present when the British student died.'

A few days later, she says, a judge (Matteini I guess) took these words into account (among other things) in deciding not to permit her to move to house arrest. Matteini called it 'a clue' confirming her presence at the scene. The interesting thing is that in the following September, in her pre-trial (conducted by Micheli I think) the judge agreed with the defence that:

'it was obvious I was talking about Raffaele's apartment, not the villa, and removed the "evidence" from the record.'

Now, this is pretty obviously an easily falsifiable claim. I checked Amanda's trial testimony, Massei's motivation and the recently-translated Cassazione motivation and I could not find reference anywhere to the 'I was there' quote, even though the telephone conversation is itself heavily focused upon in other respects (e.g. why did she not say Patrick was innocent sooner - see Massei English PDF p. 388 and Casszione at p.57).

Maybe others will have more luck searching these documents than I did but, on the assumption that this evidence was struck out at a preliminary stage and that this explains why this apparent killer point does not feature where one would expect to see it, why is Andrea Vogt (and Mach - hi Mach btw.) still going on about it and misleading everybody? I thought Vogt was well-versed in the facts of the case.

It reeks of partisanship and dishonesty to still be attaching weight to this non-point after one of the guilters' favourite judges has chucked it out. How you can speak up for this kind of thing beats me, Mach. I hope if I am wrong you will find a reference to the phrase and to anyone placing weight on it on the prosecution side or among the judges (especially as you claim they all agreed about its meaning). Otherwise, Ms Vogt should stop referring to it if she wants to be considered a fair and balanced reporter.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

extraction buffer was present during storage of the clasp

OK for everyone's enjoyment ....especially Yummi/Mach...here is the days article produced by the Independent Expert Doctor... (yep she is an actual real doctor not a fake one like Mignini or Galati) Carla Vecchiotti.

This stellar analysis with cites is proof positive that the case against AK and RS was made by a corrupt police force and prosecuted by a corrupt judiciary who wouldn't know logical or legal if it smacked them in the face...which it will soon enough do ;-)

http://www.frontiersin.org/journal/10.3389/fgene.2013.00177/full

Randy,

Thanks for the link. I especially liked this paragraph: " The main issue with that type of samples is contamination: consequently, strict protocols must be applied during the inspection, collection, and sampling of such items at the crime scene (Giardina et al., 2011). The procedures recommended to reduce laboratory contamination are equally rigorous as it is well-known that contaminant DNA at low levels may derive from reagents and other laboratory consumables, from the technical staff and from cross-contamination from sample to sample. Indeed, in the context of the Kercher murder case, transfer of a suspect's DNA into a crime scene sample was of particular importance: in fact, it appears that crime scene inspection procedures destined to minimize contamination were not carried out according to international protocols (Fischer, 2003; Laboratory Division of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, 2007; ICPO-Interpol, 2009). Furthermore, it seems that no attempts were made to discover such events."
The author list of the Giardina paper includes none other than Dr. Novelli: Giardina, E., Spinella, A., and Novelli, G. (2011). Past, present and future of Forensic DNA typing. Nanomedicine 6, 257–270. doi: 10.2217/nnm.10.160 Readers of this thread have known about the article in Nanomedicine for two years. It would be nice to see someone explain how the views he expressed there are "compatible" with the view he expressed in the present case.

I was surprised to learn this: "It could not be analyzed by the Appellate Court experts as it had been stored by the scientific police in a tube containing extraction buffer, which made it completely rusty."

 

[Chris_Halkides]

A response to the Court of Cassation's report with respect to genetics

It would be nice for one of the DNA experts here to rewrite the article in more simplified English. I think it misses the basic break from standard DNA and LCN in that the standard was used to identify evidence while LCN is used to identify DNA on items that aren't evidence until the DNA is found.

That is a good point about low template DNA. A new post at View from Wilmington looks at the Court of Cassation's report.

 

[Grinder]

Anglo as always at your service

Telegraph December 2007

 

[Chris_Halkides]

no reason to lie

Anglo as always at your service

Telegraph December 2007

"'It is clear to us that she was talking about being at the scene,' said the police source. 'There are several other moments when she alludes to it,' he added. However, Knox's lawyers have said she was referring to being at her boyfriend's house." The part where Ms. Knox said that she had no reason to lie about it is a solid indication that she was talking about Sollecito's flat. She would have a reason to lie about being at the women's flat. Only in Perugia do the words mean something else.

 

[anglolawyer]

Anglo as always at your service

Telegraph December 2007

Thanks Grinder. From the article.

The police source said: “She denies everything, but we did submit the recordings as evidence at the court.”
It is believed that the evidence was sufficient for Judge Massimo Ricciarelli to deny a request from Knox’s lawyers that she be freed into house arrest.
Instead, Knox was driven back to Capanne prison outside Perugia in handcuffs.

OK, so it was Riciarelli not Matteini. According to the report, this recording played a key part in the refusal of bail. Pretty tough luck. The 'confessions' got her locked up in the first place, but were ruled unusable, and then the ambiguous (at best) recording was used to keep her in prison and was in turn ruled to be meaningless.

 

[Grinder]

"'It is clear to us that she was talking about being at the scene,' said the police source. 'There are several other moments when she alludes to it,' he added.
However, Knox's lawyers have said she was referring to being at her boyfriend's house." The part where Ms. Knox said that she had no reason to lie about it is a solid indication that she was talking about Sollecito's flat. She would have a reason to lie about being at the women's flat. Only in Ms. Vogt's mind do the words mean something else.

Thanks Anglo for pointing us to this article.

The police leaked this in the beginning of December of 2007 a year before Amanda was charged with a crime. The way they leaked, it was clear they were doing it to hurt the defendants case. They didn't even hide the fact that it was the police leaking. No charges have been filed against anybody in Italy for leaking.

Compare that to what just happened in Louisiana. Read about it here

Here in the US the police were prosecuted as they should have been but because prosecution related people anonymously commented negative things the case has been overturned for now.

The police were prosecuted and then their rights were upheld for a fair trial. They have their successful appeal overturned but at least there is a system that recognizes right from wrong.

 

[Bill Williams]

It reeks of partisanship and dishonesty to still be attaching weight to this non-point after one of the guilters' favourite judges has chucked it out. How you can speak up for this kind of thing beats me, Mach. I hope if I am wrong you will find a reference to the phrase and to anyone placing weight on it on the prosecution side or among the judges (especially as you claim they all agreed about its meaning). Otherwise, Ms Vogt should stop referring to it if she wants to be considered a fair and balanced reporter.

As you can see AngloL, I am reluctant to call Ms. Vogt a liar because of this. She obviously drank the PLE's koolaid and went off half cocked. Maybe this is when she decided to join in and help out the prosecution wherever she could; but I am reluctant to call her a liar.

Also, where but here has Vogt ever referred to it? My thing with Machiavelli was, did she ever print a retraction, either in a major news source or on a blog?

 

[Dan O.]

Here is the relevant part of the conversation that led to the "I was there" statement:
(Note: The original conversation was in english and translated to Italian then the Italian was translated back to English by Frank. The original recording being in the hands of the ILE has undoubtable been destroyed by now)

Edda: So, it’s ********!
Amanda: Is it ********?
Edda: It’s ********.
Curt: It’s complete ********. It’s a total fabrication.
Edda: That’s what they’re doing now. They are simply lying.
Curt: It’s all a fabrication…

It seems things haven't changed much.

BTW: The statement is referenced in the ISC sentencing report of 2010-12-16 in the summary of the Appeal court ruling.

 

[Machiavelli]

(...)


It reeks of partisanship and dishonesty to still be attaching weight to this non-point after one of the guilters' favourite judges has chucked it out. How you can speak up for this kind of thing beats me, Mach. I hope if I am wrong you will find a reference to the phrase and to anyone placing weight on it on the prosecution side or among the judges (especially as you claim they all agreed about its meaning). Otherwise, Ms Vogt should stop referring to it if she wants to be considered a fair and balanced reporter.

It was Bill then the dishonest, he is the one who brought up the point, attempting to attack Andrea Vogt on a (from his argumentation) non-point.
Bill Williams dared to accuse Vogt - a person who was in the courtroom when the transcript and recording were made available - calling her a liar, and asking her to recant a pice of information, because she said something which happens to be exactly what all courts found.
You simply have no logical basis nor moral right to ask Vogt to not refer to the information, nor to assert that her information is false or that she is unbalanced, given that you admittedly don't have any argument nor information yourself to counter that, you were not in the courtroom, and yout belief is hold wrong in the opinion of all courts, and also in the Kerchers' opinion (native English speakers).
The problem is not me speaking up; the problem is people like Bill who point their fingers on people wo do their job. And I am talking about Bill as an exampe from a group of people who spread a series of lies and proven falsehoods. People who assert idiotic falsehoods like that Mignini described a Satanic ritual, that Knox underwent a fake HIV test, that Guede's letter was fake or that he should have been arrested before, or that Stefanoni lied or denied a defence request to disclose information. Those liars who spread those falsehood dare to call Vogt a liar and say she should recant something they are just totally unable to show to be "false"...

 

[anglolawyer]

It was Bill then the dishonest, he is the one who brought up the point, attempting to attack Andrea Vogt on a (from his argumentation) non-point.
Bill Williams dared to accuse Vogt - a person who was in the courtroom when the transcript and recording were made available - calling her a liar, and asking her to recant a pice of information, because she said something which happens to be exactly what all courts found.
You simply have no logical basis nor moral right to ask Vogt to not refer to the information, nor to assert that her information is false or that she is unbalanced, given that you admittedly don't have any argument nor information yourself to counter that, you were not in the courtroom, and yout belief is hold wrong in the opinion of all courts, and also in the Kerchers' opinion (native English speakers).
The problem is not me speaking up; the problem is people like Bill who point their fingers on people wo do their job. And I am talking about Bill as an exampe from a group of people who spread a series of lies and proven falsehoods. People who assert idiotic falsehoods like that Mignini described a Satanic ritual, that Knox underwent a fake HIV test, that Guede's letter was fake or that he should have been arrested before, or that Stefanoni lied or denied a defence request to disclose information. Those liars who spread those falsehood dare to call Vogt a liar and say she should recant something they are just totally unable to show to be "false"...

You've lost me here, Mach. You (and Vogt, I presume) say 'I was there' meant she was at the apartment when Meredith was killed. If that were true it would be a major element in the case against her and we would expect to see it blazoned across the pages of Massei and Cassazione but I can't find it and Amanda says a judge (Micheli?) ruled it unusable in September 2008 because it was clear she was in fact referring to being at Raffaele's place.

Now, Ms Vogt is a journalist who has covered the case very closely and would be expected to know all this. If she is still peddling the myth that Amanda told her mother she was at the crime scene then she is either very sloppy in her work or she is not to be trusted as a reliable source of fair and accurate reporting on the case.

Of course, if someone finds a reference to this point in the places I mentioned then I will withdraw. It might be there but I could not find it using a word search. I found plenty of references to the call itself but not this aspect of it, which indicates to me that what Amanda said in her book is correct - that it was ruled out. It would be a strange thing for her to get wrong.