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

[RWVBWL]

The Hot Topic

Getting back on to todays hot topic,
how does having Amanda Knox's newly found DNA on that knife help her defence?

Doesn't the Italian Supreme Court believe that to be The Murder Weapon?(*)
For some reason, I do not see how this helps...
Maybe I'm a lil' dense...
RW


(*)-Even though you+I know it ain't so,
for yuck, that huge knife woulda went waaay deeper if shoved completely to the hilt into Meredith's throat, right?.

 

[Bill Williams]

If we've seen the last of Machiavelli, how will a dinner be set up when all the smoke clears?

 

[acbytesla]

If we've seen the last of Machiavelli, how will a dinner be set up when all the smoke clears?

You think we won't see Mach back?? I feel confident we will see him again. But I don't think he will ever sit down and have dinner with your Bill.

 

[Kaosium]

Kaosium you are overtly shifting the goalpost. In order to propose a ritualistic murder scenario, you do need to propose it in court. What is not put forward in court, is not part of the trial.
Your understanding (that he "dropped" it) is based on your decision to assume that possible British tabloid reports are "truthful" (maybe you assume "there must be something true"). There is actually a simple answer: the English speaking reports about it are reporting false information. (maybe they were deceived by Spezi, Carlizzi or whoever? who knows).
No Italian source reported Mignini putting forward a ritualistic scenario. And above all, the court documentation demonstrates that in fact he put forward a different scenario, definitely a non-ritualistic scenario.

Now, because it is obvious that the information reported by tabloids has no basis, that there is instead proof of the contrary in trial transcripts, now you shift your hypothesys about what Mignini "entertained" (maybe in your next post you will specified that he dreamt of it). You should maybe start considering all those many non-tabloid and non-anglophone sources (me included, and Mignini himself included) who did NOT report about any ritual-murder scenario, and instead they just reported about something else, something totally different scenario, such as a drug-fueled sex-party that went out of control.

My opinion in this matter is not limited to what you or others say was in the Italian press or in court documents, those are hardly the only sources in the case, they are however the most difficult to access. Actually I don't even care all that much, I just think there's significant evidence that he proposed something of the kind at one point, and again advance the opinion of John Kercher himself who noted it in a laundry list of inane prosecution arguments. He wrote there was 'suspicion that there might have been something ritualistic about Meredith's death' which he followed up with Mignini noting that she died on the eve of the Day of the Dead. Why would John Kercher, who had access to Mignini both directly and through Maresca, have noted this in his piece printed in the Sunday Times if there wasn't something to it?

There are many more factors, almost 20 in all, among them the suspicion that there may have been something ritualistic about Meredith’s death. The prosecutor was criticised for mentioning this, but she was killed on the eve of the Day of the Dead, November 2. Sollecito was said to have Japanese manga comics that described the rape and killing of female vampires. Meredith had been dressed as a vampire to celebrate Hallowe’en.

He knows how it goes with the tabloids, he worked for them. There's no reason for him to include something that (as you say) had absolutely nothing to it when he had access to the primary sources themselves.

 

[Kaosium]

Look at the British paper sources now. Look at the Italian press sources. Look at their dates.
Is there anything about a ritualistic scenario from the time of Matteini's hearing?

When was the first time that some press source spoke about prosecution alleging a "ritual" element?

Err...sorry. I went back looking for this post and missed it so I replied to the other post thinking it must have been your last one on the topic. No wonder I got a sense of deja-vu doing it!

As for your specific questions, I am unsure of what we're talking about now. Why does inclusion of manga comics and writing about 'extreme experiences' preclude it also being (originally theorized before Mattenini) a 'sect-like ritualistic murder?' Wouldn't that cover the 'improvised' part? They (supposedly) tried to emulate one of the scenes in this comic about vampires which many associate with the occult, as they also do Halloween? Meredith was dressed like a vampire and became the improvised 'ritual' sacrifice?

 

[Bill Williams]

If we've seen the last of Machiavelli, how will a dinner be set up when all the smoke clears?

You think we won't see Mach back?? I feel confident we will see him again. But I don't think he will ever sit down and have dinner with your Bill.

Ok, in the spirit of fair play, I'll buy for Mach 2 as well. But Machiavelli has to bring two bottles of the good stuff...

Why? Well it's been a satisfying week. Channel 5 in the U.K. has demonstrated that the break-in through Filomena's window is very plausible. The Aveillo testimony was not earth shattering, except for shattering the prosecution's non-case. And today's revelation about the DNA on the knife pretty much scotches the idea that it was used in a murder.

The Kerchers are now closer to finding the peace and answers they deserve. Knox and Sollecito are closer to the rest of their lives unencumbered by the vendetta Mignini has been on. And with any luck someone will be reading rights to Mignini, Napoleoni, Stefanoni, Giobbi, and making sure that they have lawyers and that their interrogations are videotaped.

Oh yes... the news that John Kercher himself is under the impression that this Satanic ritual theory has legs....

There are many more factors, almost 20 in all, among them the suspicion that there may have been something ritualistic about Meredith’s death. The prosecutor was criticised for mentioning this, but she was killed on the eve of the Day of the Dead, November 2. Sollecito was said to have Japanese manga comics that described the rape and killing of female vampires. Meredith had been dressed as a vampire to celebrate Hallowe’en.

Is Machiavelli going to call both John Kercher AND Barbie Nadeau liars?

 

[Kaosium]

Getting back on to todays hot topic,
how does having Amanda Knox's newly found DNA on that knife help her defence?

Doesn't the Italian Supreme Court believe that to be The Murder Weapon?(*)
For some reason, I do not see how this helps...
Maybe I'm a lil' dense...
RW


(*)-Even though you+I know it ain't so,
for yuck, that huge knife woulda went waaay deeper if shoved completely to the hilt into Meredith's throat, right?.

Because it's yet more proof the knife was never 'clean' or 'extremely clean' which was the prosecution's dubious explanation for why there were no blood traces found on the knife, despite numerous and varying tests. If you'll recall the 'hypothesis' was there was a 'striation' in which the DNA hid which allowed it to escape the vigorous scrubbing it 'must' have undergone to remove all blood traces. If you go through Massei you'll find he mentions how 'clean' the knife was eight times, quoting police and prosecution who knew they needed some explanation for why they didn't find blood traces.

It wasn't all that clean, which all the DNA traces and food debris demonstrate. It was never subjected to that vigorous washing as it never had any of Meredith's blood on it.

 

[LondonJohn]

I don't get it, this letter was originally sent on 20 September, 2011. Raffaele was still in prison. Considering the surveillance they were under in prison, both having conversations they had with family and letters they wrote show up in the papers or court, there's little chance Raffaele could send out a bunch of 'anonymous' letters to court officials and the like.

I'm not sure I follow all the technical details but it sounds like Raffaele just got a copy of the letter, either from it being sent to him by the author or seeing it in the newspapers, and put it on his facebook page.

ETA: This letter stirred a memory so I went back and lo and behold here's where a report on it was posted in the thread. If I understood your post correctly you were saying there were bunnies who thought Raffaele had written the letter because almost two years later he posted it to his facebook page.

Are they really that stupid?

It would appear that they are

I didn't have the time or inclination to look in more depth last night (it was late and I'd been out), but - as you've discovered - it doesn't take too much effort to find evidence of the letter in public circulation back in 2011 (which is..err.. when it was written!).

Unfortunately, many pro-guilt commentators don't appear to understand just what the metadata means - and what it doesn't mean. If I, for example, copied a block of text today from somewhere (from within an internet page, say) and created a .pdf of it, then the metadata for that .pdf file would say that I created (and last amended) that file on 12th October 2013. That doesn't mean I authored the content

Some of the pro-guilt community still seem to be trying to convince themselves and others that they have PROOF that Sollecito authored the letter himself. I suggest that it is they who require a computer lesson, not Sollecito....

 

[Katody Matrass]

Lumumba? How on earth can Lumumba speak to guilt (or innocence for that matter) about the murder itself?

Remember the slander conviction? In the supreme kangaroos' motivation there is an order to look again at Amanda's 'memoriale'. They even point out which parts indicate guilt.

When all of the forensics and science is hard to grasp the jury will gravitate towards what they perceive as more approachable - the 'soft' elements. Oh yes, we don't get all this DNA and gastric contents and cell phones and computers, but it's all 'inconclusive' after all, is there anything easier? Aha, she blamed the innocent black man.

Amanda's defence, in my opinion, dealt very poorly with this element so far.

 

[Mary_H]

Remember the slander conviction? In the supreme kangaroos' motivation there is an order to look again at Amanda's 'memoriale'. They even point out which parts indicate guilt.

When all of the forensics and science is hard to grasp the jury will gravitate towards what they perceive as more approachable - the 'soft' elements. Oh yes, we don't get all this DNA and gastric contents and cell phones and computers, but it's all 'inconclusive' after all, is there anything easier? Aha, she blamed the innocent black man.

Amanda's defence, in my opinion, dealt very poorly with this element so far.

I agree, Katody, which is why I always suspect they like remaining employed more than they like wrapping up a case.

Another example of the "soft elements" you're talking about, I think, is when Maresca sensationally showed the photos of Meredith in court, as if her terrible injuries somehow proved who committed the crime.

 

[RoseMontague]

It being an interesting day in the evolution of the case, I decided to have a gander at pro-guilt commentary. And amidst all the predictable rationalisation around the 36I issue, I also noticed something peculiar (and rather amusing) relating to a certain anonymous letter...

So, here's the situation: A letter was sent - apparently anonymously - to a number of named recipients (the Hellmann Court, C&V and a local newspaper), dated 20 September 2011. The letter is a long numbered list of the failings of Stefanoni and the forensics team, and purports to come from a lab technician. Here's an English translation copy of the letter (the original was in Italian):

http://www.raffaelesollecito.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/LetterAppealCourt.pdf

Now, it appears that a pro-guilt commentator searched the metadata of that document, and made the "astonishing revelation" that the document was in fact written by no less than Sollecito himself! Cue lots of uproarious laughter from other pro-guilt commentators, alongside the obvious outrage-filled declarations of his (Sollecito's) stupidity, duplicity and slyness at trying to pass off his own writings as "anonymous".

But guess what? The metadata on that file shows that it was indeed created by Sollecito, but that it was both created AND last amended at exactly the same time: 10:59:48 PM on 12th July 2013. That in itself tells the first part of the story - this was either a cut-and-paste into a new document or (more likely) a conversion of another document into a .pdf file. Either way, it quite clearly is NOT the original document - it's never been edited or amended after having been created.

However, the much more relevant (and hilarious) factor relates to that date. Remember that the date in the metadata was 12th July 2013. Now, not only was the letter itself dated 20th September 2011 (which could obviously be corroborated by any of the receiving parties, most easily the newspaper), but a software copy of the original Italian letter is reported as having appeared on Sollecito's own Facebook page in this post by RoseMontague on IA:

http://www.injusticeanywhereforum.o...p=106881&sid=6513b8fa70a3d69d2b810e7fde99c6e4

Note the date of that post: it's 8th July 2013. IN OTHER WORDS, BEFORE THE DATE ON THE METADATA OF THE FILE CREATED/EDITED BY SOLLECITO.

So Sollecito must indeed be a computer genius if he can reverse time in order to post a letter on his FB page BEFORE he's even created it

Rational conclusion: there is NO reason to suggest that Sollecito is the original author of that letter. Instead, the evidence shows nothing more than that 1) Sollecito created a .pdf of the English translation of the letter, and that 2) this .pdf was itself only created AFTER the letter was already provably in the public domain.

Oh.... (as they say)...... dear

Too funny, LJ. So any document I make with an English translation is going to have a different creation date? Well, Duh? I would have never guessed that. I remember when I first made public Raffaele's appeal document. Stilicho insisted I must have created those 200+ pages and it was not real. This surprises me not at all. My guess is that the original letter, was probably like a real typed or handwritten letter, and then converted at some point to a word or pdf document, then a new document with an English translation was created. That would make sense. Reminds me of the Graham/Mignini interview referred to in an Oggi article and turned over to the Hellmann court by the defense team. That was an audio, probably with a created transcript that was probably like created. I am sure that people would doubt that one as well since Migi has some pretty controversial things to say like the local cops are not all that competent compared to the military cops or Amanda may just have stood outside the door directing the action in Meredith's room or it was pretty silly to announce case closed before the investigation was even done.

 

[acbytesla]

The Kerchers are now closer to finding the peace and answers they deserve. Knox and Sollecito are closer to the rest of their lives unencumbered by the vendetta Mignini has been on. And with any luck someone will be reading rights to Mignini, Napoleoni, Stefanoni, Giobbi, and making sure that they have lawyers and that their interrogations are videotaped.

Respectfully, Bill, I don't think there is any evidence supporting the idea that the Kerchers will find peace through this process. The reality is this process does not seem designed to reach a conclusive answer. Instead, its purpose seems to be about creating ambiguity as a way of saving face for the Italians. The Kerchers despite some of their statements of "just seeking the answers" are as convinced of Amanda'a and Raffaele's guilt as Mignini and some of the prosecutors. Maybe not everyone in their family, but certainly the consensus and especially John.

I can't believe the knife is still seriously being considered a possible murder weapon. In fact, I can't believe it ever was or should have been considered a possible murder weapon. It truly is the most ridiculously illogical alleged murder weapon possibly in the annals of criminal history. The fact that it was ever tested for DNA in the first place is downright abusrd, let alone 3 times.

No in the end, the Kerchers will always believe that Stefanoni found their daughter's killer when he reported that he found her DNA on that knife blade. I seriously doubt that they will ever have an epiphany that they were just fooled by the Italians.

 

[LondonJohn]

Too funny, LJ. So any document I make with an English translation is going to have a different creation date? Well, Duh? I would have never guessed that. I remember when I first made public Raffaele's appeal document. Stilicho insisted I must have created those 200+ pages and it was not real. This surprises me not at all. My guess is that the original letter, was probably like a real typed or handwritten letter, and then converted at some point to a word or pdf document, then a new document with an English translation was created. That would make sense. Reminds me of the Graham/Mignini interview referred to in an Oggi article and turned over to the Hellmann court by the defense team. That was an audio, probably with a created transcript that was probably like created. I am sure that people would doubt that one as well since Migi has some pretty controversial things to say like the local cops are not all that competent compared to the military cops or Amanda may just have stood outside the door directing the action in Meredith's room or it was pretty silly to announce case closed before the investigation was even done.

Haha yes.... or the bizarre futility of trying to argue that Mignini never posited the theory that the murder was the product of pagan/satanic rituals linked to Halloween.....

Anyhow, I'm guessing that the pro-guilt commentators who embarrassingly jumped around triumphantly about the letter yesterday have quietly and sheepishly dropped the subject now. Unfortunately for them, though, it stands as an instructive demonstration of their stupidity and/or dreadful tendencies towards confirmation bias. Plus ca change......

 

[acbytesla]

Too funny, LJ. So any document I make with an English translation is going to have a different creation date? Well, Duh? I would have never guessed that. I remember when I first made public Raffaele's appeal document. Stilicho insisted I must have created those 200+ pages and it was not real. This surprises me not at all. My guess is that the original letter, was probably like a real typed or handwritten letter, and then converted at some point to a word or pdf document, then a new document with an English translation was created. .

Of course, Raffaele created the "electronic" copy of the letter. He said he received an anonymous letter that was also sent to the judge and others. This means he was almost certainly sent a hard copy letter. The PGP must be thinking that Raffaele just created this document from scratch and circulated it to world.

But this seems incredibly unlikely considering two things. 1. The details of the letter demonstrate a thorough understanding of the proper handling of evidence and DNA samples and 2. it ignores Raffaele's understanding of software.

Metadata is not a secret that programmers are unfamiliar with. Sure a sizable
number of people aren't aware that metadata or the "properties" of a file provide the details of when, how and who created a specific document. But there are ways around this and someone of Raffale's training would definitely know that. He's not going to create a fake document and forget this very important part.

Metadata was key in the identification and arrest of the famed BTK Killer in Wichita Kansas. The BTK Killer for several years played a cat and mouse game with the police and the media, sending and leaving letters to be found by both, basically taunting them while he carried on his crime spree. Finally he made a big mistake when he sent a floppy disk to the local television station that included a letter and floppy disk with a Microsoft Word Document.

Police found metadata embedded in a deleted Microsoft Word document that was, unbeknownst to Rader, on the disk. The metadata contained "Christ Lutheran Church," and the document was marked as last modified by "Dennis." A search of the church Web site turned up Dennis Rader as president of the congregation council. Police began surveillance of Rader.
Sometime during this period, police obtained a warrant for the medical records of Rader's daughter. A tissue sample seized at this time was tested for DNA and provided a familial match with semen collected at an earlier BTK crime scene. This, along with other evidence gathered before and during the surveillance, gave police probable cause for an arrest. BTW* Want to find the metadata of documents, it is very easy to find. Open the program and the document and click on properties. It's amazing how much data is there about the details of the creation of that document.

 

[Grinder]

Wow. She was the reporter who uncritically passed on the "I was there" statement, that Knox said in a secretly recorded conversation between Knox and her mother. The plain meaning of the comment is Knox telling her mother she'd been at Raffaele's. Vogt reported that it was a confession, that Knox had secretly confessed to her mother that she'd been at the cottage at the time of the murder. Vogt never corrected that report.

Bill I gave you a link on this story from December of 2007. I do not believe that Vogt broke the story nor was she the only one to interpret it the same way.

I challenged you to show she led the way on this but you haven't but you keep saying this over and over.

I doubt she is one of the few supporters as Mignini was given a promotion.

In order to strike a balance I asked you if CD's recent story saying the Meredith DNA turned out to be starch but you refuse to acknowledge that she misreported this as an advocate for Amanda.

Vogt regularly reports on the latest from Mignini, not even so much from others who prosecuted the case. For me, and perhaps my own bias is clear, it is simply unarguable that Andrea Vogt is a virtual press agent for Mignini, not even so much for the case against Knox.

Maybe she is for the reports you read. Do you check the Italian papers?

 

[billyryan]

Respectfully, Bill, I don't think there is any evidence supporting the idea that the Kerchers will find peace through this process. The reality is this process does not seem designed to reach a conclusive answer. Instead, its purpose seems to be about creating ambiguity as a way of saving face for the Italians. The Kerchers despite some of their statements of "just seeking the answers" are as convinced of Amanda'a and Raffaele's guilt as Mignini and some of the prosecutors. Maybe not everyone in their family, but certainly the consensus and especially John.

I can't believe the knife is still seriously being considered a possible murder weapon. In fact, I can't believe it ever was or should have been considered a possible murder weapon. It truly is the most ridiculously illogical alleged murder weapon possibly in the annals of criminal history. The fact that it was ever tested for DNA in the first place is downright abusrd, let alone 3 times.

No in the end, the Kerchers will always believe that Stefanoni found their daughter's killer when he reported that he found her DNA on that knife blade. I seriously doubt that they will ever have an epiphany that they were just fooled by the Italians.

This is all about trying to come up with a reason to justify having imprisoned Amanda Knox for four years,The Italian criminal justice system don't care about the Kerchers any more than they care about imprisoning Raffaele,they know they get away with such things all of the time,CNN and the other big US networks are reporting on this case,and this case is just the tip of the iceberg of what is happening in Italy,the criminals who run the Italian justice system are well aware that in neighbouring countries across the Meditierranean in Eygpt in Syria and in Lybia the ordinary people have turned on their oppressors and they are desperate to prove that they are slightly less corupt

 

[Kaosium]

It would appear that they are

I didn't have the time or inclination to look in more depth last night (it was late and I'd been out), but - as you've discovered - it doesn't take too much effort to find evidence of the letter in public circulation back in 2011 (which is..err.. when it was written!).

Unfortunately, many pro-guilt commentators don't appear to understand just what the metadata means - and what it doesn't mean. If I, for example, copied a block of text today from somewhere (from within an internet page, say) and created a .pdf of it, then the metadata for that .pdf file would say that I created (and last amended) that file on 12th October 2013. That doesn't mean I authored the content

Some of the pro-guilt community still seem to be trying to convince themselves and others that they have PROOF that Sollecito authored the letter himself. I suggest that it is they who require a computer lesson, not Sollecito....

As previously admitted, I'm not sure what all that means either. I get a 'last modified' date for things I download which I'm guessing is the rough equivalent for the 'last amended' date on something uploaded. Would this be more or less the same thing as assuming that because my computer has a 'last modified' date for when I downloaded something that I 'must' have created that content?

If so, oh vey!

 

[Bill Williams]

Bill I gave you a link on this story from December of 2007. I do not believe that Vogt broke the story nor was she the only one to interpret it the same way.

I challenged you to show she led the way on this but you haven't but you keep saying this over and over.

I doubt she is one of the few supporters as Mignini was given a promotion.

In order to strike a balance I asked you if CD's recent story saying the Meredith DNA turned out to be starch but you refuse to acknowledge that she misreported this as an advocate for Amanda.



Maybe she is for the reports you read. Do you check the Italian papers?

One day I will convince you that this is not about striking some mythical "balance". In my opinion, this is what (now) threatens to go wrong in Florence in the only court that matters.. There may be absolutely no evidence, there might be a review of everything the ISC said needed reviewing, they could come to the conclusion that there is nothing there to implicate Knox or Sollecito......

...... but to strike a "balance" they will take Andrea Vogt's advice and convict the pair on a lesser charge.

IMO - trying to strike a balance is what is wrong now. You obviously disagree.

Please also note how your post changes the goalpost position. I did not say Vogt broke the story. I said she reported it, esp. into the Seattle media market. At the time she only reported one side of it - the side the judge (at the time) was (apparently) taking. She did not report on the other side of the argument - that "I was there" meant she was at Raffaele's. She's been that one-sided ever since.

Re: starch - the jury is out on that one. Given that the ISC seems not to have ordered the Florence court to determine the make-up of 36B, mainly because 36B was destroyed in the test, we will never know will we? Is it starch as C&V suggest? Is it Meredith's and of unknown and unknowable origin, except that it is not blood DNA?

In this atmosphere it is hard to know what "misreporting" is. Please note, I am not defending Dempsey - what I have known about her though, is that if someone like Grinder goes to her, rather than me, you'll get an answer from her that you, yourself, can evaluate. That is the only meaningful difference between Vogt and Dempsey that I care about really.

You seem on a mission to discredit FOA, all for the goal of achieving some sort of "balance". Like an umpire who can't tell a ball from a strike... what is the "balanced" position for the umpire?

As for Mignini's promotion - I am told that one of the benefits of that promotion is that now Mignini is not in a position to investigate people any more. I could be wrong, but that's what I was told. IMO that is a face saving measure, put him out of harms' way by kicking him upstairs!

I'm also now of the opinion that Mignini is less of an issue here in Oct 2013 than I've been assuming. It makes it all the more strange that Mignini would write a letter to the editor defending himself from a five-year old claim; a claim, BTW, that no less than John Kercher knows about and that Kercher himself concedes is controversial - the "Satanic Rite" theory.

And yes I do check the Italian papers - with Google-translate as my unreliable friend. And yes, I do read the true crime books - and evaluate them on the basis of who sticks around to defend their work from questions.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

Wry comments about starch

From ABC. "'We are certain that they are not organic traces, but just starch cells,' Ghirga said." What he probably meant was that the organic matter was starch (which is by definition an organic compound) but not cellular matter. I don't expect lawyers or reporters to get scientific concepts exactly right. That is as much as I am going to say about this tempest in a teapot.

 

[Charlie Wilkes]

Respectfully, Bill, I don't think there is any evidence supporting the idea that the Kerchers will find peace through this process. The reality is this process does not seem designed to reach a conclusive answer. Instead, its purpose seems to be about creating ambiguity as a way of saving face for the Italians.

I suppose the court might go for the "middle" verdict, case not proved, as opposed to the Hellmann verdict, they didn't do it. Maybe that will be enough to placate these vindictive magistrates.