I wish we had some Italian law expert (is Macchiavelli one?) that could help with these latest questions and could answer if the legal documents from Hellmann's trial are accepted as evidence in this new appeal, especially C&V. It has been said many times so far that it stands in Florence, but it would be nice if we could get some kind of official confirmation, if that's even possible, as I realize it's not something with a ready answer. The SC's opinion about C&V wasn't exactly the best, as I've just read on PMF (didn't bother to read the whole SC's ruling). I ask because amongst PGP and us people are having different opinions about it.
I can tell you with a high degree of confidence that everything from the Hellmann trial (along with everything from the Massei trial and the pre-trial hearings) will be admitted as evidence in the new appeal trial.
The Supreme Court ruling on the Hellmann appeal clearly indicates that it is not the C/V report
per se with which the SC has a problem. In fact, the SC explicitly states that the report has judicial legitimacy, and was legitimately ordered by the Hellmann court. The SC also does not have a problem with the C/V report itself, nor with its conclusions.
Rather, the SC argues (totally incorrectly in my view, but that's a different matter...) that Hellmann's court was wrong to accept "unquestioningly" the conclusions of the C/V report. The SC points out that prosecution experts (who didn't have a vested interest of course - perish the thought!) had previously testified that the forensic work of Stefanoni et al was just fine and dandy, and that therefore the results of Stefanoni's analysis should be above reproach. The SC therefore essentially says that Hellmann's court "erred" by not taking the views of these other prosecution experts into account.
I suspect that the new appeal may be able to break the deadlock on this by either having a fuller, wider debate on whether Stefanoni's results are reliable and credible or not (heads-up hint for the court: they're not), or by delving further into the rationale behind C/V's conclusions (heads-up hint for the court: broadly speaking, they're spot on).
In effect, the SC is saying "We reject Hellmann's conclusions on the reliability/credibility of the DNA evidence as presented in the motivations report, since it appears to be an arbitrary acceptance of C/V's case over that of the prosecution". Setting aside for a moment the fact that C&V were appointed as neutral court experts* - whereas clearly the prosecution has a vested interest in producing experts which support its position (as indeed does the defence) - I feel it's now up to the new appeal trial to reach a measured, balanced, objective conclusion on the issue (final heads-up hint for the court: the correct conclusion is that none of Stefanoni's work is either credible or reliable, since pretty much every protocol in the book for collecting, handling, transporting, storing, testing and interpreting low template DNA was either ignored or flagrantly breached by the fragrant not-a-real-doctor).
* Of course, if either the SC or the new appeal court or the prosecutors want to try to argue that C&V were actually improperly biased to the defence, then a) they'd better prove it, and b) they'd better also show how any such bias might have affected the C/V report's conclusions. To me, it seems pretty obvious that the C/V report's conclusions were objective and impartial, since they were in line with any rational, scientific analysis of Stefanoni's work. It goes without saying that their conclusions were therefore favourable to the defence, and I suppose that it therefore goes without saying that certain parties would leap on that as some sort of element of "proof" of improper bias.
