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

[Mary_H]

There is already a gap there, why Stefi would not open the knife or at least test there makes no sense to me. (picture attached)

They are still not in the mindset of having to prove their case. They are accustomed to their word being enough. This is all very distressing for them; I can sense their confusion and indignation as they resist this major adjustment into the modern world.

 

[Samson]

Welcome Sampson

Hardly the central plank. I say that reasonable doubt can't be challenged. I say that they didn't need to prove their innocence and that proving that would be nearly impossible without a verifiable alibi.

Thank you for the welcome, I have ticked quote message in reply, assuming that means your post appears. I said "The central plank for the prosecution is that the murder happened before the window was broken." Meaning simply the staged break in was totally a necessary condition to support Massei's convictions, and if it was accepted from the outset a burglar broke it, later proving to be Rudy, AK and RS would never have entered the frame. Nonetheless you clarified the logical point, more or less proposing that those without alibis are suspects.
I have been reading this thread for months and generally congratulate all on constructing a complete, bullet proof defence, this could well be a life saving endeavour for AK and RS, at the very least a serious resource if the battle extends beyond Florence.

 

[billyryan]

To convict the Florence court somehow has to nullify the C&V report,to do that would Stefanoni have to take the stand and answer all questions to the satisfaction of the court,surely even in the land of Italian justice this new court cannot find the C&V report in error and Stefanoni work beyond reproach without both having taken the witness stand to defend their work
Does anybody know if Patrizia Stefanoni will take the witness stand in this trial

Thanks in advance

 

[Supernaut]

Tesla I believe that if Rudy climbed into that window he wouldn't have used the technique a highly skilled rock climber used. I believe he would have climbed it in a similar way that the lawyer did.

It is a shame that the TV show didn't use someone similar to Rudy, a 5' 10", 20 YO, semi-pro basketball player. The rock climber undoubtedly had practiced the move as they actually didn't just walk up to the cottage as the set-up made it look.

What "technique" did you see him using that anyone else wouldn't have been likely to?

Otherwise, yes, it would have been better if they'd used someone like Guede - a fit, athletic 20-year old, like Guede was.

I suspect that the idea was lend gravitas by using an "expert" rather than "a young man who agreed to attepmt the climb for us".

It would have been more interesting had the shutters been closed in the way Filomena claimed she had left them, which would have left even less sill to grab.

The guy was able to stand on the grate below the window, his shoulders level with sill, and casually open and close the shutters. Whether they had been closed or not is of no importance.

 

[Supernaut]

I truly can't believe that people think that Rudy would have made the squat to full extension move and reached the window. Where he grabs the sill there would be no sill if the shutters were closed as described by Filomena - stuck shut meaning they didn't close so were not as shown when close on the show. The sill would have only had a tiny space by the hinges. Why do you think that they used a rock climber and not a basketball player? They wanted it to look as easy as possible.

See previous post.

This is getting rather mind-numbing.

 

[Supernaut]

Machiavelli says he's an expert in theatre. It's how he claims to have intuited that Knox was guilty, when he saw her in court.

He has never claimed law expertise, really, but he obviously has access to folk who are. He also has access to original documents. Strangely when trying to refute a point (eg. the Satanic Rite theory Mignini once proposed) Machiavelli will claim to have original documents of Mignini's speech (or some such thing) and then does not post it.

Since a de novo appeal's trial is a full blown "re do" of the first level trial, the judge is probably at liberty to accept or reject ANY document or witness, irregardless of whether or not the first trial entered it or refused to. Witness that Massei's court refused to do an independent DNA evaluation, but the Hellmann court overruled that by appointing Conti & Vecchiotti.

As such, the Supreme Court is not supposed to tinker with evidence, just make rulings of law and/or court procedure.

My assumption, and I am not a law expert in ANY country, is that unless Nencini specifically says, for instance, that C&V needs throwing out, that it stays as part of the trial record.

But yes, it would be nice to get a real expert to comment.

Ever heard the saying; "Every expert has an equal and opposite expert"?

Nowhere does this apply more than with the law and lawyers, and in Italy ......

The system there has been built "bottom-up" over generations (hence the obvious need for 'top-down reform'), and the resulting, labyrinthine, rickety mess of "articles" and "codes" can apparently be bent to provide any result a particular official might want.

"Experts in Italian" law would include the SC judges, above all others, and look at their "interpretation" of "Italian law" in over-turning of the Hellmann verdict.

 

[Supernaut]

I'm not really sure the knife really could be "opened" successfully to obtain any DNA that may have "seeped" into the handle. It's a hard plastic handle that is "fused" around the stainless steel blade.Maybe if you cut it open by sawing the middle of the handle. Maybe..

Thermoplastic and resin mouldings always, and I mean ALWAYS shrink after the moulding process - it's a factor which has to be taken account of in industrial design.

Couple that with constant force being exerted on a steel blade (which will also have been heated during the moulding process, and thus also have contracted slightly) that such a piece of plastic is moulded around, and it's guaranteed that fluids will be able to seep between them.

 

[LondonJohn]

I UNDERSTAND THAT THE ISC DID SAY THAT THE C&V REPORT WAS IN ERROR BY NOT IDENTIFYING THE SOURCE OF THE CONTAMINATION> DO YOU UNDERSTAND THAT EVISCERATES THEIR CONCLUSIONS?

As much as you bluster I'm not convinced that this court must accept C&V just as Hellmann didn't accept Curatolo. So even if C&V is in the record it may be moot.

"Bluster"?

I think I may see the problem here. I'm not suggesting (and have never suggested) that the new appeal court "must accept C&V". What I'm saying is that the new court will have C&V available to it as evidence. Whether the court will choose to accept, partially accept, or totally reject C/V's conclusions is up to the court.

Really weren't you one of those saying they could only rule on legal matters versus judgment calls?

Yes I was, and I was correct to say so - it's enshrined in the Italian constitution. What appears to have happened in this case is that the SC has stretched its remit under the guise of dealing with points of law. Even so, the SC is essentially saying that in its view Hellmann's court was wrong in law to acquit based on the evidence in front of it. I think the SC was manifestly wrong to have made that overall judgement, but there you go.

On this subject though, it's important to understand that the SC was not explicitly ruling on findings of fact - it was ruling on what it saw as the poor legal logic employed by the Hellmann court. That's an important distinction. And it's also why the SC didn't (and couldn't have) ruled on the C/V report itself. Instead, their ruling on this matter concerned the way in which the court had dealt with the C/V report. Again, that's an important difference.

Just to be clear I never said that C&V wouldn't be in the record I only said I would like to see a source I trusted to be accurate and knowledgeable on Italian law,

I understand that. What I'm trying to point out is that all the available information points very clearly to the conclusion that the C/V report will be admitted (or, more accurately, has been admitted) as evidence in the new appeal trial. I absolutely concur that I could be wrong, but my current position is that I believe I am well-justified in holding this point of view. I will, of course, modify or change it if new evidence emerges to the contrary

 

[Supernaut]

I'm not sure that it could actually be opened either. These sorts of cheap knives either have the handle injection-moulded around the tang in one piece, or are a two-part plastic handle that is fused (usually using high-frequency sound fusion) around the tang.

My point was merely that the knife handle HAS NOT ever been opened, contrary to some "reports". And that the Carabinieri did not even have the knife in their possession last week, let alone open the handle...

I'd forgotten about ultrasonic plastic welding.

If this is commonly used in making cheap knives, i.e. a pre-moulded handle welded around the blade (perhaps in 2 halves), it would make the observations I just made about shrinkage inapplicable.

I'm not quite fascinated enough to try and find out if this is indeed the case, though.

(However, am I the only one here who's had plastic handles on cheap kitchen knives simply snap off the blade during use?)

 

[Grinder]

What "technique" did you see him using that anyone else wouldn't have been likely to?

The climber squatted and rose up grabbing the sill/upper grate. The lawyer walked up the "ladder" reaching near the sill. I think most non-climber would do as the lawyer did.

The guy was able to stand on the grate below the window, his shoulders level with sill, and casually open and close the shutters. Whether they had been closed or not is of no importance.

Had the shutters been closed there would have been less sill to grab and even less than with the new ones closed since the ones that night would close all the way.

If they were closed, which I don't believe they were, it would require them being opened before the rock could be thrown.

 

[Grinder]

(However, am I the only one here who's had plastic handles on cheap kitchen knives simply snap off the blade during use?)

No you are not. One of my favorites at this time has only about two-thirds of it's handle left.

 

[Supernaut]

The climber squatted and rose up grabbing the sill/upper grate. The lawyer walked up the "ladder" reaching near the sill. I think most non-climber would do as the lawyer did.




Had the shutters been closed there would have been less sill to grab and even less than with the new ones closed since the ones that night would close all the way.

If they were closed, which I don't believe they were, it would require them being opened before the rock could be thrown.

Yes, so Guede could have climbed the grate and got his shoulders level with the sill, opened the shutters (assuming they were closed), then got down to throw the rock.

He would have needed no more purchase on the sill than he needed to steady himself for a couple of seconds with one hand and throw the shutters open with the other. As the guy in the video demonstrated.

 

[Grinder]

It's show and tell time Grinder. Show us a photo of the spec that Stefanoni found and tell us what you think it looks like.

I think I answered this before, I found it looked like U-238.

 

[Grinder]

Yes, so Guede could have climbed the grate and got his shoulders level with the sill, opened the shutters (assuming they were closed), then got down to throw the rock.

He would have needed no more purchase on the sill than he needed to steady himself for a couple of seconds with one hand and throw the shutters open with the other. As the guy in the video demonstrated.

This started when I said that I didn't think the climb was as easy as the rock climber made it look. That's all. Not as easy. Not impossible.

The rock climber lowers himself to demonstrate the shutter opening being easy and the sill is more like eye level than shoulder level, but, yes, I think with the shutters open Rudy could easily get up. The only issue for me is that it was a balance issue for the lawyer. Once up it would be easy to lower oneself down so one's feet were on the top rung than it would be to get up there in the first place.

The rock climber avoided the balance issue by his slick one-motion move that allowed him to reach the sill.

 

[acbytesla]

Thermoplastic and resin mouldings always, and I mean ALWAYS shrink after the moulding process - it's a factor which has to be taken account of in industrial design.

Couple that with constant force being exerted on a steel blade (which will also have been heated during the moulding process, and thus also have contracted slightly) that such a piece of plastic is moulded around, and it's guaranteed that fluids will be able to seep between them.

This may be true, but my experience with plastic resins is that they "stick granularly to everything and the handle would never actually come apart cleanly from the blade, allowing to look for DNA. (this is my experience, not necessarily what would happen in this case)

 

[acbytesla]

This started when I said that I didn't think the climb was as easy as the rock climber made it look. That's all. Not as easy. Not impossible.

The rock climber lowers himself to demonstrate the shutter opening being easy and the sill is more like eye level than shoulder level, but, yes, I think with the shutters open Rudy could easily get up. The only issue for me is that it was a balance issue for the lawyer. Once up it would be easy to lower oneself down so one's feet were on the top rung than it would be to get up there in the first place.

The rock climber avoided the balance issue by his slick one-motion move that allowed him to reach the sill.

It's always easier when you have lots of experience. I'm sure it was a little more difficult for Rudy. On that point, I agree, I just don't believe it would be a LOT more difficult for a guy like Rudy. That's all.

For me on the other hand, it would be impossible.

 

[Grinder]

This may be true, but my experience with plastic resins is that they "stick granularly to everything and the handle would never actually come apart cleanly from the blade, allowing to look for DNA. (this is my experience, not necessarily what would happen in this case)

Tesla would you think that if there was a gap that it would fill up over time?

I would think that a brand new knife with a gap would begin to take in material from the first use. My stove has a design flaw and there is this joint on the top that fills with food waste. I take a knife and scrape it out every once in a while bad I never try to clean a knife at the handle beyond simple washing.

I would think that any room for material would fill up and the new dirt or blood or DNA wouldn't sink deep in the gap and would remain in the region where cleaning would reach.

Having said that I see no reason, at this point for sure, not to open the handle. I'm sure they will find starch and it could have someone's DNA

 

[katy_did]

This kind of decision does the same thing the Massei did. IGNORED THE EVIDENCE.

The narrative for this compromise has NO connection to reality. To the world outside of Italy this would make Italy seem even more insane than it already does. (not that this seems to stop the Italian judicial system)

The fact is there is NO relationship with Rudy so why would they cover it up and stage a burglary? I can imagine covering up a crime for a very close friend or relative , I could see a motive for a scenario like that. But this is different. Rudy is basically a total stranger to both of them.

As our English friends would say "NOT BLOODY LIKELY". No, they are either covering up their own involvement or not at all.

I don't know, I think there are unfortunately a lot of people out there who think that Amanda (it's usually Amanda) knows something, even if the evidence for murder is a bit dubious. To those people, conviction for being present and staging the crime scene, but acquittal for the murder itself - based not on innocence, but on there not being enough evidence to convict - might seem like justice. Amanda's 'confession' in particular leads a lot of people to think that while she may not be guilty of murder, she was certainly there at the time.

The motive would be that they let Rudy in and so felt responsible, that they worried they might be blamed if they went to the police (because Rudy fled, leaving them at the murder scene) and perhaps that they were high and not thinking straight anyway. Once they'd committed to that course of action it was too late to back out. Plus, the court could say, maybe they were involved in the murder - we just can't prove it.

Obviously I don't think the above is what happened, I'm just considering the different ways the jury might interpret the results of the knife test. On the one hand, I don't think it can leave things unchanged - the knife most likely won't be considered the murder weapon. On the other, if you consider the rest of the evidence to be valid but disregard the knife, what are you left with? Evidence that they were in the house, but no reliable evidence that they were in the room itself. So I do wonder if they might try to craft some sort of in-between verdict based on reasonable doubt. At the moment I'd say there's maybe a 40% chance of acquittal, 40% chance of a compromise verdict, and 20% chance of conviction, although it's still really hard to be sure.

 

[Dan O.]

[IMGw=640]http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/picture.php?albumid=597&pictureid=8261[/IMGw]

Annotation of heater control settings from DSC_0219 (Date Time Original: Nov 2, 2007 6:39:54 PM) based on the installation manual for a similar model.

 

[acbytesla]

Tesla would you think that if there was a gap that it would fill up over time?

I would think that a brand new knife with a gap would begin to take in material from the first use. My stove has a design flaw and there is this joint on the top that fills with food waste. I take a knife and scrape it out every once in a while bad I never try to clean a knife at the handle beyond simple washing.

I would think that any room for material would fill up and the new dirt or blood or DNA wouldn't sink deep in the gap and would remain in the region where cleaning would reach.

Having said that I see no reason, at this point for sure, not to open the handle. I'm sure they will find starch and it could have someone's DNA

If there is a gap, absolutely yes, I just think that the mechanics of trying to get that handle apart presents challenges that would be very difficult.

I'm in favor of opening the handle if could be done, not that I think it would make a bit of difference. The knife ISN'T the murder weapon. I seriously doubt that there was two weapons involved and even if there was, this cooking knife is extremely unlikely to be the second knife. This is group masturbatory forensics, that's all.