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

[acbytesla]

Today it might have, yes.

But wait til Bongiorno drills home the inference in relation to Meredith's "DNA" on 36B in closing arguments.

Those of us who realise the significance of the Carabinieri experts' testimony today are thinking one step ahead - in that it's now obvious that the defence teams will (in closing) link today's testimony back to Stefanoni's disastrously-inept examination of the knife to show why 36B (and therefore the whole knife) should be thrown out as evidence.

I imagine that much of the media haven't made the link yet. And defendants speaking in court are always more "mediagenic" than dry and detailed scientific testimony - especially when the findings linked to that testimony have been leaked in advance.

However, it happens that today the scientific testimony unearthed a rough diamond in the "two or more tests are needed to validate the DNA results" testimony. Once Bongiorno has polished that diamond and presented it back to the judicial panel, I think they'll sit up and notice alright.

Yep, you are right, today's testimony by the scientist from the RIS is the real bombshell of the day. Far more important than the results of 36I.

 

[Bill Williams]

To me, a convincing context for this is the power and authority - and trustworthiness - that Sollecito may have perceived in the police and PM at the time.

Given that Sollecito was told that - beyond any doubt - Meredith's DNA had been found on his kitchen knife, I suspect that an innocent Sollecito would have experienced classic cognitive dissonance: he would have KNOWN that this kitchen knife couldn't have been involved in the murder, yet he'd been told by the authorities that Meredith's DNA was on the blade.

If that was the case, then I think that he - again classically - would have been pushed into a resolution of this cognitive dissonance, in a way that would have resolved both disparate sides of the equation. I think that this would have been why he rationalised the "enhanced factual" account of pricking Meredith's hand - which I think may indeed have been loosely based on a real incident (possibly with a different knife or with no knife at all).

I believe that a good psychiatrist would easily be able to explain why an innocent Sollecito might act in such a way - based on the whole "cognitive dissonance" phenomenon where a resolution of that dissonance is forced (Sollecito felt he HAD to come up with a reason how and why his kitchen knife came to have Meredith's DNA on it).

That's why I think that Sollecito's words on the "knife-pricking" are in fact entirely compatible with an innocent man who's confronted with cognitive dissonance (coupled with fear and helplessness), who's forced into resolving that dissonance.

Of course, it's fair to say that it's also compatible with a guilty Sollecito trying to lie his way out of trouble. But that's not really the point: the point is that - in my view - this behaviour is compatible with both a "guilty Sollecito" and an "innocent Sollecito" - in direct contrast to those pro-guilt commentators who claim it's only compatible with guilt.

I think he lied. Outright prevarication.

What this whopper shows is that he's an awkward and clumsy liar, and has probably learned that about himself.

It actually makes me trust what he says all the more, really, because if the knife prick scenario is the best he can do, he'd better keep his day job.

of course I am projecting. I know such people with little talent for fibbery. You can spot their whoppers a mile away.

The real issue is that Raffaele never lifted his alibi for Knox, esp. when it counted. Someone needs to explain why a guilty Raffaele would do that.

An innocent Raffaele would do that. Mainly because he'd botch the lie to begin with, like the knife prick story, and also because....

..... he's a gem of a man, moral to the core.

 

[LondonJohn]

It's sort of like testing for blood. It's not enough to just get the first question right. One must get all the questions right. Getting the first right, then missing the second and skipping the third entirely just doesn't get it.

Well yes - that's a slightly different matter, but similar principles do indeed apply.

The blood position is actually very simple:

You cannot offer evidence that a given substance/stain/spot etc is blood unless you have performed a positive confirmatory test for blood upon it.

The only purpose for the battery of presumptive tests is to indicate to investigators which areas are worthy of further investigation, and which can be ruled out at that early stage. The protocols are clear: do one or more presumptive tests, then - if positive - do a confirmatory test.

Furthermore, the protocol for using Luminol is typically to follow a positive with a 2-step TMB test. That extra test is done in order to further increase the specificity of the testing process for blood (Luminol is not highly specific to blood) - although it's also acceptable to skip the TMB test after a Luminol positive and go straight to a confirmatory blood test.

Either way, what is categorically NOT acceptable is to look at a Luminol positive, then do a negative TMB test (which you try to conceal initially), then go into a courtroom and say you found blood at that spot.

Guess what not-a-real-doctor Stefanoni did?

 

[Chris_Halkides]

The knife versus what someone thinks of the knife

He was told that there was Meredith's DNA and had no way of knowing, really. He panicked and was stupid. It's the only time, really, that he's been caught in a lie.

I am not so sure I would even call it a lie. In his book he talks about a time when he was cooking at the women's flat, and something like that happened. I am sorry, but I don't have the page number in front of me. He concluded by saying that there was no possible connection between this incident and the knife from his flat.

However, I think that two points need to be made about his story in no uncertain terms. One he was writing in his diary, and his book makes clear that his diary was taken from him against his will and the wishes of his lawyer. It is not as if he got up in court and said that this happened. To my way of looking at it, he was trying to explain this strange result to himself, not to anyone else. Two, what can it possibly matter what Sollecito thinks of the knife?! Sollecito's words cannot make bad evidence into good evidence any more than they can make good evidence into bad evidence. RoseMontague once said words to the effect, "He answered baloney with baloney," and that is close to my own view. I would rather look at the evidence itself and draw my own conclusions.

 

[acbytesla]

Well yes - that's a slightly different matter, but similar principles do indeed apply.

The blood position is actually very simple:

You cannot offer evidence that a given substance/stain/spot etc is blood unless you have performed a positive confirmatory test for blood upon it.

The only purpose for the battery of presumptive tests is to indicate to investigators which areas are worthy of further investigation, and which can be ruled out at that early stage. The protocols are clear: do one or more presumptive tests, then - if positive - do a confirmatory test.

Furthermore, the protocol for using Luminol is typically to follow a positive with a 2-step TMB test. That extra test is done in order to further increase the specificity of the testing process for blood (Luminol is not highly specific to blood) - although it's also acceptable to skip the TMB test after a Luminol positive and go straight to a confirmatory blood test.

Either way, what is categorically NOT acceptable is to look at a Luminol positive, then do a negative TMB test (which you try to conceal initially), then go into a courtroom and say you found blood at that spot.

Guess what not-a-real-doctor Stefanoni did?

You sort of set me up with your earlier post. Couldn't resist.

 

[acbytesla]

I am not so sure I would even call it a lie. In his book he talks about a time when he was cooking at the women's flat, and something like that happened. I am sorry, but I don't have the page number in front of me. He concluded by saying that there was no possible connection between this incident and the knife from his flat.

However, I think that two points need to be made about his story in no uncertain terms. One he was writing in his diary, and his book makes clear that his diary was taken from him against his will and the wishes of his lawyer. It is not as if he got up in court and said that this happened. To my way of looking at it, he was trying to explain this strange result to himself, not to anyone else. Two, what can it possibly matter what Sollecito thinks of the knife?! Sollecito's words cannot make bad evidence into good evidence any more than they can make good evidence into bad evidence. RoseMontague once said words to the effect, "He answered baloney with baloney," and that is close to my own view. I would rather look at the evidence itself and draw my own conclusions.

It sounds like a clear case of trying to explain something he did not understand and conflation... Grinder, what do you think?

 

[LondonJohn]

You sort of set me up with your earlier post. Couldn't resist.

Nor could I

 

[LondonJohn]

I am not so sure I would even call it a lie. In his book he talks about a time when he was cooking at the women's flat, and something like that happened. I am sorry, but I don't have the page number in front of me. He concluded by saying that there was no possible connection between this incident and the knife from his flat.

However, I think that two points need to be made about his story in no uncertain terms. One he was writing in his diary, and his book makes clear that his diary was taken from him against his will and the wishes of his lawyer. It is not as if he got up in court and said that this happened. To my way of looking at it, he was trying to explain this strange result to himself, not to anyone else. Two, what can it possibly matter what Sollecito thinks of the knife?! Sollecito's words cannot make bad evidence into good evidence any more than they can make good evidence into bad evidence. RoseMontague once said words to the effect, "He answered baloney with baloney," and that is close to my own view. I would rather look at the evidence itself and draw my own conclusions.

Yes - that's what makes me think that Sollecito's story (which in hindsight was obviously not true as told) was indeed based at least loosely on something that had actually happened.

And if that's the case, it lends more weight to the "innocent Sollecito trying to resolve cognitive dissonance" theory, especially when one considers the immense stress, fear, confusion and helplessness that Sollecito must have been going through at that very time.

 

[LondonJohn]

Well, that was an interesting day, wasn't it?

As I turn in for the night, I reflect that acquittal for Knox and Sollecito is now one significant step closer -though there is still a long way to go. I am certain that Bongiorno and Dalla Vedova will have realised the significance of today's testimony in relation to 36B (and thus to the knife as a whole), and will make that argument forcefully and effectively in closing arguments.

Let us see what tomorrow (figuratively speaking of course!) brings.

Good night.

 

[acbytesla]

Well, that was an interesting day, wasn't it?

As I turn in for the night, I reflect that acquittal for Knox and Sollecito is now one significant step closer -though there is still a long way to go. I am certain that Bongiorno and Dalla Vedova will have realised the significance of today's testimony in relation to 36B (and thus to the knife as a whole), and will make that argument forcefully and effectively in closing arguments.

Let us see what tomorrow (figuratively speaking of course!) brings.

Good night.

knock on wood

 

[billyryan]

I am not so sure I would even call it a lie. In his book he talks about a time when he was cooking at the women's flat, and something like that happened. I am sorry, but I don't have the page number in front of me. He concluded by saying that there was no possible connection between this incident and the knife from his flat.

However, I think that two points need to be made about his story in no uncertain terms. One he was writing in his diary, and his book makes clear that his diary was taken from him against his will and the wishes of his lawyer. It is not as if he got up in court and said that this happened. To my way of looking at it, he was trying to explain this strange result to himself, not to anyone else. Two, what can it possibly matter what Sollecito thinks of the knife?! Sollecito's words cannot make bad evidence into good evidence any more than they can make good evidence into bad evidence. RoseMontague once said words to the effect, "He answered baloney with baloney," and that is close to my own view. I would rather look at the evidence itself and draw my own conclusions.

Yes Halides1;he was writing in his diary,I have not read his diary but could Rafaelle have been listing all of the innocent ways that Merediths DNA could have got on the knife,to see if he could come up with the answer to how Stefanoni got this result.

The other answer to this would be what reason had Raffaele to believe that anybody but himself would ever read his diary

 

[kwill]

Re: the knife. Is it true that Raffaele Sollecito said the following....

"The fact there is Meredith's DNA on the kitchen knife is because once when we were all cooking together I accidentally pricked her hand. I apologised immediately and she said it was not a problem."

If so, what is the explanation for that?

As I think someone said upthread, this sentence was taken from his diary. His private diary, written while he was being kept in prison, taken against his will and published in the newspapers.

He wasn't writing for publication, or making a public claim, or testifying under oath . . . he was alone in a cell, trying to make sense of something that didn't add up with the only tool he had, and that was his imagination.

 

[Dan O.]

Re: the knife. Is it true that Raffaele Sollecito said the following....

"The fact there is Meredith's DNA on the kitchen knife is because once when we were all cooking together I accidentally pricked her hand. I apologised immediately and she said it was not a problem."

If so, what is the explanation for that?

First of all, lets be accurate on when, where and what Raffaele said. This is in his private prison diary on November 18. Raffaele has been in prison since the interrogation of the 5th. He first heard about this knife two days earlier from watching television.

Nov 18 2007
they are keeping me in jail because there is a kitchen knife with a
trace of Meredith's DNA. It seems like a horror movie ... Looking back
and remembering it came to mind that the night dad sent me an sms
message of goodnight to be indiscreet (knowing that I was with
Amanda), then the day after Amanda repeated to me that if she had not
been with me at this time she would be dead. Thinking and
reconstructing, it seems to me that she always remained with me, the
only thing I do not remember exactly is when she left in the early
evening for a few minutes.
I am convinced that she could not have killed Meredith and then return
home. The fact that there is Meredith's DNA on the kitchen is because once while cooking together, I shifted myself in the house handling the knife, I had the point on her hand, and immediately after I apologized but she had nothing done to her. So the only real explanation of the kitchen knife is this.I am not quiet because if they have found a trace so ridiculous they
can find many so many others on the rags and so on ... What a
nightmare! They should first of all show that the knife is indeed the
weapon of the crime: knife, type of cut, the obvious traces on the
blade, etc.. Then if they want to find invisible traces of Meredith in
my house, find some in the streams of this passage! There must be a
divine justice to all this! I continue to wake up in the morning with
accusatory faces that fix me as a murderer ...
​

We know from multiple sources that Raffaele did cook at the cottage on at least a couple of occasions. It is entirely possible that the story Raffaele relates is true. However, the knife involved in that incident would have been Raffaele's pocket knife or a knife from the cottage. Raffaele's kitchen knife has never left his kitchen. For this, I can only presume that Raffaele is conflating facts due to his stressed condition.

Also note that this story involved the very point of the knife and that the skin was not pierced, there was no blood drawn. There is no way that this event could explain the DNA finding even if it were the same knife.

This story is nothing more than the ramblings of a scared kid.

 

[Strozzi]

.

. . . it lends more weight to the "innocent Sollecito trying to resolve cognitive dissonance" theory, especially when one considers the immense stress, fear, confusion and helplessness that Sollecito must have been going through at that very time.

Solicito's wondering how Meredith's blood got on his kitchen knife is another example of how isolated, dependent, and vulnerable subjects trust what authorities tell them, and speculate from it. No accurate scientific test shows Meredith's DNA was on the knife. But Stefanina's false analysis and false conclusion was communicated to Raffaele, who believed what he was told. His mind went into overdrive trying to comprehend (speculate) how Meredith's blood could have gotten on his kitchen knife.

In their interrogations the police got Raffaele to believe at one point that Amanda could have gotten up in the night while he slept, slipped out, done something, and then returned to his bed - all while he slept and did not notice. Possible, yes, if you don't remember details and if you trust the authorities' version. (In this case, Raffaelle was deceived by the police's version, but later realized it was impossible as Amanda would not have been able to get back in his flat. He had the only key.)

 

[Supernaut]

Not a bad dinner at all. A big red squirrel is might fine eating. I'm not a big fan of the collard greens but with nice hollandaise sauce, they might be just fine.

Very funny exchange' y'all.

But ACBT, red squirrels are all but inedible - greys are very tasty.

 

[acbytesla]

Very funny exchange' y'all.

But ACBT, red squirrels are all but inedible - greys are very tasty.

I think you have that backwards. You see the greys all over the Northwest and none of the Reds. But in the Midwest where we use to hunt squirrels and knoodle for catfish, you only seem to find the reds. It's been a long time since I've been to Iowa...but I don't recall ever hunting or eating the greys.

 

[Dan O.]

He was told that there was Meredith's DNA and had no way of knowing, really. He panicked and was stupid. It's the only time, really, that he's been caught in a lie.

Where is the intent Bill? Raffaele is being assaulted by lies concerning this knife. The first lie was that it was even considered the murder weapon. Then he was lied to by Stefanoni's fictitious lab work finding Meredith's DNA on the blade. And they lied to him saying the the girls didn't have knives at the cottage so Amanda took his only kitchen knife over there. So Raffaele puts all this together and remembers when he touched Meredith's hand with the point and he writes this in his diary. If Raffaele were capable of rational thought at that time he would have realized that his cooking story was immaterial. If the knife were at the cottage at any time, it would have Meredith's DNA on it.

We now know that the girls had a plethora of knives at the cottage and if none of those were good enough, Amanda had her own brand new set. There was never any reason to have brought Raffaele's knife to the cottage.

 

[Strozzi]

Very funny exchange' y'all.

But ACBT, red squirrels are all but inedible - greys are very tasty.

My relative, who lives in the Ozark Mountains in Missouri, has a pack of "coon hounds." The most exciting thing to him is to hunt racoons with his coon hounds. I guess they are tastier than squirrel. If he were more sophisticated he would own English setters and shoot grouse.

 

[Bill Williams]

He was told that there was Meredith's DNA and had no way of knowing, really. He panicked and was stupid. It's the only time, really, that he's been caught in a lie.

Where is the intent Bill? Raffaele is being assaulted by lies concerning this knife. The first lie was that it was even considered the murder weapon. Then he was lied to by Stefanoni's fictitious lab work finding Meredith's DNA on the blade. And they lied to him saying the the girls didn't have knives at the cottage so Amanda took his only kitchen knife over there. So Raffaele puts all this together and remembers when he touched Meredith's hand with the point and he writes this in his diary. If Raffaele were capable of rational thought at that time he would have realized that his cooking story was immaterial. If the knife were at the cottage at any time, it would have Meredith's DNA on it.

We now know that the girls had a plethora of knives at the cottage and if none of those were good enough, Amanda had her own brand new set. There was never any reason to have brought Raffaele's knife to the cottage.

Intent? Probably the panic in thinking the cops had something on him, and he had no way, really, of knowing if that was true...

... just like when the cops told Knox that she needed to imagine what it was like at the cottage if Lumumba had been there. They asked, "Did you hear anything," Knox answered, "No."

They then said, "If your friend is being attacked by Lumumba and she was screaming, how could you not hear that?"

Her answer, "Maybe I put my hands over my ears."

That one became (when leaked) Amanda purposely trying to drown out the screams of her friend.

SO, I realize Raffaele is at the mercy of the "information providers," and was probably not thinking they had any reason to lie!

Imagine what life for Knox AND Sollecito would be like if, back then, Raffaele had caved in and squealed on Knox. There'd have been no Ris Carabinieri confirmation of C&V.

The overall story of Raffaele is his commitment to the truth, even at the risk of 35 years in jail. But early on, his "intent" was being a scared kid.

 

[Bill Williams]

As I think someone said upthread, this sentence was taken from his diary. His private diary, written while he was being kept in prison, taken against his will and published in the newspapers.

He wasn't writing for publication, or making a public claim, or testifying under oath . . . he was alone in a cell, trying to make sense of something that didn't add up with the only tool he had, and that was his imagination.

And people like Machiavelli have the GALL to say that the prosecution was not leaking these things to the press to poison the well against Sollecito and Knox.