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

[NancyS]

I know CoulsdonUK reads here, and he has been very dedicated in not forgetting Meredith Kercher in all this. He's also resisted, really, expressing any opinion about guilt or innocence of the two accused.

My question is: is this process worthy of the horror that the Kerchers continue to endure? How much of this can that family really take? Were the Kerchers served, when the ISC last March, quashed the Hellmann acquittal, just so that Crini could reduce it to pooh, no motive, and no premeditation?

CoulsdonUK is high on my list for going for a pint together....

It's horribly tragic that this the case has turned into such a parody - losing a daugher/sister in those circumstances is one of the worst things that can happen to anyone, it's a hurt that will never heal. The prosecution team have used and abused the Kercher family grief to add pathos to their absurd theories, whilst helping to insure a lighter sentence for Rudy Guede.

 

[billyryan]

Well add up all the wrong things about this case...those obvious, blatant, moronisms of fact-less innuendo and a zero sum of evidence against the two innocents and yet...YET... this defense (who are lovely men and women certainly) are far and beyond their experience depth since they still cant seem to be able to win this lame azed case!

That makes them a lame defense and if they don't bat one out of the ball park next month these two are back to square one. No...maybe even more jail time! They are lame. The proof is in the pudding. Simple actually. Lovely people yes...I would use Carlo as my dresser, I want the Perugia grey hair dude to be my father. But I wouldn't want either to represent me for anything in an Italian court room.

Its just the sad truth. You cant swim with the sharks unless you get into the water with them.

Good lawyers win in a fair court but this is not a fair court,I don't believe the greatest lawyer on earth could have won in judge Matteini's court who set this whole travesty in motion.

Sabrina Misseri (if I spelled her name right)and her mum got convicted and a life sentence for a murder they had nothing to do with,to which somebody confessed and is still confessing too,during this case Frank claimed on the shock that the best defence lawyer in Italy had taken up job of defending them,but they are still in jail and the real killer Sabrina father who has confessed is free

Grinder appears to me to be saying that Amanda and Raffaele's team will only make a weak defence of their clients on the 16/17 of December,maybe time will prove him right but I hope not,I am still hoping that Bongiorno in particular will rise to the occasion and get the court to see the truth that Rudy Guede murdered Meredith and that Raffaele and Amanda are innocent

 

[GreyFox]

I wonder what the proportion is. At first, the PGP pushed a strong agenda of erudite European sensibilities vs. crass American sensibilities. Quennell is from New Zealand, I think; Michael a/k/a Fulcanelli is in Great Britain, and Peggy lived in Paris for 20 years. Many of the "leaders" at their blogs seem to live in or be from other countries. This is one reason they celebrate Barbie and Andrea -- both are American ex-pats living in Europe.

Don't forget the self proclaimed PGP Messiah is from ... I believe planet Atlan ? Is that right. Think it's the 2nd star to the right of Uranus . Slightly south of the border.

 

[Samson]

I wonder what the proportion is. At first, the PGP pushed a strong agenda of erudite European sensibilities vs. crass American sensibilities. Quennell is from New Zealand, I think; Michael a/k/a Fulcanelli is in Great Britain, and Peggy lived in Paris for 20 years. Many of the "leaders" at their blogs seem to live in or be from other countries. This is one reason they celebrate Barbie and Andrea -- both are American ex-pats living in Europe.

Most interesting, as Diocletus says, this can't get boring. With too many points to cover internationally, I have a primal query that I have not seen raised. Why do the Kercher family seek comfort from establishing their daughter's last moments were seeing such treachery from her friends? I can't phrase this question elegantly.

 

[Diocletus]

You mean, it might be parody?

Someone already compared Crini's performance to a Monty Python sketch.

It makes me, for one, feel like I've been taking crazy pills.

Yes, it goes like this:

Amanda Knox killed Meredith Kercher because Rudy Guede didn't flush Filomena Romanelli's toilet.

Somehow a rape fits in there, too.

 

[Strozzi]

Yes, it goes like this:

Amanda Knox killed Meredith Kercher because Rudy Guede didn't flush Filomena Romanelli's toilet.

Somehow a rape fits in there, too.

Diocletus, you left out Laura. She staged the break in.

 

[Diocletus]

I think that is exactly right. I have gotten some pushback for bringing politics into this thread, but this case is very much a political issue for Italians. Amanda is picking up the tab for the cable car disaster, CIA renditions and a host of other US sins.

I think that the case presentations are a really good reflection on the local character of Italians. The motives reflect what prosecutors think their local juries might believe. Thus:

Perugia: Provincial, primal. Obsessed with witchcraft and sex. Therefore, we have the Halloween-Initiation-Rite-Orgy motive.

Florence: Euro-sophisticated. Obsessed with cleanliness and presentation. Therefore, we have the you-must-die-because-somebody-left-poop-in-the-toilet motive.

Mignini knew that no one in Perugia would believe that someone would kill over a poop; whereas Crini knows that no one in Florence would believe the witchcraft stuff.

If this thing ends up in Brussels, they'll have to meld the two motives together, and we're either going to have the poop being left as a part of the Halloween initiation rite, or else the witch left the poop.

 

[Dan O.]

Most interesting, as Diocletus says, this can't get boring. With too many points to cover internationally, I have a primal query that I have not seen raised. Why do the Kercher family seek comfort from establishing their daughter's last moments were seeing such treachery from her friends? I can't phrase this question elegantly.

John is the owner of what his dog in Italy does. John has to clean it up. Nobody else can do that for him.

 

[Diocletus]

Diocletus, you left out Laura. She staged the break in.

This actually reminds me of yet another college story. Two roommates were wrestling and it became somewhat intense. As they were breaking it up, they were not looking at each other, and an observer (could have been me, but I'm not saying) jabbed one of the wrestlers in the side. The guy who got jabbed thought that the other wrestler had taken a cheap shot at them, and so they started to have a real fight. Ha ha was that funny.

I guess my point is that Meredith shouldn't have gotten all uppity with Amanda since the poop was in fact left by Rudy. Unless of course that never happened, and then, well, never mind.

 

[acbytesla]

Yes, it goes like this:

Amanda Knox killed Meredith Kercher because Rudy Guede didn't flush Filomena Romanelli's toilet.

Somehow a rape fits in there, too.

That has to be the most absurd motive I have ever heard!!! Crini totally skips over Rudy's semen inside Meredith and suggest that Amanda went into a rage with brand new roommate over a guest not flushing the toilet? It's the crap in the toilet this moron focuses on? If I had been a judge, I would have been laughing at the idiot.

He seemed to say over and over again that he didn't have to prove anything. Which he didn't.

 

[Bill Williams]

It's horribly tragic that this the case has turned into such a parody - losing a daugher/sister in those circumstances is one of the worst things that can happen to anyone, it's a hurt that will never heal. The prosecution team have used and abused the Kercher family grief to add pathos to their absurd theories, whilst helping to insure a lighter sentence for Rudy Guede.

There’s no tragedy in life like the death of a child. Things never get back to the way they were.

 

[JREF2010]

Im starting to turn PGP I think, maybe possibly, could be , I don't know, possible, maybe, not sure, but could be, kind of, maybe.

I agree now....I see where the PGP is coming from, that AK and RS could, maybe possibly , ya never know, might have, anything can happen, maybe commited this crime, possibly, if, could be maybe possibly.

 

[acbytesla]

Im starting to turn PGP I think, maybe possibly, could be , I don't know, possible, maybe, not sure, but could be, kind of, maybe.

I agree now....I see where the PGP is coming from, that AK and RS could, maybe possibly , ya never know, might have, anything can happen, maybe commited this crime, possibly, if, could be maybe possibly.

Well, as long as your sure.

 

[Diocletus]

I read some summaries of recent ECHR opinions on deprivation of counsel.

It looks to me like Knox has a slam dunk in some respects. I mean, gee—the Italian Supreme Court has already decided that she was entitled to counsel at some point and she did not get counsel.

The only issue as to the right to counsel being violated is when did the right to counsel attach for purposes of the ECHR—did it attach prior to the start of the interrogation (I think it did), but this doesn't even matter that much, because it clearly attached before she signed the 1:45 statement that in part underlies the arrest warrant. Thereafter, we have quite a lengthy period of denial of counsel (by decree of Mignini, access to counsel was denied for two days, and not for any good reason). So, not much of an issue there: her right to counsel under ECHR 6.3.c was violated for at least two days.

Then you get into the question of are the consequences of the violation of the right to counsel. It seems to me that any statements made by Knox during this period cannot be used against her for purposes of proving her guilt of the crime being investigated, i.e., murder. What I’m not sure of yet is whether the statements could be used to support a charge that was not then under investigation, i.e., calumnia. But it seems to me that even as to this charge, the court is going to run into problems with entrapment, etc. Bottom line, and this seems to be the crux of the ECHR analysis once a violation of counsel is established: the calumnia never would have arisen if there had been access to counsel in accordance with the law, and thus Knox was injured by the deprivation of counsel.

Getting a bit beyond her currect ECHR appeal (which is of the calumia conviction), we can see that a judgment of an ECHR violation regarding calumnia will be a de facto condemnation of the murder conviction. First, the calumnia and civil charges were joined with the murder trial, and therefore, they were in fact in play in the murder proceeding, notwithstanding any artificial distinction that might be raised about what particular evidence was used for. Second, the supreme court is now urging the use of the calumnia conviction as evidence of guilt in the murder, and therefore, the statements underlying the calumnia charges are being used in a sort of backdoor way to support the murder conviction.

Bottom line for me: Knox was deprived of counsel in violation of ECHR 6.3.c, and the 1:45, 5:45 and gift statements are all the fruit of this illegal deprivation of counsel. The calumnia action is a derivative of an unlawful deprivation of counsel. The murder proceeding is already tainted by the use of these statements, and further, to the extent that a murder conviction is based on a finding of guilt for calumnia, this is going to be a violation of the ECHR.

 

[Grinder]

Grinder appears to me to be saying that Amanda and Raffaele's team will only make a weak defence of their clients on the 16/17 of December,maybe time will prove him right but I hope not,I am still hoping that Bongiorno in particular will rise to the occasion and get the court to see the truth that Rudy Guede murdered Meredith and that Raffaele and Amanda are innocent

I too share your hope. Also, I share your feeling that system has a lot to do with it.

I believe they need to reconstruct the case from day one, putting the first emphasize on the interrogation night. They should bring out the mysterious note from the 7th showing clearly that she was distancing herself from the Lumumba accusation as soon as possible. They should hammer on the police techniques and the oddity that she told them exactly what they thought was what happened, when it wasn't what happened. Now, that's a coincidence.

Then they need to tear into the witnesses, all of them. Then show the footprints and point out the material that made them never was identified.

Show the bathmat print and make the case that they need to do more than say it isn't Rudi's they need to show whose foot it matches.

Discussing their character, lack of motive and past alleged scenarios will not be effective.

 

[Bill Williams]

I think now the rest of the world is starting to understand how Canadians in general feel about the antics of Toronto Mayor, Rob Ford, now that Crini has come out with his pooh-pothesis.

In Canada, when the CBC Radio 1 News snaps on at 6 am to awaken our body politic, we've learned to steel ourselves against, "What is Rob Ford going to apologize for today?" When the news can finish without mentioning that Rob Ford has not had to apologize for something overnight, then we can risk getting out of bed and face the day - particularly if we run into foreigners either on the street or on the internet, in places such as this.

Mentioning Rob Ford these days to a Canadian will earn you a well placed, "Oh look! Squirrel!", or the Canadian in question will purposely and with malice aforethought bring up the Satan-Rite theory just to get some diversionary stuff going...

Now that Crini has stunned everyone from the cops in Perugia all the way to the lofty heights of the Italian Supreme Court with his pooh-pothesis, with the kitchen knife being a match for the outline of a knife-in-blood on Meredith's sheet, with there being no motive and no-premeditation, and with no forensically interesting presence at all of Kercher on the kitchen knife meaning that it is (!) the murder weapon (!)......

There's a Rob Fordesque demeanour settling over this case.

I half expect in the coming days that Crini, like Ford before him, will apologize and include in this contrition that he'd been bombed out of his skull that day in court.

I mean why not? One of these days Italians will regard their courts to be populated by the same folk (right to the genetic level) that populate the highest civic offices in Toronto.

You cannot write this stuff. Where's Machiavelli when you need him, this is a situation just begging for some dietrology, because I sure as hell cannot figure it out within the normal exchanges of discourse.

Italy does know, don't they, that at base this is a horrible murder of a true innocent that they're trying to sort out, don't they? What the hell is going on in Italy?

 

[acbytesla]

I think now the rest of the world is starting to understand how Canadians in general feel about the antics of Toronto Mayor, Rob Ford, now that Crini has come out with his pooh-pothesis.

In Canada, when the CBC Radio 1 News snaps on at 6 am to awaken our body politic, we've learned to steel ourselves against, "What is Rob Ford going to apologize for today?" When the news can finish without mentioning that Rob Ford has not had to apologize for something overnight, then we can risk getting out of bed and face the day - particularly if we run into foreigners either on the street or on the internet, in places such as this.

Mentioning Rob Ford these days to a Canadian will earn you a well placed, "Oh look! Squirrel!", or the Canadian in question will purposely and with malice aforethought bring up the Satan-Rite theory just to get some diversionary stuff going...

Now that Crini has stunned everyone from the cops in Perugia all the way to the lofty heights of the Italian Supreme Court with his pooh-pothesis, with the kitchen knife being a match for the outline of a knife-in-blood on Meredith's sheet, with there being no motive and no-premeditation, and with no forensically interesting presence at all of Kercher on the kitchen knife meaning that it is (!) the murder weapon (!)......

There's a Rob Fordesque demeanour settling over this case.

I half expect in the coming days that Crini, like Ford before him, will apologize and include in this contrition that he'd been bombed out of his skull that day in court.

I mean why not? One of these days Italians will regard their courts to be populated by the same folk (right to the genetic level) that populate the highest civic offices in Toronto.

You cannot write this stuff. Where's Machiavelli when you need him, this is a situation just begging for some dietrology, because I sure as hell cannot figure it out within the normal exchanges of discourse.

Italy does know, don't they, that at base this is a horrible murder of a true innocent that they're trying to sort out, don't they? What the hell is going on in Italy?

I love Rob Ford. He has given more ammunition to Letterman, Leno and Kimmel. Seriously, the guy is funny.

 

[acbytesla]

I read some summaries of recent ECHR opinions on deprivation of counsel.

It looks to me like Knox has a slam dunk in some respects. I mean, gee—the Italian Supreme Court has already decided that she was entitled to counsel at some point and she did not get counsel.

The only issue as to the right to counsel being violated is when did the right to counsel attach for purposes of the ECHR—did it attach prior to the start of the interrogation (I think it did), but this doesn't even matter that much, because it clearly attached before she signed the 1:45 statement that in part underlies the arrest warrant. Thereafter, we have quite a lengthy period of denial of counsel (by decree of Mignini, access to counsel was denied for two days, and not for any good reason). So, not much of an issue there: her right to counsel under ECHR 6.3.c was violated for at least two days.

Then you get into the question of are the consequences of the violation of the right to counsel. It seems to me that any statements made by Knox during this period cannot be used against her for purposes of proving her guilt of the crime being investigated, i.e., murder. What I’m not sure of yet is whether the statements could be used to support a charge that was not then under investigation, i.e., calumnia. But it seems to me that even as to this charge, the court is going to run into problems with entrapment, etc. Bottom line, and this seems to be the crux of the ECHR analysis once a violation of counsel is established: the calumnia never would have arisen if there had been access to counsel in accordance with the law, and thus Knox was injured by the deprivation of counsel.

Getting a bit beyond her currect ECHR appeal (which is of the calumia conviction), we can see that a judgment of an ECHR violation regarding calumnia will be a de facto condemnation of the murder conviction. First, the calumnia and civil charges were joined with the murder trial, and therefore, they were in fact in play in the murder proceeding, notwithstanding any artificial distinction that might be raised about what particular evidence was used for. Second, the supreme court is now urging the use of the calumnia conviction as evidence of guilt in the murder, and therefore, the statements underlying the calumnia charges are being used in a sort of backdoor way to support the murder conviction.

Bottom line for me: Knox was deprived of counsel in violation of ECHR 6.3.c, and the 1:45, 5:45 and gift statements are all the fruit of this illegal deprivation of counsel. The calumnia action is a derivative of an unlawful deprivation of counsel. The murder proceeding is already tainted by the use of these statements, and further, to the extent that a murder conviction is based on a finding of guilt for calumnia, this is going to be a violation of the ECHR.

I'm really curious if they acknowledge the principle of "fruit of the poisonous tree" If her statements regarding the crime being inadmissible because she didn't have a lawyer, how is it possible that a statement during that interrogation could be admissible for something else?

 

[JREF2010]

I too share your hope. Also, I share your feeling that system has a lot to do with it.

I believe they need to reconstruct the case from day one, putting the first emphasize on the interrogation night. They should bring out the mysterious note from the 7th showing clearly that she was distancing herself from the Lumumba accusation as soon as possible. They should hammer on the police techniques and the oddity that she told them exactly what they thought was what happened, when it wasn't what happened. Now, that's a coincidence.

Then they need to tear into the witnesses, all of them. Then show the footprints and point out the material that made them never was identified.

Show the bathmat print and make the case that they need to do more than say it isn't Rudi's they need to show whose foot it matches.

Discussing their character, lack of motive and past alleged scenarios will not be effective.

The judge was obviously interested in the knife results first and foremost.

Now add in the Crini motive, the big new surprise and the defense will be having to deal with this in December. They have to somehow overcome the new motive too.

I think blobs are blobs, and the Judges run the show the jurors are just there as puppets.

 

[Diocletus]

I'm really curious if they acknowledge the principle of "fruit of the poisonous tree" If her statements regarding the crime being inadmissible because she didn't have a lawyer, how is it possible that a statement during that interrogation could be admissible for something else?

My sense is that they have a pragmatic approach. I think that if they conclude that the "false accusation" was caused by the deprivation of counsel, then the calumnia conviction will be found to be an ECHR violation. That is why you see Knox stating that the accusation was coerced--the presence of the lawyer would have prevented to coercion and thus there would be no "false accusation." In fact, there was no lawyer, so the issue will boil down to whether Knox can show that the statement was coerced.