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

[Bill Williams]

I thought that Mignini belatedly modified his explanation of the crime to comform to the fact that no evidence exists that places Amanda in Meredith's room. Mignini said that Amanda must have been in the hallway directing the event. So why is Briars arguing against Mignini?

Because theres 500 different scenarios the pgp has thrown out there.

Recent revelations point out the problem that PGP are in, intellectually speaking. The case against AK and RS has always been emotionally driven - and has always been tied to Mignini. Witness Machiavelli and Harry Rag/The Machine, who both seem to have some emotional attachment to this; while at the same time being stuck, really, in one of the earliest versions of "mignini's case" against the pair.

There needs to be a bit of a caveat before saying more, and that is the caveat about motive. "Motive" as part of a prosecution's case is not critical when the circumstantial evidence is solid and/or when there is an unassailable confession. The caveat about "confessions" is that the best confessions are ones which remain part of the narrative, meaning that the perps never go back on what they've confessed.

And.... oh yes.... that the confession actually is consistent with the details of the crime.

What have we here? Amanda and Raffaele have always had the same story - well until they, at interrogation, "buckled and told us what we already knew." Guilters and supporters love to argue about WHEN it happened, but it is clear that quickly both Amanda, and more importantly Raffaele, returned to their "pre-buckling alibi" and neither has wavered since. It has been six years of a consistent story from them, with a few weeks (at best) of them trying to sort out the coercions of interrogation, when they (by the police's own admission) "buckled" into temporarily agreeing with someone else about what had happened.....

...... which, by the way, was NOT a version that made it anywhere near a courtroom. Meaning, Lumumba had nothing to do with it. AK and RS during that brief time never once "confessed" to the prosecution's crime narrative that made it to court.

But with all these caveats out of the way, back to what Strozzi and JREF2010 are onto.

Clearly, this is a case where motive needs to play a more cohesive role in people's theories than usual. Why? Well, as DNA evidence disappears, and as there now is actually proof that the break-in was easy and probable, any prosecution needs to bulk up on motive.

I think that this is one of the reasons why the ISC, in quashing the acquittals in March, had to have another go at motive - specifically to pick one it thought was the most reasonable and instruct the lower-fact-finding court to examine it.

It seems that motive, in this case, IS important. Acc. to the ISC at least. (It may have been more reasonable for the ISC - as a non-fact-finding-court - to leave it more open than it did, ie. by picking one of the many motives advanced... but that doesn't need to delay us here...)

What has gone on since the ISC quashings? Have the guilters been vindicated that now out of the hands of the corrupt (as Machiavelli said, bought off my US media interests through a Masonic intermediary!) Hellmann court, we can finally learn the truth about all this, the truth the Kerchers deserve?

No. The DNA evidence is now officially (all but) history - even Crini has had to make the incredible statement (an assertion, no evidence to back it up) that Raffaele's kitchen knife is a match for the outline of the real murder weapon on Meredith's sheet. Why? Well that knife needs to be kept somewhere near this case or there's needing to be some 'splainin' as to why it's been a key part of the prosecution's narrative for six....

.... did I say "six" years? That's a long time to have a knife this silly be the backbone of a case, don't you think?

Not even Mignini tried to get away with that!!!!!, bringing out the equally ludicrous two-knife theory instead. Crini has nakedly exposed the fact that neither his, nor Mignini's, prosecution really knows how to squeeze AK and RS into what is essentially Rudy's ugly crime.... BTW, Judge Masse wrote about how AK and RS had to have been squeezed into, inexplicably, Rudy's crime - and Massei's mini-motive for them being involved was a brief and equally inexplicable, "choice for evil."

Which brings us full circle to Strozzi's and JREF2010's point. If motive is not all that important to guilters, they certainly have them by the truckload. Despite the ISC's instructions that this new court look at the sex-game gone wrong theoryu, Crini has completely ignored it. Why? Perhaps because there's no evidence of it? That's what I think.

At least there IS evidence of Rudy's pooh in Filomena's/Laura's toilet. You at least can smell this motive for what it is.

And despite even Judge Massei writing that Amanda and Meredith had a normal room-mate relationship, friendly and all that (and Massei was the convicting Judge!) Crini is advancing a theory that a turd in someone else's toilet which belongs to a fifth party not resident upstairs, somehow caused Amanda to stab Meredith, whose toilet was at the other end of the building. All this based on mutual hostility that even Massei ruled against after listening to the testimony of housemates/friends in the 2009 trial.

No wonder the ISC wanted to go back to sex-game gone wrong.

Which brings us full circle to Strozzi's and JREF2010's point, because now even I'm wandering from it.

As JREF2010 says, why not just adopt a strategy to throw ALL the possible motives at the Nencini court and letting them pick one? Why not let Nencini convict them and write a motivations report which includes ALL the possible motives, because then at least the ISC could settle on one of them, even the most bizarre one...? Why not just do that?

I mean, the goal is to convict them isn't it? Now that DNA is gone, that the superwitnesses haven't even been talked about at this trial, now that Aviello as simply confirmed his/her own story he/she told years ago....now that the RIS Carabinieri have forced Crini to talk about the kitchen knife being a match for the bedsheet outline....

Why not just offer all the motives and say....

.... here, pick a card, any card, and I'll guess which one you've picked... NO! Don't tell me....

Is it:

- Satanic ritual
- ritual to honour the day of the dead
- sex game gone wrong
- jealousy killing
- household tension killing over pooh
- choice for evil
- or no motive at all​

Apparently you get to choose....

 

[Kaosium]

If Rudy got 30 years it means that the original penalty was life-jail, then discounted because of the abbreviated trial. And indeed life-jail is the ordinary penalty for murder and sexual violence. It was enough to have been condemned for the theft too and he would have taken life-jail anyway because in that case only the 'daily isolation' would have been discounted.
<snip>

Link:
http://web.archive.org/web/20100807000133/http://perugia-shock.blogspot.com/2008_10_01_archive.html

Frank assumed that Mignini had asked for life-jail and then it was discounted to 30 years for the fast track mitigation, wonders what happened to the theft charge, and thinks Rudy got it pretty easy. He made a perfectly logical assumption, but didn't realize (at this time at least) that Rudy got it even easier than that. Mignini didn't start with life-jail, he started with 30 years, allowed three mitigations of two years a piece, then the fast track mitigation took a third off the sentence which is how Rudy skated away with a mere 16 year sentence instead of the 30 Frank assumed he'd gotten in this report.

Had Mignini asked for what Frank assumed, and appealed Rudy's mitigations, and prosecuted him for the theft charge and prosecuted him for his previous theft of at least the lawyer's office in Perugia, when all was said and done he could have put Rudy away for a very long time even with the fast track mitigation.

Instead he didn't appeal any of the three mitigations he could, never even attempted to bring charges against him for the previous burglaries which had happened shortly before the murder, and prosecuted Raffaele and Amanda for the theft. Damned curious being as Raffaele and Amanda didn't need it and the money was taken from a purse with Rudy's DNA on it and he was the one who had no job and was facing eviction but still managed to get to Germany and survive there until captured.

In contrast he asked for the lives of Raffaele and Amanda, appealed their mitigations and added on the theft charge as well as one for supposedly staging the break-in and the slander for Amanda. He also filed charges against Raffaele's family as well as Amanda's parents.

 

[acbytesla]

I have not researched this topic in depth, so what follows is informed speculation. I think that such an assertion is dubious at best, although it falls within the realm of possibility. I can imagine a thin-layer chromatography experiment that could not distinguish between closely related narcotics. However, if the TLC result were positive, one would surely want to follow it up with a test that was more discriminating (one involving mass spectrometry, for example). Barbie should have asked what test they supposedly did. It sounds like more Perugian prevarication, but it is difficult to be certain.

Isn't this more of an experiment testing an unknown substance as opposed to determining what trace chemicals maybe found in organic tissue, hair or fluids?

 

[whoanellie]

I have not researched this topic in depth, so what follows is informed speculation. I think that such an assertion is dubious at best, although it falls within the realm of possibility. I can imagine a thin-layer chromatography experiment that could not distinguish between closely related narcotics. However, if the TLC result were positive, one would surely want to follow it up with a test that was more discriminating (one involving mass spectrometry, for example). Barbie should have asked what test they supposedly did. It sounds like more Perugian prevarication, but it is difficult to be certain.

I took a quick look on the interwebs. From what I can find testing of hair for drugs is done using an initial immunoassay screening test. Positive samples are then subjected to confirmatory GC/MS analysis. How much do you want to bet that they got a positive immunoassay result and then failed to see anything with GC/MS?

 

[MDDVS]

I took a quick look on the interwebs. From what I can find testing of hair for drugs is done using an initial immunoassay screening test. Positive samples are then subjected to confirmatory GC/MS analysis. How much do you want to bet that they got a positive immunoassay result and then failed to see anything with GC/MS?

You mean, the same procedure applied to the luminol stains?

 

[Strozzi]

A brazillian is fairly standard for Meredith's peers - I used to work in a GUM clinic and I barely saw a woman under 30 who didn't have a brazilian.

Maybe the prosecution's next theory will be that Meredith was disgusted with Amanda 'working a 70s vibe downstairs' (to quote Gwyneth Paltrow )

So is this another prosecution theory? Meredith and Amanda had a difference of opinion over how much waxing was appropriate? Amanda drew the line, and Meredith crossed it? A prickly situation, to say the least. Not a happy ending to a nice friendship. But murder???

I think Crini better stay with the pooh motive.

 

[Grinder]

We can be sure of one thing: No positive drug tests for anything other than marijuana was found.

Theories like Briars, involving a drug buy encounter a problem with no results.

Curatolo had to look away and at the kids in an orchestration more complex than synchronized swimming and drugs ordered need to be left unconsumed etc. etc.

 

[NancyS]

I took a quick look on the interwebs. From what I can find testing of hair for drugs is done using an initial immunoassay screening test. Positive samples are then subjected to confirmatory GC/MS analysis. How much do you want to bet that they got a positive immunoassay result and then failed to see anything with GC/MS?

I think that is most likely - and any over the counter medication that contains codeine is likely to cause a positive result. You're not allowed to be on any codeine based medication if you are in a drug & alcohol detox programme as it messes up the testing.

 

[Supernaut]

I don't see how the bars make it harder but not really important. .......

They effectively reduce the depth of the window-ledge by several inches, that's how.

 

[Supernaut]

Hi Strozzi,
I'd read that on PS years ago, think I dug up a passage recently from it,
always thought how much fun it would be to go get questioned by police late at night while stoned. Yikes!

Didja know that when people freak-out (get acutely paranoid) on MJ, or spiral into a bad LSD trip, the underlying cause is low blood sugar?

I posted about this waaay back here on JREF.

The brain needs a steady supply of oxygen (obviously) and sugar to stay "on an even keel".

The brain of a person under the influence of a psychotropic (or simply concentrating hard) can burn this fuel at a quite amazing rate.

There was a myth that orange juice was the thing to get some-one out of a bad trip, that the ascorbic acid (vit C) somehow partially neutralised the lysergic acid. Not so - it was just the sugar in it.

I saw this first hand, years back - a young lady bumming out on LSD, who calmed down in minutes after being given sweets (they were Rowntrees's Fruit pastels, as it happens!).

I raised this because I believe it has a bearing on what Amanda experienced in the small hours of Nov 6th 07.

She and Raff had Raff had been smoking, and I believe this and what the cops inflicted on her induced plummeting blood-sugar which caused her to damn-near freak out.

 

[acbytesla]

They effectively reduce the depth of the window-ledge by several inches, that's how.

This is very true. The more a climber can pull and put his weight inside the window frame, the less weight is pulling him to the ground.

 

[Grinder]

This is very true. The more a climber can pull and put his weight inside the window frame, the less weight is pulling him to the ground.

The climber put his hands on the sill far from the window and bars. As it appears on the video he uses the bars to hoist himself but it is hard to see because they switch between cameras.

Rudy climbing that night needed to open the shutters at some point if Filomena didn't leave them open. So he climbs up and opens them and then throws the rock through the lower right pane. Then he climbs back up and knocks some glass in and reaches his hand in and up to open the latch and then the window. This is all done standing on the top of the lower window. Up until this point he hasn't needed and depth of the sill. Now he can grab inside the window and pull himself up.

Are you imagining that he pulled himself up and crouched on the sill? Anything's possible but see no reason he would do it that way.

Reach in open the window, grab the inside of frame and pull himself through. No need to perch like the actor did.

 

[Samson]

The climber put his hands on the sill far from the window and bars. As it appears on the video he uses the bars to hoist himself but it is hard to see because they switch between cameras.

Rudy climbing that night needed to open the shutters at some point if Filomena didn't leave them open. So he climbs up and opens them and then throws the rock through the lower right pane. Then he climbs back up and knocks some glass in and reaches his hand in and up to open the latch and then the window. This is all done standing on the top of the lower window. Up until this point he hasn't needed and depth of the sill. Now he can grab inside the window and pull himself up.

Are you imagining that he pulled himself up and crouched on the sill? Anything's possible but see no reason he would do it that way.

Reach in open the window, grab the inside of frame and pull himself through. No need to perch like the actor did.

Worth mentioning again that at this point the prosecution cites the undisturbed glass as evidence of staging, but the introduced debris is under the left pane where the photographs show no glass on the sill, so he climbed in that side.

 

[Bill Williams]

The climber put his hands on the sill far from the window and bars. As it appears on the video he uses the bars to hoist himself but it is hard to see because they switch between cameras.

Rudy climbing that night needed to open the shutters at some point if Filomena didn't leave them open. So he climbs up and opens them and then throws the rock through the lower right pane. Then he climbs back up and knocks some glass in and reaches his hand in and up to open the latch and then the window. This is all done standing on the top of the lower window. Up until this point he hasn't needed and depth of the sill. Now he can grab inside the window and pull himself up.

Are you imagining that he pulled himself up and crouched on the sill? Anything's possible but see no reason he would do it that way.

Reach in open the window, grab the inside of frame and pull himself through. No need to perch like the actor did.

The length of time we on this thread have spent parsing, dissecting, and analyzing this simple manoeuvre says quite a lot.... all of us here, PIP, PGP, or inbetween need to keep our day jobs.

I go back to what I was told when first following this.... I was going through Guilter-Kermit's powerpoint as to why Filomena's window had to have been part of a staged break-in, based mostly on the "impossibility" of the climb through her window. Besides, Kermit added, there's that nail, which Kermit claimed (ridiculously) would have prevented Rudy going up that wall. Besides, claimed other guilters - it was a ten meter climb up a sheer face and Rudy could not hover like that, so they said....

Everyone here obviously should keep their day jobs. Some make it sound like some complex engineering-study needed to have been completed before Rudy would have attempted it......

He was a second-storey burglar, for pete's sake. I'm as guilty as anyone for over-thinking things, but this one takes the cake. By the time I typed all this, Rudy had gained access to the upper floor of the cottage and was on the toilet listening to music...

If the PLE had actually investigated this, perhaps AK and RS would not have been convicted - perhaps not even charged. Every time a PGP says that there was no disturbance of wet grass below the window or evidence of wet grass tracked into Filomena's room, where is that evidence?

This is not rocket science.

 

[acbytesla]

The climber put his hands on the sill far from the window and bars. As it appears on the video he uses the bars to hoist himself but it is hard to see because they switch between cameras.

Rudy climbing that night needed to open the shutters at some point if Filomena didn't leave them open. So he climbs up and opens them and then throws the rock through the lower right pane. Then he climbs back up and knocks some glass in and reaches his hand in and up to open the latch and then the window. This is all done standing on the top of the lower window. Up until this point he hasn't needed and depth of the sill. Now he can grab inside the window and pull himself up.

Are you imagining that he pulled himself up and crouched on the sill? Anything's possible but see no reason he would do it that way.

Reach in open the window, grab the inside of frame and pull himself through. No need to perch like the actor did.

No, I think you described the most likely scenario well. That's how I imagined this was done. The bars keep you out. In the video the climber pulled himself up with the bars. Without them he pulls himself up and by the inside of the window.

 

[Grinder]

No, I think you described the most likely scenario well. That's how I imagined this was done. The bars keep you out. In the video the climber pulled himself up with the bars. Without them he pulls himself up and by the inside of the window.

Thanks again Tesla - btw I'm rooting for Bertha and hope they ran into an old monorail train .

Bill as you said you aren't averse to beat a dead horse. At this time the bookkeeper is speculating on Raf ruining the computers because he figured it would look bad if they were sent to trial. Now, he's the same guy that said Amanda wouldn't get $50,000 for her book and many other insightful things.

I was only baffled by the assessment of another that the bars made it more difficult and I just couldn't see how.

I am one that was surprised by how far up the climber/actor was when only standing on the top of the lower window. The defense was pathetic not have had a better actor than their lawyer showing how easy the reaching of the window was. I never thought it was impossible and the Ch.5 guy does use his feet but the upper frame of the lower window allowed Rudy to stand on it and clean the glass up unlatch the window and grab the inside frame. He had no need to squat on the sill thereby being even less visible.

Someone should force Massei to watch the video.


On another note, remember when the PGP were going on and on about how the books the kids wrote would seal their fates? Did Crini introduce the books as evidence? How much of their writings and interviews did he use.

Hey Bill, hows that Mach/Mignini/Vogt investigation going?

 

[Bill Williams]

Thanks again Tesla - btw I'm rooting for Bertha and hope they ran into an old monorail train .

Bill as you said you aren't averse to beat a dead horse. At this time the bookkeeper is speculating on Raf ruining the computers because he figured it would look bad if they were sent to trial. Now, he's the same guy that said Amanda wouldn't get $50,000 for her book and many other insightful things.

I was only baffled by the assessment of another that the bars made it more difficult and I just couldn't see how.

I am one that was surprised by how far up the climber/actor was when only standing on the top of the lower window. The defense was pathetic not have had a better actor than their lawyer showing how easy the reaching of the window was. I never thought it was impossible and the Ch.5 guy does use his feet but the upper frame of the lower window allowed Rudy to stand on it and clean the glass up unlatch the window and grab the inside frame. He had no need to squat on the sill thereby being even less visible.

Someone should force Massei to watch the video.


On another note, remember when the PGP were going on and on about how the books the kids wrote would seal their fates? Did Crini introduce the books as evidence? How much of their writings and interviews did he use.

Hey Bill, hows that Mach/Mignini/Vogt investigation going?

First you berate me for beating dead horses, and now you're encouraging me.... nice!

There are many reasons people spend weeks posting to websites like this one, and then cease. Those who actually have accurate behind the scenes info that they prerelease are in a bit of a double bind, though. What if their info says that things are not going well for this mess that Mignini started? My guess is that they simply stop posting.

Some can give us heads up on the ISC quashing of the acquittals, and some can let us know that against all logic Crini will introduce the hereto-unknown concept that Raffaele's kitchen knife now suddenly matches the outline on the sheet! Geez, Mignini didn't even try to argue THAT silliness!

Perhaps the person who knows all this also found out that this was a desperation move on behalf of the prosecution.

And despite your own accusation about my own ability to parse information from behind the scenes, I am just now able to get the bare bones of what happened with last Friday's defamation trial brought by Mignini against Frank Sfarzo. Please note this is sketchy.... these days I wish to be as up front with the quality of the info as well as it's content.

Seems that some PGP were predicting that last Friday a slam-dunk of conviction against Frank Sfarzo for his many journalistic sins, aimed at Mignini, about which Mignini leveled criminal defamation charges. I am assuming that our guy who had foreknowledge of Crini's new allegations about the knife, thought that Friday would bring a conviction.

Well, it turns out, I think, that Mignini did not bring much of a case. From what I know only one item of alleged "defamation" got past this judge (whoever it was) and put that issue over for trial in February 2015. That's right, 2015.

When some guilters covered this, they tried to make the best out of it by saying it was 2014 but they quietly dropped it when it was pointed out that that date in 2014 was a Sunday.

So, piecing things together from many sources, and admittedly still coming up with a very vague report, it seems that that bit of mischief that Mignini is bringing against Sfarzo is just that - mischief. Although we will see what we will see.

Also, the fellow who was claiming that the Jan 15 hearing against Mignini in Turin was "only a preliminary, and that all charges about abuse of office will be dropped at that time," is not entirely so.... even though the fellow seems to have behind the scenes sources hard to find by us mere mortals....

..... more than one Italian media source is saying that the Turin court on Jan 15, 2014, is actually the beginning of the trial against Mignini (and another) for abuse of office related to the 21 who were falsely prosecuted over the Narducci, Monster of Florence affair.

Now.... no one seems to be talking if this will result in an acquittal, a conviction, or a throwing of the charges to another jurisdiction like the last time.... the fact is that Mignini has been found guilty by a court, which it turned out did not have the jurisdiction (in hindsight) to render a verdict or even hear the case.

The core evidence, so they say, remains the same. So is it fair to assume that Mignini will be re-convicted? We will see on that one too.

But they are saying that Mignini's performance at Sfarzo's trial was less than stellar. But consider the source on that one - me!

One thing is for sure - the wrongful prosecution of Sollecito and Knox has spawned a virtual cottage industry of side-prosecutions... and it is far, far, from over. You need a roadmap to keep track.

All the while we're finding out new things about the people "behind the scenes". Soon, my hunch is, there will be no reason to argue back and forth about break-ins, DNA sequencing, or the minutiae of it all....

One commentator at one of the PMF hate sites reports that he/she actually read Filomena's testimony in Italian, and is soon to receive guilter anger for his/her departure from guilter orthodoxy. The plain-text reading of Filomena's testimony, acc. to one guilter, is so confusing that it is impossible to tell what she's saying about the condition of the shutters on Nov 1, 2007. But then we can all read what the person wrote... I won't because I don't want to give them the click....

So, speaking of beating a dead horse.... I thought we weren't getting along, Grinder? Must be Christmas.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

preliminary screening

Isn't this more of an experiment testing an unknown substance as opposed to determining what trace chemicals maybe found in organic tissue, hair or fluids?

Thin-layer chromatography has been used as a preliminary screen for certain kinds of drugs in the past, but it is possible that other methods have supplanted it. I only meant the link I gave to be illustrative of a method that lacked discrimination. Any compounds that have the same relative mobility (due to having about the same polarity) will look the same in this experiment. For really identifying a substance, you need to do mass spectrometry or nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy.

ETA
"Q: Can hair be affected by cross-reacting substances such as over-the-counter medications?
A: Enzyme-immunoassay antibodies (EIA), similar to those used to test urine, are used for the initial drug screening in hair; therefore the potential for substances such as over-the-counter medications to cause a false positive screening result does exist. To eliminate the possibility of reporting a false-positive result due to cross-reactivity, our laboratory performs Gas Chromatography Mass Spectrometry (GC/MS) for all specimens that screen positive. " link

ETA2
This site has a good discussion of threshold values and false positives, mostly with respect to urine testing (which is similar to testing hair, but with some sampling differences). Under barbituates, naproxen and ibuprofen are listed as false positives. Under opiates, poppy seeds are list as one of a number of substances giving a false positive.

With respect to threshold values of opiates, the values of the screen and the confirmatory test are identical, 2000 nanograms per milliliter. Therefore, if the authorities used the same two threshold values (by no means a certainty), then a positive screen result followed by a negative confirmatory result could not possibly be explained on the basis of not having enough material. The negative confirmatory result would have to be the result of the presence of an interfering substance. Therefore, I think that Barbie's report is very questionable.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

What Napoleoni saw in Meredith's room

From p. 103 in the English translation of the Massei report: "She [Napoleoni] was wearing shoe covers and sterile gloves. 'I then saw this girl who was on the floor with her face lying towards the right of the viewer, with a terrible wound. Was semi-naked, had the t-shirt rolled up above the breast and lots of blood and spatters of blood even on the breast‛ (page 229)." Does this last detail not confirm that the bra was removed while Meredith was still breathing?

 

[whoanellie]

You mean, the same procedure applied to the luminol stains?

That's my guess.