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

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It was her place , did she say it wasn't her idea?Why not ask her on her blog Bill then you will have something to post about.

Why would I ask? And what, pray tell, WOULD I ask? My point is that all of this is a complete non-issue, another factoid-like something-'er-other which is much ado about nothing.

The only reason PGP are talking about it is because there is nothing pointing to guilt. Nothing, nada, nienta, zilch, zero. Heck, even the English Catholics wrote a few days ago about the persecution of Amanda and Raffaele at the expense of a poor murdered girl... the real victim in ALL this.

Besides, Machiavelli has already explained it - I am bound by Omerta, and risk being "neutralized" by speaking against the innocence status quo.

I respectfully ask that you cut me a break on this one.
 
Put it this way: I could download the wiki-style template and create a website that contained "all the information" showing how the Moon landings were hoaxes. My site would look much like any true Wikipedia page - but the choice of content and editorial slant would be entirely mine.

What really destroys the credibility of the wiki project is not its editorial slant but its almost complete lack of proper citations that reference actual source documents (or reasonable facsimiles thereof). One page I looked at was festooned with testimony cites that lacked page numbers and linked not to the source docs but to "summary" pages elsewhere on the same wiki. The whole thing is hermetically sealed. It's a huge fail. The best way to trip up conspiracy theorists is to ask them to cite reliable sources in a transparent manner... it just can't be done.
 
:eek:z

Its hard to discuss anything with your guilter this and that . It was her apartment she was the only one in the know living there so it probably was her idea. Even if it wasn't she thought it would be fun to scare her roommates.


Frankly, who the hell cares? It really wouldn't matter if Knox had been a certified juvenile delinquent with a conviction for causing malicious damage, if she has an alibi for the time of this murder. Which she appears to have. Lots of people have episodes in their past where they did something a bit questionable. They didn't all kill Meredith Kercher!

I simply cannot describe how tired I am of people who are trying to accuse someone of a crime where there is no evidence at all that they committed it, running off to find some completely unrelated act to smear the person with. It's irrelevant.

Probably the most notorious example of this is Sion Jenkins, when the police unearthed the fact that some years previously he had sexed up his CV, when applying for his present job. It was pretty minor - he said he'd been to Gordonstoun (a posh school) when he'd actually been to Glasgow Academy (a very good school), and he said he'd graduated from the University of Kent when in fact he had a diploma from a college which had subsequently amalgamated with the University of Kent. His post-grad teaching qualification was entirely genuine, and he had been promoted to headmaster on his own merits.

This was spun to assert that he had got his job under false pretences, and that he had no qualifications at all. The inference was drawn that anyone who would tell the odd porkie on their CV was obviously a person who would batter their foster daughter to death with a tent peg without a second thought. It was even suggested that the motive for the absolutely motiveless murder was that Bille-Jo might be going to reveal his heinous crime!

The police also canvassed all the boys he taught or had taught, trying to find someone who would state that Mr. Jenkins had once lost his temper. Incredibly, for a teacher in a boys' school, they could find nobody. That last didn't get any publicity, but for weeks all there was on TV about the case was this falsified CV.

I couldn't make it out even at the time. It seems to me that massaging a CV a bit isn't that unusual, and hardly turns someone into a violent child murderer. It was only later that I realised they didn't have any real evidence against the man, and were trying to blacken his name instead. I think he went through more trials than Amanda Knox before he was finally acquitted.

So no, I don't care if she messed up someone's room as a prank. I once got up very early and hid three bicycles from the shed behind my friend's house as an April Fool's prank. I thought it was funny at the time but nobody else was amused. It didn't turn me into a bicycle thief. Or a murderer.

Find some way Knox could have murdered Kercher and left a corpse with all her last meal still in her stomach, and then we can discuss it. Otherwise, all you have is irrelevant distraction.

Rolfe.

ETA: Ninja-ed by Bill.
 
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Whatever you do, don't go to Italy, or better yet (if you do) stay the hell away from Perugia,

d

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Frankly, who the hell cares? It really wouldn't matter if Knox had been a certified juvenile delinquent with a conviction for causing malicious damage, if she has an alibi for the time of this murder. Which she appears to have.

I simply cannot describe how tired I am of people who are trying to accuse someone of a crime where there is no evidence at all that they committed it, running off to find some completely unrelated act to smear the person with. It's irrelevant.

Probably the most notorious example of this is Sion Jenkins, when the police unearthed the fact that some years previously he had sexed up his CV, when applying for his present job. It was pretty minor - he said he'd been to Gordonstoun (a posh school) when he'd actually been to Glasgow Academy (a very good school), and he said he'd graduated from the University of Kent when in fact he had a diploma from a college which had subsequently amalgamated with the University of Kent. His post-grad teaching qualification was entirely genuine, and he had been appointed headmaster on his own merits.

This was spun to assert that he had got his job under false pretences, and that he had no qualifications at all. The inference was drawn that anyone who would tell the odd porkie on their CV was obviously a person who would batter their foster daughter to death with a tent peg without a second thought. It was even suggested that the motive for the absolutely motiveless murder was that Bille-Jo might be going to reveal his heinous crime!

The police also canvassed all the boys he taught or had taught, trying to find someone who would state that Mr. Jenkins had once lost his temper, Incredibly, for a teacher in a boys' school, they could find nobody. That last didn't get any publicity, but for weeks all there was on TV about the case was this falsified CV.

I couldn't make it out even at the time. It seems to me that massaging a CV a bit isn't that unusual, and hardly turns someone into a violent child murderer. It was only later that I realised they didn't have any real evidence against the man, and were trying to blacken his name instead. I think he went through more trials than Amanda Knox before he was finally acquitted.

So no, I don't care if she messed up someone's room as a prank. I once got up very early and hid three bicycles from the shed behind my friend's house as an April Fool's prank. I thought it was funny at the time but nobody else was amused. It didn't turn me into a bicycle thief. Or a murderer.

Find some way Knox could have murdered Kercher and left a corpse with all her last meal still in her stomach, and then we can discuss it. Otherwise, all you have is irrelevant distraction.

Rolfe.

ETA: Ninja-ed by Bill.

The prank is a small matter isolated from the totality of the evidence. No one is accusing her of a crime based on this. The evidence points to one verdict, the SC said it much be looked at as a whole.
 
Regarding the authoritarian meme, I plead guilty.

Regarding the open discussion “until a consensus forms around the best truth that can be extracted from the available evidence”, - this amounts to the court of public opinion. This is a court that for all intents and purposes, will not matter come January 30th.

JREF has come to a consensus of innocence, as has IIP. TJMK and PMF have come to a consensus of guilt. There is no common ground or any agreement on any of the evidence (circumstantial or forensic) presented between these divergent courts of public opinion.

It is possible for a person to have read the translated primary court documents and have come to an opinion of guilt, without hating, without degrading, without being irrational, and without having a pony in this race. It is also possible for a person to be devoid of arrogance, and to admit that he or she is not completely sure of this stance. Therefore, I rely on my meme and not on the opinions of strangers on a forum. If they are truly innocent, I hope the wisdom of the court in Florence judges it to be so. If they are truly guilty, then I hope that this is the judgement with punishment to follow.

The reason I posted on JREF is because my curiosity got the best of me. I wanted to know whether there were people who believed in Amanda's and Raffaele's innocence dispassionately, but who were also open to the possibility of their guilt. It appears that the answer would be, no. (But thanks Planigale – your response was at least dispassionate and genuine).


In belated answer to this question: Yes, I most definitely am one of those who is open to the possibility to the factual guilt of Knox and/or Sollecito. I hesitate to speak for anyone else here - but my best guess is that a significant number of other pro-acquittal/pro-innocence posters here would share that position in principle.

But, you see, it would take actual evidence - credible, reliable evidence - to make me change my position to one of guilt. Let me give you an example. If (say) sufficiently clear, reliable, time-authenticated CCTV footage emerged of Knox and Sollecito travelling in the direction of the cottage at 8.50-9.00pm and back in the direction of Sollecito's apartment at 10.30pm, then I would immediately switch to a position of pro-guilt. Likewise, if (say) a knife was found in the undergrowth that had properly-tested traces of Meredith's blood on the blade and Knox's/Sollecito's fingerprints on the handle, and if that knife matched all the wounds and the imprint on the sheet, I'd switch to pro-guilt. Or if (say) reliable, properly-tested traces of Knox's or Sollecito's DNA had been found on Meredith's body, then I'd switch to pro-guilt.

That's the problem: there is currently no credible, reliable evidence that points to the guilt of Knox and Sollecito. A sceptical, reasonable person draws conclusions based on the available evidence - but if new evidence emerges, then a sceptical, reasonable person might change his conclusions in the light of that new evidence. My current conclusion, based on the current evidence (and lack of evidence) is that Knox and Sollecito should be acquitted. If new evidence ever came to light that pointed squarely towards their guilt, I'd have no problem whatsoever in changing my conclusions. The thing is, though, I'd have to say that I don't see any such new evidence ever emerging. Therefore, I feel confident in saying that I will probably never have cause to change my conclusion.

(As a final note, you may need to draw the distinction between a belief in acquittal (non-guilt) and a belief in innocence. They are very separate constructs. For example, I personally believe very strongly in favour of acquittal (non-guilt), but my belief in innocence is not as strong. Nor need it be. Innocent people never need to prove their innocence - that would be not only a logical double-negative, but also an ethical abomination.)
 
The prank is a small matter isolated from the totality of the evidence. No one is accusing her of a crime based on this. The evidence points to one verdict, the SC said it much be looked at as a whole.

But of course, the SC ignore the requirements of Article 192, which states the standards evidence should meet BEFORE it is considered in conjunction with other evidence. To anybody with an ounce of intelligence and objectivity NONE of the pieces of 'evidence' in this case meet this standard. The prank included.
The fact is that it's a massive step from a prank to an actual crime. Much shorter step to get from Rudy's previous crimes to this crime.
 
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The prank is a small matter isolated from the totality of the evidence. No one is accusing her of a crime based on this. The evidence points to one verdict, the SC said it much be looked at as a whole.
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I agree, but when exactly is THAT going to happen?

d

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:eek:z



Its hard to discuss anything with your guilter this and that . It was her apartment she was the only one in the know living there so it probably was her idea. Even if it wasn't she thought it would be fun to scare her roommates.



Do you even understand the scenario that Knox described in her version of events? If you want to believe that she is flat-out lying in her version of events, that's fine but that's a different matter. If, however, you want to accept her version of events as accurate, she's telling you that what she did was rearrange furniture and personal belongings while her housmates were not present, in order to trick them into thinking the house had been burgled (not robbed - which necessitates personal confrontation), while they (the housemates) were out.

Which part of this version of events do you not understand properly? Have you ever had an April Fools' joke played on you, or have you ever played one on somebody else? Do you not understand that the very essence of an April Fools' joke is to cause short-term alarm or shock to the "victim" - an alarm/shock which is soon dissipated when the joke is revealed. This is exactly the type of thing that Knox is describing.

That you appear to read nefarious and sinister things into Knox's version of events says rather more about your misjudged arguing position than it does about Knox, I'm afraid.........
 
The prank is a small matter isolated from the totality of the evidence.


It has absolutely NOTHING to do with the case. Literally nothing.

No one is accusing her of a crime based on this.


You could have fooled me!

The evidence points to one verdict, the SC said it much be looked at as a whole.


The evidence points to one thing, overwhelmingly. To a time of death not long after 9 o'clock. And that is most certainly looking at the evidence as a whole.

Deal with it.

Rolfe.
 
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Not that this is really important either, but the UW used to originally be in the Eastern part of downtown Seattle just West of Capital Hill. It's why one of the downtown East to West Streets is called University Street. It's between Union and Seneca.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Washington

"In 1861, scouting began for an appropriate 10 acres (4 ha) site in Seattle to serve as the campus for a new university. Arthur and Mary Denny donated eight acres, and fellow pioneers Edward Lander and Charlie and Mary Terry donated two acres to the university[9] at a site on Denny's Knoll in downtown Seattle. This tract was bounded by 4th and 6th Avenues on the west and east and Union and Seneca Streets on the north and south."
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The University still owns but leases out most of that downtown land.
The present location of the University is the former grounds for the 1909 Alaska Yukon Exposition. In fact, the streets and walkways between the buildings are pretty much exactly where they were for the exposition.

The Rainier Vista and Drumheller Fountain, the focus of the A-Y-P, are today the central focus of the Science Quadrangle of the university's overall plan.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alaska–Yukon–Pacific_Exposition
 
Briars said:
The prank is a small matter isolated from the totality of the evidence.

This rank is the only evidence there is. It is factoids like this that comprise the guilter version of "the totality of the evidence". It's main purpose for the last six years in guilter-land is to suggest that Knox had a predisposition towards some sort of psychopathology that could possibly lead to murder. Otherwise, why would ANYONE be talking about it at all!?

Briars said:
No one is accusing her of a crime based on this.
See above. Once again in case it was not clear the first time, for six years this was spun as a "rape prank" in guilter-land to suggest psychopathology of some sort.

Briars said:
The (lack of) evidence points to one verdict, the SC said it much be looked at as a whole.

There, I fixed that for you.Looked at as a whole in guilterland, one sees an April Fools prank, sex on a train, imagined tension between Meredith and Amanda that even Massei did not find as factual, no motive for AK and RS to have been involved, no prior experience in the crimes alleged (where Rudy at least was an experienced break-in artist)... the list is almost endless...

But please, I am bound by Mafia Omerta... they are coming for me right now for talking to the authorities.... this may be my last post here....

Please no cheering....
 
The evidence points to one thing, overwhelmingly. To a time of death not long after 9 o'clock. And that is most certainly looking at the evidence as a whole.

Deal with it.

Rolfe.

Yes, and Meredith's cell phone outside the cottage by 10:13pm.

I would think the defense would drive that point to full clarity, include all the time stamps before 10:13pm. Even uninterested jurors and judges, with too many cases, can understand a simple clock and time scenario.
 
Regarding the authoritarian meme, I plead guilty.

Regarding the open discussion “until a consensus forms around the best truth that can be extracted from the available evidence”, - this amounts to the court of public opinion. This is a court that for all intents and purposes, will not matter come January 30th.

JREF has come to a consensus of innocence, as has IIP. TJMK and PMF have come to a consensus of guilt. There is no common ground or any agreement on any of the evidence (circumstantial or forensic) presented between these divergent courts of public opinion.

It is possible for a person to have read the translated primary court documents and have come to an opinion of guilt, without hating, without degrading, without being irrational, and without having a pony in this race. It is also possible for a person to be devoid of arrogance, and to admit that he or she is not completely sure of this stance. Therefore, I rely on my meme and not on the opinions of strangers on a forum. If they are truly innocent, I hope the wisdom of the court in Florence judges it to be so. If they are truly guilty, then I hope that this is the judgement with punishment to follow.

The reason I posted on JREF is because my curiosity got the best of me. I wanted to know whether there were people who believed in Amanda's and Raffaele's innocence dispassionately, but who were also open to the possibility of their guilt. It appears that the answer would be, no. (But thanks Planigale – your response was at least dispassionate and genuine).

Most people that are now convinced of Amanda and Rafaelle's innocence started by believing they were guilty. So you're wrong, people are (or were) open to the possibility of guilt. It's people who believe they are guilty that never changed their opinion from day one.
 
I didn't have an opinion one way or another. Mostly I thought life was too short to get up to speed on the evidence in the case. Despite Stilicho PMing me to urge me to get involved because he was sure I'd support his position.

I didn't realise at the time that he was looking for medical support for some silly rationalisation to explain away the digestive tract evidence. He laid it on thick about how I was such a respected poster and my input would be valuable. I think he did this twice. I blew him off saying life was too short to get sucked in. (I didn't actually know which side of the case he was on at that point - that was how little I'd paid attention to any of it.)

Then, on another thread, I read a post where someone concisely outlined the evidence of the digestive tract, and made the point that Knox had an alibi stretching past 9.30. I was simply dumfounded. Was the hugely complicated "cartwheel" case as easily explained as that?

I got a bit interested and got up to speed on the main points. It was indeed that simple. The PM was done right, and the whole meal was in the stomach with nothing in the duodenum. In a healthy 20-year-old, who had eaten around six or half past. There's not much more to say, really.

When Stilicho discovered I had in fact entered the thread, but on the other side from what he had anticipated, he started insulting me on PMF, calling me a doggy doctor who was good for nothing but clipping toenails. (In fact I am a pathologist who does post mortem examinations that I have to go to court and explain in animal welfare and wildlife crime cases. Estimating how long the animal has been dead for is part of that, as is determining whether the animal suffered before it died, and if so how long for.)

So no, I was never in a position of believing in guilt. I knew next to nothing about the case before I read the crucial part of the evidence.

Rolfe.
 
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It is possible for a person to have read the translated primary court documents and have come to an opinion of guilt, without hating, without degrading, without being irrational, and without having a pony in this race.

I agree with the above, as far as it goes. However if we add to the above list of qualities "with good critical thinking skills", "with relevant scientific knowledge" and "with reasonably well-developed reading comprehension" it does become impossible for such a reader to come to an opinion of guilt.

As others have pointed out, the bottom line is still that there is not one single coherent pro-guilt theory that explains all the relevant evidence. This is not a case where there are many ways the accused could be guilty and nobody knows which is the case. This is a case in which even the people who are adamantly convinced that the accused are guilty cannot explain how that could actually be true.

Suppose we had a case where nobody has any idea where Joe Blow and Jane Doe are for a period of twelve hours, but the next morning Jane Doe's body is found buried in a shallow grave nearby with Joe Blow's DNA on it. Reconstructing what happened in those twelve hours will probably never be possible but there's still a case for guilt.

What we've got here is two people with an independently verifiable alibi for the actual time of death, and an actual time of death which through pure chance happens to be nailed down to a fairly small time window. Nothing else matters at that point. No pro-guilt theorist has yet managed to come up with any way that Knox and Sollecito could actually be involved.

The reason I posted on JREF is because my curiosity got the best of me. I wanted to know whether there were people who believed in Amanda's and Raffaele's innocence dispassionately, but who were also open to the possibility of their guilt. It appears that the answer would be, no. (But thanks Planigale – your response was at least dispassionate and genuine).

When I first encountered this case I was quite open to the possibility of their guilt. When I started looking at the prosecution case in detail and noticed that the supposed evidence fell apart under examination I shifted to thinking that there certainly wasn't proof beyond reasonable doubt. Only when we proved that the time of death was incompatible with Knox and Sollecito being involved did I settle in to thinking that their guilt was actually impossible, and even then I would have revised that view if a professional like Rolfe had told us we amateurs had got the science wrong.

If you have a whole lot of time to spare you could read the original "Cartwheel" thread and all its continuations and watch the development of the pro-innocence case. It was pretty scrappy at first - some elements of the prosecution case were obviously worthless, but others were seemingly problematic for the pro-innocence side. One by one, when examined closely by people with the skills and motivation to dig into the facts and the relevant science, those seemingly problematic elements turned out to be errors or lies from the police, or to have perfectly good explanations compatible with innocence.
 
Yes, this is why I can't understand why people who believe in guilt can go on without dealing with this simple fact first. And no, appeals to luminol footprints which may or may not be blood doesn't really constitute good evidence otherwise. Neither can the confused statements made by Miss Knox. In fact, I think I have a much better understanding of what actually went on on that interrogation room than most posters here, certainly much better than most anglo-saxonic posters. Neither can the discredited DNA evidence. I mean it doesn't make any sense to start with. When I saw Stefanoni's notes where you could read "too low" several times I knew the case was rotten. Add in the hiding of evidence, the destruction of the hard drives, deleting of possibly exculpatory CCTV footage, not recording the interrogation, etc. It's just scandalous.

They thought they would be able to get away with this like they do when they're just prossecuting a random gipsy or other person of low social-economic status. But no, the whole world is watching this one and they just look like clowns.

So I'd really like if pro-guilt at least tried to overcome the stomach contents hurdle before proceding with their accusations. Machiavelli at least tried although his reply was very far from satisfactory. Appeals to "non-continuous meals", whatever that means, and the unmeasured claimed effect of yeast on diggestion (emphasys on unmeasured, he doesn't really even know if there's any effect at all) are not good enough.
 
The prank is a small matter isolated from the totality of the evidence. No one is accusing her of a crime based on this.

That is exactly what they are doing. They are taking any material they can from her life to support the criminal accusations. They are saying that anyone who pulled off this prank is more likely to have committed this crime.

The evidence points to one verdict, the SC said it much be looked at as a whole.

If you are going to look at people's histories as part of the whole, then you must look at everything they have done, not just the stuff that makes them look guilty.
 
Yes, this is why I can't understand why people who believe in guilt can go on without dealing with this simple fact first. And no, appeals to luminol footprints which may or may not be blood doesn't really constitute good evidence otherwise. Neither can the confused statements made by Miss Knox. In fact, I think I have a much better understanding of what actually went on on that interrogation room than most posters here, certainly much better than most anglo-saxonic posters. Neither can the discredited DNA evidence. I mean it doesn't make any sense to start with. When I saw Stefanoni's notes where you could read "too low" several times I knew the case was rotten. Add in the hiding of evidence, the destruction of the hard drives, deleting of possibly exculpatory CCTV footage, not recording the interrogation, etc. It's just scandalous.

They thought they would be able to get away with this like they do when they're just prossecuting a random gipsy or other person of low social-economic status. But no, the whole world is watching this one and they just look like clowns.

So I'd really like if pro-guilt at least tried to overcome the stomach contents hurdle before proceding with their accusations. Machiavelli at least tried although his reply was very far from satisfactory. Appeals to "non-continuous meals", whatever that means, and the unmeasured claimed effect of yeast on diggestion (emphasys on unmeasured, he doesn't really even know if there's any effect at all) are not good enough.

Some posters on one of the warring PMF sites now claims that Knox herself is to blame for the destruction of the hard drives.

And in partial answer to LBR's query here... that statement on one of the warring PMFs goes completely unchallenged. This is in answer to LBR's partial claim that there is an equivalence to the innocence vs. the guilt sites.

They need a Grinder over there. I know, I have the bite marks!
 
As I said, they should start by explaining how Meredith's last meal was fully inside her stomach before proceeding in their accusations.
 
I didn't have an opinion one way or another. Mostly I thought life was too short to get up to speed on the evidence in the case. Despite Stilicho PMing me to urge me to get involved because he was sure I'd support his position.

I've had about 5 or 6 fairly long-running PMs with guilters, where things could be said out of the spotlight of the main thread.

What is astonishing is the number who really aren't that much interested, really, in the position they hold publicly. One reduced everything about a belief in guilt for Knox (there was barely a mention of Raffaele) to, "All the lies she told." We had a good back and forth as to what those lies may have been, and when I finally found The Machines' list, and added three more (guilter-claims as to what the lies were).....

- they were mostly "lies" attributable to Raffaele
- all of these came when Raffaele was isolated, in solitary confinement and not sure of the veracity of what the cops were telling him!
- the only lie attributable to Amanda was about Lumumba
- leaving me to conclude that since Amanda Knox was perhaps the most scrutinized "liar" in history, coming up with only one semi-solid candidate for this honour actually should be seen in her favour! They actually have trouble coming up with many lies. (And we're talking The Machine's list, and he was looking for them!)​

He and I kind of wrestled that one to a draw, really.

Then there was the fellow who thought Knox innocent of the murder, but who had panicked and staged the break-in... that one fell apart as a PM when he said he was tired of summarizing his "case", and pointed me to a rather long post he'd made some years ago on one of the warring PMFs. I read it, and quoted it in in this JREF thread - and he promptly accused me of violating the sanctity of the PM, revealing confidential stuff. The fact the thing quoted was public on PMF....

Then there was the two (or three) who said they actually were not much interested in guilt or innocence, but said guilt-like things to maintain their relationships - mainly at .ORG. And, no, you're not getting their pseudos from me.

There's been one or two what might be called, "solid guilters". Mostly they ended with accusations that I was stalking them or obsessed with them.
 
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