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

[RoseMontague]

Oh, I see what you're saying. I should have said "she accused Lumumba of a crime, without knowing whether he did it or not."

Yes, a person the cops suggested to her. Sure would be nice to have the tapes of her interrogations over 4 days.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

not sure where it is

I know the passage is quoted from Amanda's testimony but is the whole document available? Is this the two letters available written by Amanda to her attorneys on Andrea Vogt's website?

And my question had nothing to do with authenticity but rather if you had seen the whole document? Do you have a link to the Websleuths page?

christianahannah,

I cannot find the link so far. The document is definitely not the same as the letters to her lawyers, which make interesting reading in their own right.

 

[snook1]

I don't know if this was posted earlier, if not, it's an interesting quote.

Judge Hellmann said: "I remain certain that there is no concrete evidence at all against these two young people.
"This new sentence was on the cards - it's tied to the decision made by the Supreme Court - Amanda's not doing a bad thing by not coming back to Italy."

 

[Bob001]

I don't know if this was posted earlier, if not, it's an interesting quote.

Process question: Did the second appeals court respond directly to the first -- which stated that there is no valid evidence against Amanda and Raffaele -- or was their role to review the original conviction and say "Looks ok to us." In other words, did the second appeal find that the first appeal decision was in error, or did it treat the first appeal as if it didn't exist?

 

[Strozzi]

I don't care if she wrote the next five volumes of War and Peace. She did what the police wanted her to do, which was to embellish and create. She went into the Questura with a story the cops didn't like, and came out with one they liked and approved of. Curiously, the story the cops liked and approved turned out to be completely false. That, right there, proves the point.

I do not believe that the police did not record the interrogation. Amanda was interrogated for hours in a modern police headquarters building. The building had concealed recording equipment built into interrogation rooms and waiting areas. A day or two earlier the police deliberately placed Amanda and Raffaele together alone in another room to listen to them talking, hoping to hear something compromising, but there was nothing compromising from it.

Amanda's Italian was elementary and few police spoke English well, which is why during the nighttime interrogation of Amanda the police sent for Anna Donnino, their interpreter who lived 45 minutes away. It took Donnino a long time to get there that night and the police were going at it with Amanda all that time.

Inspector Giobi, the crack investigator sent from Rome to help the Perugia detectives investigate the murder, said he was in the control room during Amanda's interrogation watchng her body language. Giobi said he could hear her screaming and Prosecutor Mignini joined Giobi in the control center later to monitor the interrogation.

They were desperate to get something on her that night because they knew Amanda's mother was flying into Rome from Seattle and was to arrive in Perugia the next day. The police did terrible things to Amanda that night as they tried to get her to say something incriminating. Amanda was shouted at, hit, called a stupid liar, told if she did not tell the truth she would be sent to prison for 30 years and never see her family again.

Amanda truthfully told the police again and again that she was not there but was shouted down and repeatedly called a liar and told to stop lying. She was told she was there but did not remember it becuase she was blocking it out because of the trauma like with amnesia and needed to remember and told to imagine she was there. She was then asked details about what she would have seen and heard and what room she would have been in when Meredith was attacked.

Of course the police recorded it. But the police cannot let the Italian or American people hear what they did to Amanda in interrogation, including hitting her twice "to help her remember", so the recordings "disappeared".

The interrogation should be made into a movie so that people know what occurred in the Perugia police headquarters that night. People need to know what can occur in Italian justice.

If the police interrogators had done that in the U.S. they would have been charged, convicted, and sent to prison. The individuals, their department, and city would pay very expensive damages for the trauma and rights violations they inflected upon Amanda.

Let us not forget Raffaele while Amanda was being interrogated that night. He was being interrogated in another interrogation room. Raffaele wrote that he heard Amanda screaming and instinctively started to rise from his chair to help her and a senior police officer next to him whispered into his ear that if he tried to help her the police offier would beat him into a bloody pulp. The reason the police officer whispered that into Raffaele's ear rather than saying it out loud is because the police offier knew the conversation was being recorded.

 

[GreyFox]

A step out of the dark ages

I support the court decision because the decision is legal. It is provided by the law. The law is made by legislators. The decision is also fair in the context of the set of laws, but above all it is legally correct.
But the decision does NOT say that it is ok to have sex with children. This is a lie. Proven lie, not just unfounded assertion.
I do consider many Knox supporters racists. And not in a position to call som people corrupt or mafiosi or liars, given their moral credibility.

You have a nack for rambling and repeating your ramble sentence after sentence to disguise your real answer.

Fact is : A child that gives into his molesters demands because he feels he has no choice but to do so (trapped) is not a willing victim. I dont give a damn what any court or laws say. Regardless of how you want to twist it.

Likewise a young woman stuck in a room full of authorative figures trying to convince her she has no hope other than to succumb to what they want is not a willing victim either.

That is how they molested/bullied her into telling them "what they knew to be true" .

The crimes (PLE/molesters) may be different but the evil way of getting what they want from her are not that far apart.

Moral character is the difference from those who understand and those who dont. Hence..... PIP vrs PGP.The ability to step out of ones shoes and determine if it's really fair. If it was me......would I want to be juged this way.

 

[yimyammer]

I don't know if this was posted earlier, if not, it's an interesting quote.

I assume this comment was made after the Florence courts decision? Do you have a link to the complete interview?

thx

 

[snook1]

Process question: Did the second appeals court respond directly to the first -- which stated that there is no valid evidence against Amanda and Raffaele -- or was their role to review the original conviction and say "Looks ok to us." In other words, did the second appeal find that the first appeal decision was in error, or did it treat the first appeal as if it didn't exist?

We don't know yet what the second appeal said exactly. We have to wait for the motivation report. They basically confirmed the first trial's verdict. As far as I'm aware, the first appeal isn't even considered as a part of a process now. It was anulled, apart from some testimonies, like C&V report.

 

[Diocletus]

I support the court decision because the decision is legal. It is provided by the law. The law is made by legislators. The decision is also fair in the context of the set of laws, but above all it is legally correct.
But the decision does NOT say that it is ok to have sex with children. This is a lie. Proven lie, not just unfounded assertion.
I do consider many Knox supporters racists. And not in a position to call som people corrupt or mafiosi or liars, given their moral credibility.

Really. The Italian legislature said that it should be a mitigating factor for a child rapist to claim that he "loved" his victims? I'll bet not. I'll bet that this is yet another monstrosity by your very very stupid judiciary.

By giving child rapists a mitigation for "love" you create the absurd situation where you have to have evidence on this issue. You also decrease the deterrent effect of the law.

It's also sick.

 

[GWCarver]

I don't know if this was posted earlier, if not, it's an interesting quote.

This would mean Amanda and Raffaele had already been found guilty in a trial in which they were not defendants and had no representation before they actually were tried the first time.

One would think that alone would be a reason to not allow Amanda's extradition.

 

[Poppy1016]

This would mean Amanda and Raffaele had already been found guilty in a trial which they were not defendants and had no representation before they actually were tried the first time.

One would think that alone would be a reason to not allow Amanda's extradition.

I have never understood how Guedes trial can be tied into AK and RS trial when they could not participate in that trial. How can RG make statements that create prejudice towards AK and RS and not be cross examined on those statements? I guess I will never understand how decisions made in his trial are automatic facts in AK and RS trial before their trial ever began.

 

[snook1]

I assume this comment was made after the Florence courts decision? Do you have a link to the complete interview?

thx

http://news.sky.com/story/1204879/amanda-knox-judge-describes-agony-of-decision

But then two years later they were dramatically cleared by Judge Hellmann at appeal - and walked free.

Then in a further twist, that decision was overturned by Italy's Supreme Court and sent back to the appeal court .

Knox was sentenced to 28 years and Sollecito to 25 years on Thursday.

Speaking about the latest decision, Judge Hellmann said: "I remain certain that there is no concrete evidence at all against these two young people.

"This new sentence was on the cards - it's tied to the decision made by the Supreme Court - Amanda's not doing a bad thing by not coming back to Italy."

In its ruling last year the Supreme Court decided that "errors" had been made in the 2009 appeal court hearing and that these should be "remedied".

Judge Hellmann, the best person in Italian justice system.

 

[Poppy1016]

Is it at all possible that the Supreme Court only wanted the issues of Alessi and the knife testing addressed by the Florence court so that it could make a final not guilty decision? Perhaps they had given orders to uphold the guilty verdict until these issues were addressed, and if these issues were answered favorably to AK and RS that THEY would give the not guilty verdict, not Florence. Thus they would put and end to the case. Just curious.

 

[Diocletus]

I think I agree with this - being a suspect means having <some> indication. Or elements if you will of criminal conduct. If you have all elements then they would likely be charged and arrested etc.

As such, isn't that what they had against Amanda, some indication? And isn't that precisely when the right to an attorney attaches?

Seems like that you are arguing that they did indeed fail to provide an attorney. Unless you argue that Raffaele retracting support for her alibi provides no such "element". That would seem difficult to me.

They had every element used to effect the arrest before she signed the 1:45 statement. There is no escaping this fact. She was therefore a suspect under EU law and was entitled to counsel.

Nevertheless, the proceeded to conduct and illegal interrogation without counsel, an interrogation that elicited non-spontaneous remarks from the suspect in custody.

This was all illegal.

The only question is what the remedy should be. It seems to me obvious that if Europe wants to have any sensible system for interrogations, then the illegally-elicited statements cannot be used for any purpose in a proceeding in which the suspect is charged with the crime for which she was suspected at the time the statements were made.

The Italians are trying to be slippery weasels about this, but they are wrong and I think they're going to get embarrassed. Oh well. Should have thought of that before the Supreme Court went all in on injustice.

 

[Diocletus]

I have never understood how Guedes trial can be tied into AK and RS trial when they could not participate in that trial. How can RG make statements that create prejudice towards AK and RS and not be cross examined on those statements? I guess I will never understand how decisions made in his trial are automatic facts in AK and RS trial before their trial ever began.

Hellman called BS on this issue and wrote a nice little discussion of it. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court judges didn't actually go to law school.

 

[Bob001]

I have never understood how Guedes trial can be tied into AK and RS trial when they could not participate in that trial. How can RG make statements that create prejudice towards AK and RS and not be cross examined on those statements?
...

Could Guede have been called as a defense witness during the original trial? Maybe he could have been worn down under aggressive cross-examination, but at the very least he could have testified that "I was there, and I never saw Amanda and Raffaele."

 

[Poppy1016]

Could Guede have been called as a defense witness during the original trial? Maybe he could have been worn down under aggressive cross-examination, but at the very least he could have testified that "I was there, and I never saw Amanda and Raffaele."

Exactly

 

[kwill]

I think she should write another book.

She's got another hell of a story to tell, only this one can reflect her growing knowledge of how common her experience of unlawful interrogation was, and how irreversible the damage from that kind of practice can be and often is.

She's become one of those thoughtful, articulate, passionate advocates who are informed by virtue of being accidentally dragged into a hellish situation.

I would think a book that combines her own story with those of others wrongfully convicted would be not just a strong argument on her own behalf but also useful to the public in general. What happened to her could happen to any of us, anywhere.

 

[Darth Rotor]

I would rather let Bubba in jail have a go at me than to live with this injustice.

No, you wouldn't.

Saving face. This apparently is extremely important to Italians. ~Dr. Imago

Yes. This is part of why I made that wager with two of the folks supporting Foxy Knoxy on the first rework of the trial, wherein the decision was to vacate the original conviction. (Not, however, libel against Lumumba). I was a bit surprised that this consideration didn't outweigh whatever else was on the table. I lost the bet, and made two donations to JREF as per wager. Maybe I should have waited one appeal cycle longer to make the wager.

She wasn't tried a third time, it was the third stage of the process. Double jeopardy doesn't apply.

Indeed. From what I have read, there is one further level of appeal within Italy, and Ms Knox has stated in a TV interview that she will of course resort to that legal appeal. Only after that appeal would extradition proceedings be in the offing.
That is how I understand how it stands at the moment.

My sister who is a lawyer and consequently uninterested in this case ("criminal law is dismal"), has said to me that there is judicial truth and external reality.

Having served on a jury in a criminal case, I utterly agree with this observation, from the position of juror. We can't make a decision on the facts of the case, we made our determination based on part of the facts and a lot of argument. An immense amount of info was raised by the defense and the state which we were frequently excused from hearing and seeing. A (serious) game, played by rules, if you don't mind my saying.

Do you really think she stabbed anyone?

It seems that Rudy did the stabbing, but the cops believe she and Raf were accomplices.

Yeah, unlike the Knox CTers, the courts probably didn't spend tens of thousands of hours obsessing over the excruciating minutia of the case, like where the prosecutor went to school and what he ate for breakfast. Of course today's verdict makes no difference. JFK nutters, 9/11 nutters, Pan-Am 103 nutters, Moon landing nutters, etc all still believe they are right. No amount of evidence will ever convince them otherwise.

Scrut, what weight of line did you choose for this thread?

If only Amanda hadn't turned those damn cartwheels. (We've now come full circle)

Nice pun. But per below, it was apparently a yoga move. That of course proves her innocence ... I think. Raf, having failed to yoga at the time, is thus hosed.

Maybe he can also tell us why there is nothing nutty about arresting scientists for failing to predict earthquakes.

Heh, that's another topic, albeit farcical.

I understand they wanted to rename the city Knoxville but at the last moment discovered that had been taken.

+1

Ann Coulter wrote a column saying exactly what Kestrel is attributing to conservatives in general. It was the last column of hers I read.

Do you generally find yourself in agreement with Coulter, when it hasn't to do with Ms Knox?

A friend of mine just took a trip to Barcelona and the island of Mallorca.

Been to Perugia. Been to Florence. Been to Mallorca. Mallorca wins.

Yes. And Jamone is better than prosciutto.

In prison, my guess is you'll get jamone some times, but not prosciutto. That's an expensive cut of meat, in Italy.

"The Amanda Knox case marks the only time in history white police officers caught a drug-dealing, working-class, low-life black man with a criminal record and charged him with committing rape, robbery and murder...before deciding "Nah. He did it?! Come on now. Not buying it. Let's railroad two middle-class, educated and attractive young white people for what he did and let him off easy!"

Funny, when put that way.

To which I would only add that, unluckily, the local police force turned out to be an amalgam of pride, thuggery and corruption for which bending laws and framing suspects was SOP.

Not Chicago, Perugia.

If the US were a European country, it could not even qualify to be member of the European Union with the draconian criminal justice system that it has.

In case you were uncertain about this, the US never wanted to be a European country. Indeed, our founding fathers wanted to very much NOT be a European country. That sentiment remains very strong here, for which I am thankful.

As for the Italian Justice system, it stinks on ice.

How do you think Ron Goldman's family feels about American Justice, subset California.

Scruts is just here to boost his posts numbers. His arguments are never thoughtful or serious. Just one liners mostly...the Rodney Dangerfield of JREF. Only thing missing is the funny part.

Not sure you quite understand the Joy of Scrut.

Yeah, yeah, American babes: give 'em fifteen idle minutes and they murder someone.

For this image problem, I suggest you blame Sharon Stone from the movie Basic Instinct.

"Let he who is without sin cast the first stone" applies to everyone, Mach, including you.

It is curious to see that on a forum full of Skeptics, most of whom are atheists, references to Biblical teaching creep into the conversation.

Summary:
- One more appeal cycle will be resorted to, at the highest appeals court in Italy.
- Meredith was cut, and it appears Rudy is in jail for being a cutter, or involved in cutting. She's still dead, whomever actually used the blade.
- Amanda and Raf were convicted, then overturned, then over-overturned, for being either accomplices or cutters.
- Extradition requests are political processes, handled by the Executive Branch of our government, which is usually the State Department and Department of Justice.
- There were about fifty posts in the past two days that I could have reported for being Off Topic, but I didn't report them due to the chance that posts not off topic would be assigned to AAH as well.

The adventures of Foxy Knoxy seems to be the gift that keeps on giving: seven mega threads.

It appears that the first post on this case made on JREF was the one I tossed out in 2007, vis a vis the initial news of the murder and arrests in Perugia. I cannot take any credit for what has happened since, nor would I want to.

 

[GreyFox]

I can't answer that until you explain who PG, The Ballerina Stalker, Atlan, The Messiah, and the Hurricane are. Sounds like an impressive lineup!

They make the Kool aid you drink. Was popular in Jonestown.