Category: The Massei Report

Thursday, March 04, 2010

Sentencing Report: Barbie Nadeau Quotes The Motive, Physical Evidence, And Alibis

Posted by Peter Quennell

Please click above for Barbie Nadeau’s full report on the Daily Beast website. Key excerpts.

1) The motive

“One can hypothesize that the bad decision came after the consumption of stupefying substances.”

But they disagreed on the motive. The prosecution lawyers began their case in January, 2009 by arguing that Kercher was killed during a sex game gone awry. By closing arguments, they had changed the theory slightly, trying to make the case that Knox resented her prissy British roommate and killed her in hatred. The jury rejected both theories, and the reasoning document declares that “the killing was carried out with no planning, no animosity and no revenge against the victim.

“The two young lovers, interested in each other and in the intellectual and cultural world around them, would not have made a conscious decision to kill Kercher. Instead, the judge wrote, they killed spontaneously under the influence of drugs. “One can hypothesize that the bad decision came after the consumption of stupefacente””stupefying substances””that Amanda verified in her testimony.”

As the jury saw it, Knox, Sollecito and Rudy Guede, the Ivory Coast native who was convicted for his role in Kercher’s murder after a fast-track trial in 2008, came to the house the two girls shared in order to get high. Guede used the toilet, then became aroused when he saw Knox and Sollecito making out. He went to Kercher’s room and made sexual advances toward her. The reasoning refers to evidence presented at Knox’s trial that Guede was the type of guy that “bothered women” when he was under the influence.

Then, according to the reasoning, Kercher cried out for help, but instead of helping her, Knox and Sollecito, their judgment impaired, decided instead to help Guede. The killing was based on “sexual-erotic violence” but not with Knox as the mastermind. The jury felt that it was Guede who led that attack, and the other two, too high to know better, joined in.

2) The physical and forensic evidence

The judge’s reasoning also underscores what the jury believed to be the most important elements of the prosecution’s forensic case. They believed that a kitchen knife with Knox’s DNA on the handle and a trace of Kercher’s on the blade was the weapon that made the large fatal wound in Kercher’s neck. They also referred to Sollecito’s “knife habits,” surmising that, as an admitted collector of blades, he likely used his own knife to make the second wound. The jury agreed that Sollecito and Knox conspired to stage a break-in in another bedroom to cover their tracks.

And they attributed an unidentifiable bloody shoeprint found on the pillow under Kercher’s body to Knox, even though the prosecution only implied that it was compatible with a woman’s shoe size. A spot of Knox and Kercher’s mixed blood in one of the bedrooms, found using Luminol, and four additional spots in the small bathroom the girls shared also swayed the jurors.

“These were left when Amanda was cleaning her hands and feet of Kercher’s blood,” the judge wrote.

3) The Knox and Sollecito alibis

The judge also wrote emphatically about the lack of credible alibi. Although Knox and Sollecito claimed to be at his apartment all night, “Not one phone call, not one meeting, no computer activity or any other element proved that they stayed at that apartment.” And the judge was particularly hard on Knox for accusing Patrick Lumumba, an innocent man, of the murder “knowingly and deceivingly.”

Overall, however, it appears that the jury was sympathetic to the two suspects, but ultimately felt that they committed a crime for which they must pay a hefty price.

Sentencing Report: La Repubblica Has The Most Substantive Report So Far Today

Posted by ziaK

Click above for the Repubblica’s story in the original Italian.

This translation below is of this the longest report so far today in the Italian media, presumably by staff reporters in Perugia, although it is unsigned.

Verdict filed in Meredith crime: Murder arising from Guede’s sexual violence

PERUGIA - Four hundred and twenty-seven: This is how many pages it took for the judges of Perugia’s Court of Assizes to explain the sentence on the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia on 1 November 2007. For this crime carried out, the judges wrote, “without any planning, without any animosity or feeling of rancour”, Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito were sentenced to 26 and 25 years imprisonment, respectively. For the same crime, Ivory Coast national Rudy Guede was sentenced (to 30 years following a “fast-track” trial, subsequently reduced to 16 years in appeal) and is currently waiting to file an appeal with the Supreme Court. The Perugian judges wrote: “The motive, was of an erotic, sexually violent nature, which riginated in the evil choice made by Rudy, and elicited the active collaboration of Amanda and Raffaele.”

From Viterbo prison, where he is held, Rudy wrote a letter with an appeal: “to those who know, talk”. A request which appears to be addressed to the same Amanda and Raffaele (both - particularly the American student whom he has always claimedto know - pointed to by Rudy as having been present at the crime scent, ndr) who have always declared themselves to have no involvement in the affair.

Together, all the elements which emerged during the process “demonstrated a comprehensive and unified picture, without gaps and inconsistencies”, wrote the judges in the file signed by the Court President, Giancarlo Massei and by assessor judge Beatrice Cristiani. According to the College [as in the board of judges], the picture that emerges “has, as its necessary and strictly consequential outcome, the attribution of the hypothesized facts of the crime to both the accused.”

The measure furthermore asserts that Knox “freely accused Patrick Diya Lumumba of having killed Meredith, and so accused him with the full knowledge of the innocence of the same Lumumba”. The judges underlined that there had not been “any confirmation” that Amanda had been urged by the investigators to accuse Lumumba. For Perugia’s Court of Assizes, the objective aimed at by the American (who was also convicted for the crime of calumny with regard to the Congolese [sic] musician, ndr) was to “lead the investigators down the wrong path, far from that which could have led them to establish her own responsibility, and that of her boyfriend”. “Such behaviour is a choice”, wrote the Court, “and thus merely defensive: Amanda had a good relationship with Lumumba, by whom she had always been well treated, and therefore there could have been no motive for rancour, animosity, revenge which could have justified such a serious accusation.”

The murder of Meredith Kercher, it further reads, was carried out “without any planning, without the animosity or feeling of resentment towards the victim which in some ways can be seen as the preparation/predisposition to commiting a crime”. According to the board of judges, “the actions turn out to have been carried out as a result of purely coincidental events”.

In the judges’ report, they talk of “purely coincidental events which, when joined together with each other, created a situation which, in the combination of various factors, made possible these crimes to the detriment of Meredith: Amanda and Raffaele who suddenly found themselves without any commitments, meet Rudy Guede by chance (there is no trace of any appointment having been made), and find themselves together at the house on the via della Pergola on the very evening (between 1 and 2 November, ndr) that Meredith is there alone”. According to the judges, “even the behaviour towards Meredith - once the assault and the murder have been commited - which consisted in covering her lifeless body, shows a feeling of pity for the victim, refusal, and thus a sort of repentance for what has been done: refusal and repentance shown through such an act of pity.”

The judges attributed the material criminal act, that is, the sexual violence, to Rudy Guede, who was aided by Amanda and Raffaele, weakened by the drugs they had consumed. The judges wrote: “Amanda and Raffaele participated actively in the criminal actions carried out by Rudy with the aim of overcoming Meredith’s resistance, subjugating her will, and allowing Rudy to relieve his lustful urges.” The judges also wrote in their report: “The prospective of helping Rudy achieve his aim of subjugating Meredith in order to sexually abuse her may have appeared to be an exciting detail which, although unforeseen, should be tried”.

“The motive”, added the Perugian judges, “was therefore of an erotic, sexually violent nature, which originated in the evil choice made by Rudy, and elicited the active collaboration of Amanda and Raffaele. That such participation, active and violent, had also involved the current defendants as well as Rudy can be deduced from what has been observed in talking about the lesions suffered by Meredith, by the outcome of the genetic investigations, by the prints of bare feet found in various parts of the house.”

According to the judges, in this murder case, one of the tests, carried out by several people, is confirmed by Meredith’s physical strength, by the fact that she was conscious on the evening of the assault, and by her previous experience in the gym. “Meredith, when the violence began, was awake and dressed, and was not laying down on her bed.” Furthermore: “According to the analyses, the young woman had a slender and well-endowed physique, and was physically very strong, as was claimed by Meredith’s mother and sister. She had even done boxing”.

Judges’ Sentencing Report Released In Perugia And It Is 427 Pages Long

Posted by Peter Quennell

Judge Massei is seen above on live TV from the court on the night he announced the verdict and sentence.

The sentencing report is four times the length of the Micheli report a year ago which itself was very detailed. It was made available to the media today on paper by the court in Perugia.

First take in the Italian media is by TGCom.

The judges of the Court of Assizes of Perugia lodged the grounds for the condemnation of Raffaele Sollecito and Amanda Knox for the murder of Meredith. All the issues raised in the process, it says, “demonstrate a comprehensive and unified whole, without gaps and inconsistencies”...  The reasons for conviction of two defendants are contained in a voluminous file. It is 427 pages signed by the President of the Court Giancarlo Massei and assessor Beatrice Christians.

The motive is described in the report as essentially the thrill of the moment in helping Rudy with a sexual attack and while there was a predisposition there was no longer term intention.

Drugs are seen as having played a role.

Sollecito and Knox are apparently seen in the report as the knife wielders and one of them seems to have delivered the fatal blow.

We will be obtaining the report of course and arriving at our own English-language version in the next several weeks.

RIP poor Meredith. This has to be so tough on her family and her friends. We love this photo below. So trusting and so full of life.