Headsup: Unsurprisingly, Knox chickens out of presenting her "proof" on 10 April of being forced to frame Patrick for Meredith's murder when actually under no stress. She's not a good liar. She could face Patrick's tiger of a lawyer and many officers she has slimed. Trial is closed to the press, like the most damning parts of the 2009 trial; a pity that. And see links here for Knox's false framing #2: Rudy Guede as sole killer.
Category: 16 Interrogation hoax

Friday, June 26, 2015

What No-Show Amanda Knox SHOULD Have Emailed Judge Nencini As Truthful Testimony in December 2013

Posted by Chimera



As the real thing really didnt work any better for Knox…


As is well known, Amanda Knox refused to attend her own appeal in Florence in 2013/2014.

This was a defence appeal by Knox herself and Sollecito against the 2009 conviction by Judge Giancarlo Massei’s trial court.  It was not a new trial, or a retrial, or even a prosecution appeal. It was an appeal DEMANDED by Knox and Sollecito.

While Knox refused to attend, she did send a long, rambling email to Lead Judge Nencini.  Judge Nencini tartly read out the email in court, and remarked that she could have delivered this in person and answered questions if she wanted it credibly on the record - after all, Sollecito was sitting right there and not scared out of his wits.

Kudos to fellow main posters Finn MacCool and SeekingUnderstanding for their original and well done posts on this ‘‘submission’‘

With a bit of fact checking, Knox’s email could have looked to the court and the media more like this.  Enjoy.

Court of Appeals of Florence section II Assise Proc. Pen, 11113

Letter sent to attorneys Carlo Dalla Vedova and Luciano Ghirga via email Seattle, 15 December 2013

Attn: Honorable Court of Appeals of Florence

1. I have no doubt that my lawyers have explained and demonstrated the important facts of this case that prove my innocence and discredit the unjustified accusations of the prosecution and civil parties. I seek not to supplant their work; rather, even though I am not present to take part in this current phase of the judicial process, I feel compelled to share my own perspective as a six””year-long defendant and causation of Meredith’s injustice.

2. The Court has access to my previous declarations, and please disregard that whole ‘‘aggravated calunnia’’ in which Cassation says i framed Patrick to divert attention, or that pending calunnia charge claiming I falsely accused the police to sabotage the court proceedings.  I trust you will not be blinded by these things to come to this verdict.  I must repeat: I am innocent.  Because repeating it will help dissuade you from studying my lies too carefully.

3. According to my lawyers: I am not a murderer, I am not a rapist, I am not a thief or a plotter or an instigator, at least not until Cassation signs off on it. I did not kill Meredith or take part in her murder or have any prior or special knowledge of what occurred that night, (other than screaming, slit throat, and that the body was moved). I was not there for part of the time, and had nothing to do with it.

4. I am not present in the courtroom because I am afraid. Frederico Martini is probably still pissed that I gave him up; the court and jail officials don’t like my book; and I think there is still an open warrant on me for calunnia.  Also, without any employment or housing references, staying here may be tricky.  I have faith in your judgement, but am worried you are so poor a judge you will be blinded my the Prosecution’s vehemence.  I remember Judge Micheli: he was the wise Judge who found Guede guilty; he was the idiot Judge who ordered Raffaele and I to stand trial as accomplices.

5. My life being on the line, at least until I get parole, and having with others already suffered too much, I’ve rehearsed this story and attentively followed this process and gleaned the following facts that have emerged from the development of this case that I beg you not to dismiss when making your judgement:

6. No physical evidence places me in Meredith “˜s bedroom, the scene of the crime, because I define only that as the crime scene.  My DNA mixed with Meredith’s was in the bathroom and Filomena’s room, not Meredith’s.  Those bloody footprints cleaned away were in the hallway, not Meredith’s room.  Raffaele had one knife, and this other was at his flat, neither of which is Meredith’s room.  My lamp on Meredith’s floor had no fingerprints on it, and does not implicate me.  That DNA on Merdith’s bra, and bloody footprint on the bathmat only implicates my alibi witness (who refuses to be questioned), not me.  Those false alibis, false accusations, details I know about the crime, and phone records are not physical evidence, and did not happen in Meredith’s bedroom. Those ‘‘eyewitnesses’’ the Prosecution produced are not forensic evidence, and do not place me in Meredith’s room.

7. Meredith’s murderer left ample evidence of his presence in the brutal scenario, we made sure of that.  Heck, the police couldn’t even find my fingerprints in my own bedroom.

8. No evidence places me in the same brutal scenario, again, which I restrict to Meredith’s bedroom, and only actual physical evidence.  The prosecution has failed to explain how—with these restrictions—I could have participated in the aggression and murder””to have been the one to fatally wound Meredith””without leaving any genetic trace of myself. Just because i spend a lot of time talking about it, and am a C.S.I. fan, doesn’t mean I know how to remove evidence.  That is because it is impossible. It is impossible to identify and destroy all genetic traces of myself in a crime scene and retain all genetic traces of another individual, or so C.S.I. has taught me. Either I was there, or I wasn’t. My analysis of the crime scene answers this question: I wasn’t there.

9. My interrogation was illegal and produced a false “confession” that demonstrated my non-knowledge of the crime- The subsequent memoriali, for which I was wrongfully found guilty of slander, did not further accuse but rather recanted that false “confession.” Yes, I wrote out a false ‘‘confession’’ that accuses someone else.  Just as I testified to the prosecutor in prison and to my family members in prison when our conversations were being recorded without my knowledge. Dammit, give me some privacy.

10. My behavior after the discovery of the murder indicates my innocence, if you think creatively enough. I did not flee Italy when I had the chance, because (in my November 4th email), the police wouldn’t let me leave.  I stayed in Perugia and was at the police’s beck and call trying to think of answers for over 50 hours in four days, convinced that I could help them find the murderer, or at least someone who was ‘‘close enough’‘.  I never thought or imagined that repeatedly changing my story would fuel their suspicions. I did not hide myself or my feelings: when I needed sex, Rafael ‘‘embraced’’ me; when I was scared of being exposed, I cried; when I was angry that it wasn’t working, I swore and made insensitive remarks; when I was shocked, I paced or sat in silence, at least until I could find a new ‘‘best truth’‘; when I was trying to help, I evaded questions, consoled Meredith’s friends, especially her male friends, and tried to keep a positive attitude that this would blow over.

11. Upon entering the questura I had no understanding of my legal position, accompanying Raffaele to a witness summary session which I was not invited to. 20””years old and alone in a foreign country, I was, legally speaking, innocent and never expected to be suspected and subjugated to torture, and I wasn’t. I was told I was a witness, then after I placed myself at the crime scene I was told I was a suspect. I was questioned for a prolonged period in the middle of the night and in Italian, a language I barely knew, and that questioning includes the time I was sleeping or getting tea.  I denied legal counsel- still The Court of Cassation deemed the interrogation and the statements produced from it was inadmissible. In my memoir, WTBH; I was lied to, yelled at, threatened, slapped twice on the back of the head. I told myself I had witnessed the murder and was suffering from amnesia. I told myself that if I didn’t succeed in ‘‘remembering’’ what happened to Meredith that night, I would never see my family again. I browbeat myself into confusion and despair, to sell to the media at a later date. When you berate, intimidate, lie to, threaten, confuse, and coerce someone in believing they are wrong, you are not going to find the truth, but again, that is not what happened here.

12. The police used tea and kindness to coerce me into signing a false “confession” that was without sense and should never have been considered a legitimate investigative lead. In this fragmentary and confused statement the police identified Patrick Lumumba as the murderer because we had exchanged text messages, the meaning of which I let the police wrongfully interpret (”˜Civediamo piu tardi. Buona serata’). The statement lacked a clear sequence of events, corroboration with any physical evidence, and fundamental information like: how and why the murder took place, if anyone else was present or involved, what happened afterward””it supplied partial, contradictory information and as the investigators would discover a little later, when Patrick Lumumba’s defense lawyer produced proof of him incontestable alibi, it was obviously inaccurate and unreliable.  After over 50 hours of rehearsing the questioning over four days, I was mentally exhausted and I was confused.

13. This coerced and illegitimate statement, which I dreamed up, was used by the police to arrest and detain a clearly innocent man with an iron-clad alibi with whom I had a friendly professional relationship, (at least until I destroyed his life). This coerced and illegitimate statement was used to convict me of slander.  Judge Hellmann saw that this statement was coerced, and threw out my calunnia conviction .... I mean he increased the sentence .... never mind.The prosecution and civil parties are accusing and blaming me, a result of their own overreaching.

14. Experience, case studies, and the law recognize that one may be coerced into giving a false"confession” because of torture.  I’m not sure why this applies to my case, but damn, it sure sounds impressive.

15. This is a universal problem. According to the National Registry of Exoneration, in the United States 78% of wrongful murder convictions that are eventually overturned because of exonerating forensic evidence involved false “confessions.” Almost 8 in 10 wrongfully convicted persons were coerced by police into implicating themselves and others in murder. I am not alone: Susan Smith and Casey Anthony ‘‘falsely confessed’’ that other people did it too.  And exonerating forensic evidence is often as simple as no trace of the wrongfully convicted person at the scene of the crime, but rather the genetic and forensic traces of a different guilty party””just like every piece of forensic evidence identifies not me, but Rudy Guide.

16. In the brief time Meredith and I were roommates and friends we never fought.  Roommates, not friends.

17. Meredith was my friend, not that I was her friend. She was kind to me, helpful, generous, fun, and in retrospect, I should have been more of the same.  She never criticized me. She never gave me so much as a dirty look, even as I left the place a mess, and even when I flirted with her boyfriend, or she took my job at the bar.

18. But the prosecution claims that a rift was created between Meredith and I because of cleanliness. This is a distortion of the facts. Please refer to the testimonies of my housemaster and Meredith’s British friends. None of them ever witnessed or heard about Meredith and I fighting, arguing, disliking each other. None of them ever claimed Meredith was a confrontational clean-freak, or I a confrontational slob. Laura Masotho testified that both Meredith and I only occasionally cleaned, whereas she and Filomena Romanelli were more concerned with cleanliness. Meredith’s British friends testified that Meredith had once told them that she felt a little uncomfortable about finding the right words to kindly talk tome, her new roommate, about cleanliness in the bathroom we shared. The prosecution would have you believe this is motivation for murder. But this is a terrifying distortion of the facts, as proving motive it not necessary—anywhere.

19. I did not carry around Rafael’s kitchen knife.  That’s what men are for, to do the lifting for me.

20. This claim by the prosecution, crucial to their theory, is uncorroborated by any physical evidence or witness testimony. I didn’t fear the streets of Perugia and didn’t need to carry around with me a large, cumbersome weapon which would have ripped my cloth book bag to shreds. My book bag showed no signs of having carried a bloody weapon. The claim that he would have insisted I carry a large chef’s knife is not just senseless, but a disturbing indication of how willing the prosecution is to defy objectivity and reason in order to sustain a mistaken and disproven theory.  Yes, i can positively disprove a theory I know nothing about.

21. It is yet another piece of invented “evidence”, another circumstance of theory fabricated to order, because having discovered nothing else, the prosecution could only invent: phone records, false alibis, false statements, false accusations.

22. I had no Contact with Rudy Guide, even though I mention in my book having seen him twice, and a third time in the next paragraph.

23. Like many youth in Perugia, I had once crossed paths with Rudy Guide. He played basketball with the young men who lived in the apartment below us. Meredith and I had been introduced to him together. Perhaps I had seen him amongst the swarms of students who crowded the Perugian streets and pubs in the evenings, but that was it. We didn’t have each other’s phone number, we didn’t meet in private, we weren’t acquaintances. I never bought drugs from Rudy Guide or anyone else. I was having sex with Federico for drugs, which isn’t the same thing.  The phone records show no connection. There are no witnesses who place us together, except my statement here. The prosecution claims I convinced Rudy Guide to commit rape and murder, completely ignoring the fact that we didn’t even speak the same language. He has lived in Perguia for 15 years, and I am a student of Italian. Once again, the prosecution is relying upon a disturbing and unacceptable pattern of distortion of the objective evidence.

24. I am not a psychopath.  That evaluation in 2008 was unfair, as I didn’t get a chance to prepare my spontaneous answers.

25. There is no short list to the malicious and unfounded slanders I have enjoyed over the course of this legal process. In trial, in the media I have been called no less than:

“Conniving; manipulating; man””eater; narcissist; enchantress; duplicitous; adulterer; drug addict; an explosive mix of drugs, sex, and alcohol; dirty; witch; murderer; slanderer; demon; depraved; imposter; promiscuous; succubus; evil; dead inside; pervert; dissolute; a wolf in sheep’s clothing; rapist; thief; reeking of sex; Judas; she-devil;

26. I have never demonstrated anti-social, aggressive, violent, or behavior. Throwing rocks at cars, writing rape stories, and staging break ins are not violent or anti-social.  I am not addicted to sex or drugs.  In fact, Federico Martini hasn’t given me any since I was arrested.  Upon my arrest I was tested for drugs and the results were negative. I am not a split-personality One does not adopt behavior spontaneously.

27. This is a fantasy. This is uncorroborated by any objective evidence or testimony. The prosecution and civil parties created and pursued this character assassination because they have nothing else to show you. They have neither proof, nor logic, nor the facts on their side. They only have their ‘‘evidence’’ against me, and my personal opinions about them. They want you to think I’m a monster because I am telling you they think I am a monster.  it is easy to condemn a monster. It is easy to dismiss a monster’s defense as deception. But the prosecution and civil parties think I’m both severely mistaken and wrong. I have condemned them without proof of wrongdoing, and I seek to convince you to condemn them without proof of wrongdoing.

28. If the prosecution truly had a case against me, there would be no need for these theatrics. Never mind that this is my own appeal, and I ‘‘should’’ be demonstrating why the 2009 trial verdict is unjust.  If I had a case, there would be no need for smoke and mirrors to distract you from the mountains of physical evidence against me. But because this evidence exists that proves my guilt, I would seek to deceive you with these impassioned, but completely inaccurate and unjustified pronouncements. Because I am not a murderer (yet), I would seek to mislead you into convicting me by charging your emotions, by painting me as an innocent until proven guilty, but not as a monster.

29. The prosecution and civil parties are committing injustices against the Kerchers because they cannot bring themselves to admit, even to themselves, that they’ve made a terrible mistake, namely, that the murder was premeditated. Again, it is my own appeal, but they are persecuting me.

30. The Court has seen that the prosecution and civil parties will not hear criticism of their mistakes, by people who won’t attend their appeal.

31. The Court has seen that the prosecution jumped to conclusions at the very start of their investigation: they interrogated and arrested innocent people and claimed “Case Closed"before any evidence could be analyzed, before bothering to check alibis.  As proof of this, they called Raffaele to the police station (at his leisure), to clear up discrepencies in his alibi.  Then when he claimed I lied, Rita Ficarra then asked me for an explanation.  Those brutes!  Then they hauled in Patrick just because in ‘‘confessed’’ several times that he did it.

32. The prosecutor and investigators were under tremendous pressure to solve the mystery of what happened to Meredith as soon as possible. The local and International media was breathing down the necks of these detectives. Their reputations and careers were to be made or broken. In spite of that, they still saw my mistakes. Under pressure, they admitted to as few mistakes as possible and committed themselves to a theory founded upon disproving my mistakes.

33. Had they not jumped to conclusions based on nothing but Raffaele’s changing alibi and my false accusations, they would have discovered definitive and undeniable evidence of not Patrick Lumumba, but of Rudy Guede, Raffaele Sollecito, and Amanda Knox. We would not be here over six years later debating clues my lawyers claim are inconclusive and unreliable.  Had we plead guilty we would have been spared the cost, anguish and suffering, not only of Raffaele’s and my family, but especially of Meredith’s family as well.

34. My accusations are unworthy of judicial or public confidence. In over six years I have failed to provide a consistent, evidence-driven, corroborated theory of the crime, but would nevertheless argue that you should not take my life away. I beg you to see through the ‘‘facts’’ and ‘‘reason’’ of what I say. I am innocent. Raffaele is innocent. Meredith and her family deserve the ‘‘truth’‘. Please put an end to this great and prolonged injustice for them.

in faith,

Amanda Marie Knox

 


Saturday, May 30, 2015

Court Filing Contends Fifth Chambers Encroached Illegally On First Chambers & Florence Court Powers

Posted by Our Main Posters




Overview

It is now 2 months since the oral verdict, and the written verdict is required soon.

We have devoted an entire series by lawyers to showing how unsound in law, in science, in media analysis, and in facts of the case the Marasca/Bruno oral explanations are.

This opinion representing the Perugia and Florence Prosecutions was drafted by several of the most experienced and respected lawyers in Italy.

It was drafted in light of the spoken Fifth Chambers verdict pro-defendant at the end of March. The panel’s written explanation was then overdue. The opinion was filed with the Florence court.

These passages quoted below raise issues of what the Fifth Chambers under the Penal Code legally can and can not do, with respect to prior rulings of (1) the Supreme Court itself, which mostly overturned Hellmann in 2013 for exceeding legal scope; and (2) the Florence (Nencini) appeal court.

According to this opinion, the Fifth Chambers has significantly overstepped its legal boundaries in brushing aside previous rulings and trying to fulfill the role of an appeal court, or a first-level trial court.

This was the same overstretch that the First Chambers concluded the 2011 Hellmann appeal court had wrongly done. Both courts are widely considered in Italy to have been illegally bent.

This is now uncharted territory. If this opinion goes forward the Judges of the First Chambers and Florence court and the Council of Magistrates all seem likely to side with what it claims.  If so reactions might ripple on for years.

The Fifth Chambers judges might find themselves increasingly beleaguered. And their rulings on evidence items and the investigators and prosecutors and foreign media would all seem to be moot, if the perception grows that the Fifth Chambers should not even have gone there.

the judgment of the [Florence] court remitted to would have been impugnable only for reasons not regarding the points already decided by the Court of Cassation, according to the very clear disposition of Article 628, second paragraph, Criminal Procedure Code. From this it follows that the Fifth Chamber of the Supreme Court, called on to decide the merits of the appeals brought by the accused against the decision of the court remitted to, would have had to consider as inadmissible the appeals presented in violation of the second paragraph of Article 628 Criminal Procedure Code and, in any case, would have had to rigorously conform with the points already decided by the First Chamber and with all the questions of law decided by the same”¦

the Court of Cassation cannot, therefore, ever adopt decisions on the merits and issue orders of acquittal under Article 530, second paragraph, Criminal Procedure Code.

...two chambers of the same Court of Cassation, the First (the one competent for proceedings in homicide matters, whose decision of annulment is definitive and who had identified and decided questions of law in a definitive and un-retractable manner) and the Fifth (who would have had to decide the appeals presented only on grounds of legitimacy of the defendants’, constrained by what had already been definitively decided by the First) have handed down two absolutely divergent decisions and the second had annulled the Florentine decision, positively excluding any remitting to another court and acquitting the defendants pursuant to Article 530, second paragraph, Criminal Procedure Code.

the judgment of the [Florence] court remitted to would have been impugnable only for reasons not regarding the points already decided by the Court of Cassation, according to the very clear disposition of Article 628, second paragraph, Criminal Procedure Code. From this it follows that the Fifth Chamber of the Supreme Court, called on to decide the merits of the appeals brought by the accused against the decision of the court remitted to, would have had to consider as inadmissible the appeals presented in violation of the second paragraph of Article 628 Criminal Procedure Code and, in any case, would have had to rigorously conform with the points already decided by the First Chamber and with all the questions of law decided by the same”¦

the Court of Cassation cannot, therefore, ever adopt decisions on the merits and issue orders of acquittal under Article 530, second paragraph, Criminal Procedure Code.

...two chambers of the same Court of Cassation, the First (the one competent for proceedings in homicide matters, whose decision of annulment is definitive and who had identified and decided questions of law in a definitive and un-retractable manner) and the Fifth (who would have had to decide the appeals presented only on grounds of legitimacy of the defendants’, constrained by what had already been definitively decided by the First) have handed down two absolutely divergent decisions and the second had annulled the Florentine decision, positively excluding any remitting to another court and acquitting the defendants pursuant to Article 530, second paragraph, Criminal Procedure Code.

from these starting points in fact and in law which are absolutely undeniable, it emerges that the course of proceedings in this case have been absolutely linear and respectful of the substance of the procedural rules up to and including the Florentine decision.

the Court of Cassation, on the appeal of the Prosecutor-General of [the Perugia] district Court, had in a radical and definitive manner annulled the acquitting pronouncement and had remitted it to the Florentine district court because the same would adopt the consequent decisions of merit in the line of reasoning of the principles of law laid down by the First Chamber of the Supreme Court and of the points decided by it.

These principles of law are by now unmodifiable and unarguable: the [Fifth Chambers] , called on to decide the matter, as a “second opinion”, concerning the appeal of the defendants from the [Florence] judgment below, would have had to hand down a judgment fully within the “railway tracks” of the law, as fixed by the First Chamber, like the Florentine district court did, principles from among which we may cite:

[Umodifiable principle] the principle, in fact the unfailing legal prerequisite of a Supreme Court decision, namely the fact that the Court is precluded from “trespassing into a re-evaluation of the compendium of evidence” (see the judgment of the First Chamber at page 40);

[Unmodifiable principle] the principle of law of the total and holistic evaluation of the probative material, as opposed to the “parcelled-up and atomistic evaluation of the pieces of circumstantial evidence, taking them into consideration one at a time and discarded in terms of their demonstrative potentiality”, which characterised instead, in the negative, the decision of the Court presided by Pratillo Hellmann (see the decision of the same First Chamber at pp. 40 and 41”¦ ). The ancient brocard “Quae singula non probant, simul unita probant” [”˜Those which alone do not prove, together do prove’], quoted on p 41 of the First Chamber’s judgment, consecrates in a definitive and unmodifiable manner this requirement of a global and holistic approach in which each individual piece of the jigsaw puzzle of reconstruction of the facts is considered together with all the others in their demonstrative synergy;

[Unmodifiable principle] the principle by which the [Hellmann] court had run afoul of grave shortcomings and contradictory lines of reasoning and in glaring misrepresentations of the outcome, even in the attempted decoupling of the calunnia, by now definitively attributed to Ms Knox, with the result of masking from view the responsibility of the same in the homicide;

[Unmodifiable principle] the principle according to which the testimony of the homeless person Mr Curatolo ought to have been evaluated on the basis of corroboration between his statements and the objective and unarguable circumstances emerging from the trial (such as the fact that the witness had with absolute decisiveness anchored the fact of having seen the two accused in the precincts of the basketball courts of Piazza Grimana, nowadays Piazza Fortebraccio, the evening before the arrival, the following day, at the Via della Pergola house of the men from Forensics in their white coveralls), rather than on the basis of Mr Curatolo’s social conditions and lifestyle (see the cited judgment of the First Chamber at page 50);

[Unmodifiable principle] the principle according to which the definitive conviction of accomplice Rudy Hermann Guede ought to have been taken into account (no. 7195/11, published on 16.12.2010, it also from the First Criminal Chamber of Cassation), Guede having been held to have been extraneous to the simulation of burglary of a house. [A] habitation that, on the night of the murder, was solely at the availability of the victim and of Amanda Knox and from the statements made by the same Rudy before the Perugian district court, according to which Meredith was killed by the two co-accused (see the judgment at pages 55 and 56).

[Unmodifiable principle] The principle by which contamination of the evidence is to be proved by the party invoking it and which, on the facts of the case, no evidence in support had been offered and which the [Hellmann} Court had seriously confused the abstract possibility of the fact with the averment of the fact (see the judgment at page 69).Umodifiable principle] The principle according to which it was a matter of a homicide committed by multiple persons, in concourse amongst themselves (see page 73 of the cited judgment).

Here is a translation of Article 530:

Article 530:

1. If the act does not subsist [541 2, 542], if the defendant has not commited it [541 2, 542], if the act is not an offence or it is not envisaged by law as an offence, that is, if the offence has been committed by a non-indictable person [c.p. 85] or by a not punishable person for other reasons, the judge issues a judgement of acquittal, stating the reason. 

2.The judge issues a judgement of acquittal also when there is lack of evidence or it is not sufficient, or there is contradictory evidence that the act subsists, that the defendant has comitted it, that the act constitutes an offence or that the offence has been committed by an indictable person.(1).

3. If there is evidence that the act has been committed in circumstances of a legal excuse or exemption from criminal liability, that is, there is doubt about them, the judge issues a judgement of acquittal pursuant to clause 1.

4. In the event of an acquittal the judge applies security measures, in the cases provided for by law.

And here is a translation of Article 628:

Impugnability of a ruling issued by a judge after remand

1. A verdict that had been issued by a court following a Cassation order of remand, may be impugned through a recourse at Supreme Court of Cassation if the ruling was issued on an appeal instance, and through the mean provided by law if was issued on a first instance level.

2. In any case a verdict issued by a court following a Cassation order of remand may be appealed only on the reasons that do not concern those that had already been decided by Cassation on the order of remand, or for not abiding to disposition of art. 627 paragraph 2.


Monday, May 18, 2015

“What It Feels Like To Be Wrongly Accused” Could This Be Your First Draft, Amanda Knox?

Posted by Chimera



Above: someone who unequivocally WAS wrongly accused - and still has seen no justice

What finally was published. You may decide if this was a scrapped first draft, with due caution!

I wanted to get it all out now, so I don’t have to keep explaining it a a hundred times, like I have been on CNN, ABC, NBC, Daybreak, or my memoir, or anyone else who would listen.

I have this dream in my head that when you accuse someone of a horrific act they didn’t do, they inevitably experience shock, disorientation, confusion.  They will likely get their name and photo in the paper, and forever be associated with a vile deed.  The emotional scars will remain, and their families and friends will abandon them or at least lose trust.  However, they did not suffer nearly as bad as you have, as some trauma, such as being slapped in the head, broke you down emotionally.

In all honesty, I know this is as strange to me as it is to everyone else.  Since most people don’t angrily deny false accusations, they just let the pressure squeeze their temples, and they let it become hard to concentrate.  But they are clearly acting suspiciously, if they don’t remember a fact correctly.  But even when they are locked up for that vicious crime, it has to be considered that they are still trying to help the police.

Truthfully, when you falsely accuse someone of murder, police strangely wonder why you did not bring this knowledge up before.  You try to keep a straight face, but there is tension in your right eyebrow, and below your right nostril and sometimes triggers you to twitch uncontrollably, making you self conscious about looking people in the face.  There’s a pinpoint knot that spasms between your heart making it hard to sit still, as your lies are crumbling around you.

But the truth is, this is still much easier than being outside a murder room with your hands over your ears, while your ‘‘friend’’ is being murdered.  After all, it could have been you.  The stress is causing you to vaguely remember things, about obscure texts, and to forget if your boyfriend is with you.  The stress causes you to smell, even after taking a shower, and to wake up first thing in the morning to buy bleach, as a sudden urge for housecleaning is therapeutic.

Honestly, it can be incredibly stressful to have to release this sudden burst of energy.  You yell, are anxious, and hit yourself in the head.  The police try to calm you down with food and drinks, but the visions and dreams are tormenting you, as you imagine that you have witnessed something horrific.  Yes, your friend let out a huge scream as she died, but you are not really lying when you tell the police who did it.  After all, your 2 hour police interview, or was is 14, 35 or 50? Or 150?... was tantamount to torture, and you should not have to be subjected to the stress of having to explain yourself a hundred times while the police investigate the murder of your friend.  You suffered too.

My best truth is that when people don’t trust you after making these false accusations, the anxiety arrives even at the most safe and casual of circumstances.  You’re hypersensitive to what people say, and how they say it.  They seem skeptical when you refer to things constantly as your best truth, or the truth you remember, or the truth you think is closest to the truth. There is an accumulation of primal anger and grief that can give no satisfactory expression when you start talking about visions you had, or how you vaguely remembered something happening. There is always this thought: how can you reconcile with significant parts of society whose trust you have abused?

I have nothing but lies to be afraid of.  But people take things out of context.  Saying someone had their f***ing throat slit is a way of explaining how a person died (even if I didn’t ‘‘officially’’ know it).  That person was my friend.  People can’t admit they were wrong when I make gurgling sounds and call blood ‘‘yucky’‘.  The can’t admit their mistakes when I say I only knew someone for a month, and want to get on with my life.  That person was my friend.  They find fault with everything when I say ‘‘shit happens’‘, and miss the memorial, because someone else made the decision for me.  That person was my friend.  They come up with speculation, and twist things around, and they are haters, when they complain about me wearing Beatles T-shirts in court.

In my head, the trauma felt by the victim of a wrongful accusation is foreign and unimaginable to the majority of people, that’s why I am here to help.  By that I mean write this story, not just make up (more) false accusations.

But, in the closest version of the truth, these are the questions that need answered: Why is the person I falsely accused angry with me?  Why is he not angry with the police for arresting him?  And why are the police now suspicious of me after making a false accusation?  Can they not see that I am a good person?  Why are people angry when I give interviews of get a million dollar book deal?  Can they not see I’ve suffered?  I mean, my friend (whose name I forget), was murdered, but it could just as easily have been me.  Why are people persecuting me? (loud sigh)

Honestly,  I am a victim here.  Why can you not see that?

Anyway, that’s all for now.  Just need to get on with my life.


Thursday, April 23, 2015

Knox Interrogation Hoax #18: Final Pre-Trial Opportunities Which Knox Flunked

Posted by Our Main Posters



Image of Judge Micheli who presided over the hearings that remanded Knox to trial.

1. Overview Of The Interrogation Hoax Series

In Post #1 there’s a long summary of what various courts concluded in sentencing Knox for calunnia to three years. 

All 17 posts prior to this one are linked-to there. The first twelve posts cover the key parts of the trial testimony and evidence from investigators for the events at Perugia’s central police station on 5-6 November 2007.

The next six including this show how Knox failed to convince numerous magistrates at many hearings that she was ever interrogated or abused or made to lie. For the most part in fact she did not even try. 

2. The Six Pre-Trial Opportunities Which Knox Flunked

The previous five posts and this one cover the six hearings from late 2007 to late 2008, any one of which was a big opportunity for Knox. She could have been released if the evidence was weaker and the arguments of herself and her legal team stronger.

Knox blew all six opportunities. The judges were Claudia Matteini, Massimo Ricciarelli and two others, Torquato Gemelli and four others, and Paolo Micheli (this post). A total of 10 judges, and Dr Mignini. After the first two, one of Knox’s lawyers walked off the job.

Those ignorant of the reports of these hearings (all but one newly translated for this series with the Micheli to come) often demonize the prosecutor, Dr Mignini, as somehow taking a harder line than all those judges.

Really?

Read all of the reports and in fact every one of those judges took a harder line than Dr Mignini who worked very hard to be fair. His early version of the attack on Meredith was of an almost accidental death with sexual humiliation in the course of a hazing.

This went out the window, and all of the judges without exception adopted a harder position - that Knox’s anger had spiraled over Meredith’s difficulties with her, and a barbaric 15-minute torture-attack resulted in Meredith’s death which may have been premeditated in a timespan between minutes and days.

Judge Matteini, Judge Ricciarelli, and Judge Micheli (see below) all flat-out warned that they considered RS and AK to be dangerous to others and that they needed to be kept locked up pending trial.  Judge Gemmelli and other Supreme Court judges endorsed this.

Typically Knox was constrained by her lawyers to say little or nothing.

They were already wrestling to try to wind back the three problematic statements she demanded to make on 5-6 November - mainly by changing the subject and aggressively attacking Guede. 

She was allowed to be questioned by Judge Ricciarelli and she herself volunteered to be questioned by Dr Mignini three times, but her performances were shaky and erratic and once she seemed to break down in tears.

There was little or no hint of the inflammatory claims which cost her three years which Knox came up with when she had to take the stand mid-2009 to try to defend her framing of Lumumba.

3. Micheli Hearings September and October 2008

This Sky News report describes how prior to the Micheli hearings Knox’s lawyers seemed pretty desperate to change the subject.

Valter Biscotti and Nicodemo Gentile said they wanted Guede’s trial to be separate from that of Knox and Sollecito because they feared a pact against their client. Mr Biscotti added: “We feel the urgent need to have our trial heard independently of the other two suspects.

In recent weeks a lot of poison has been spread by the defence teams and we feel the necessity to find some form of serenity in a separate hearing.  That’s why we have asked for a fast-track hearing just for our client and we want that hearing as quickly as possible.  At this hearing we will prove that our client has absolutely nothing to do with the tragic death of Meredith Kercher.”

On 16 Sept 2008 Judge Micheli accepted the Guede team’s request for a fast-track trial and as the rules require moved all of the hearings behind closed doors.

A fast-track proceeding is closed to the public, unlike a full trial. It will be held before the same judge, who is expected to issue the verdict at the time he decides whether to indict Knox and Sollecito. The rulings are expected next month.

Judge Micheli had mountains of investigative reports and physical evidence to plow through. He heard witnesses in four hearings (with Meredith’s family present at several) on the DNA collection, on the character of Rudy Guede, and also on the three defendants acting menacing outside their house, which he heavily discounted.

Late on 28 October Judge Micheli issued a 17-page ruling which includes almost no mention of Knox implicating Patrick. He convicted Guede of murder and sexual assault, and sentenced him to 30 years. He also ordered Knox and Sollecito to stand trial on charges of murder and sexual assault.

As the UK Guardian and many other media reported, Judge Micheli assessed Knox and Sollecito as being dangerous. 

The suspected killers of Meredith Kercher were refused transfer from jail to house arrest last night while awaiting trial for her murder, because of the danger that they might flee and kill again.

After 12 hours’ deliberation in Perugia, the judge, Paolo Micheli, said there was a “concrete possibility” that Amanda Knox and her boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito would run off if freed from prison.

In a written ruling to lawyers, he said he believed the murder of the British student was not premeditated, but the likely “absolute disregard” shown by Knox and Sollecito for the victim’s life meant they would be capable of murdering again….

Turning down their request for house arrest yesterday, Micheli agreed with prosecutors that more than one person took part in the sexual assault and murder, dismissing claims that the 47 bruises and knife wounds on Kercher’s body could have been made by a single attacker.

He upheld the testimony of a neighbour who heard more than one person fleeing Kercher’s house, adding that while footprints there might not definitely belong to Knox and Sollecito, they did indicate more than one attacker.

He stood by forensic evidence indicating Kercher’s and Knox’s DNA on a knife found at Sollecito’s house which investigators suspect is the murder weapon, and ruled Sollecito’s DNA on Kercher’s bra strap as reliable evidence.

On 30 October Judge Micheli was interviewed. No sign in this that any claim of unfairness to Knox was on his radar.

4. Apparent False Claim Of A Statement By Knox

Bearing in mind that these hearings were all behind closed doors, none of the Italian and English-language media reports including those of the New York Times make any mention at all of Knox testifying or answering questions. Nor do the books of Sollecito or John Follain.  We are still checking with Italy to make sure.

To jump the gun on the series a bit, a probable non-statement by Knox morphed in Knox’s 2013 book into this heated claim below, which we have already been told, based on court transcripts and Judge Micheli’s immediate 17 page report, was definitely not what was said, if anything, in court.

On October 28, the final day, I got to speak for myself. Since the judge understood English, I stood up without my interpreter and tried to explain what had happened during my interrogation. I told the judge that I hadn’t meant to name Patrick or to cause confusion but that the interrogation had been the most brutish, terrifying experience of my life. I’d been exhausted to begin with, and I had gotten so scared and confused that it was as though I went out of my mind. My interrogators told me that they had evidence I’d been at the villa, that Raffaele was no longer vouching for my whereabouts that night, that I had been through such a horrible trauma, I had amnesia. “I believed them! I’m innocent!” I cried.

Posts #1 to #12 have shown that Knox experienced no “brutish, terrifying experience”. Trauma was inflicted only by Sollecito and then by Knox on herself. With high confidence, we can conclude that as so often in her book Knox was simply making this up. So much for Linda Kulman’s fact checking.

5. The Micheli Sentencing Report Of January 2009

Finally three months later Judge Micheli issued a sentencing report of about 100 pages. While it has still not been fully translated we did summarise it in four posts here.

In the Italian original (which is equally firm to harsh on all three defendants) it is quite graphic about what the physical evidence says of the callous role of Knox and Sollecito in the torture-attack.

Judge Micheli does note how often Knox and Sollecito help to destroy one another’s stories which numerous witnesses confirmed helped to spark Knox’s conniption and framing of Patrick.

There is no mention at all of Knox taking exception to her “interrogation”.


Tuesday, April 21, 2015

The Certainties And Open Questions In The Amanda Knox Trial Starting In Florence On 9 June

Posted by Our Main Posters



Dr Giuliano Giambartolomei prosecutes in both the Sollecito and Knox trials

1. A Bizarre Crime

What Knox will soon be on trial for is one of the most bizarre crimes conceivable.

If you followed all the links in the post directly below this (with more to come soon) you will see that the evidence is overwhelming that Knox maliciously and self-servingly invented the Interrogation Hoax of 5-6 November 2007 for very little likelihood of benefit and with massive damage done to good people and the proud image of Italy.

So what does Knox do? Learn anything? No. She serves three years for framing Patrick - and comes right out of prison to repeat more or less the self-same crime but this time on steroids. Passages in her book and claims in interviews were almost hysterically insistent, and the email she sent to Judge Nencini in December 2013 even more-so. In that email she actually ranted on about torture.

And dozens of others in the US picked up on the false claims and, as Steve Moore and John Douglas and Bruce Fischer did, heavily embellished them. What Knox was convicted for is still right there on a dozen YouTubes all “helpfully” uploaded by Bruce Fischer. 

Some few in Italy might have been undecided a month ago whether Sollecito was really there when Meredith was murdered. But nobody at all in Italy likes the dangerous and inflammatory campaign Knox has spearheaded.

This really could be Knox’s OJ Simpson moment. This time she could face as much as six years, and the US would seem to have zero grounds to resist extradition.

And as Knox was finally confirmed as sentenced for calunnia to the detriment of Lumumba by Cassation in 2013, left unaffacted by Cassation in 2015, Knox can no longer make any claim to have been induced to do so by the police and prosecution.

If she has a viable defense nobody, repeat nobody, right now seems able to imagine it. 

2. The Certainties

The trial will begin on 9 June in the Florence courthouse in front of Judge Anna Liguori.  The lead prosecutor will be Dr Giuliano Giambartolomei who is also the chief prosecutor in the Sollecito & Gumbel book trial which convenes next on 30 April.

While charges in the Sollecito & Gumbel trial are for diffamazione and vilipendio (slander of officials and of the system) the anticipated charges in the Knox case are for the more serious crime of calunnia (for accusing justice officials of crimes in court).

For a very good reason, diffamazione and vilipendio and especially calunnia are taken more seriously in Italy than equivalent contempts in some other systems.

This is because of a long-running (if declining) tendency for “connected” defendants to try to take the justice system down a peg in the hope of an unfair break in trials they or their unsavory buddies are in the midst of.

3. The Open Questions

The Knox book and email to Judge Nencini and TV claims cannot be a part of a calunnia case but certainly can be used as evidence of Knox’s disingenuousness and malice. To what extent this will happen is not clear yet, but signs are a lot of online evidence on these lines is being captured.

Nor is it clear yet who will represent Knox. Possibly Ghirga and Dalla Vedova, but they may not be the “best” team for her as they are credited in Knox’s book for its content and they handed over as a court document the inflammatory Knox email to Judge Nencini. (Remember, Sollecito is not being defended in his trial by Bongiorno or Maori.) 

Nor is it clear yet what line Knox’s defense may take. It is quite out of the question that she again simply repeats the claims that already cost her three years signed off on twice by Cassation. If Sollecito seems seriously stuck for a defense, Knox seems even more-so.

Nor is it clear yet if the defense team will make an immediate bid to Cassation for dismissal. The Fifth Chambers which overturned the murder conviction is already deeply entangled and under scrutiny, and judges there may already be wondering if they have committed career suicide to very little real benefit for anyone.

Also it is not clear yet how this will impact the pending trial of Curt Knox and Edda Mellas for diffamazione for repeating as gospel Knox’s false claims to a British reporter, and we dont know how this will impact Oggi’s trial for enthusiastically publishing some of Knox’s false claims.

It is not clear yet how the Knox PR (if it is still active) or the pro-Knox opportunists or the highly confused US media will handle this - but to repeat as gospel any of Knox’s claims could from now on be legally radioactive.

it is not clear yet how the Obama Administration will (if at all) react to this. Whether there will again be covert intervention, or whether they will finally concede that Italy did get it right and crimes should be paid for and not given a free pass. 

Finally, will Knox again be a no-show in Florence, as she was (against her lawyers best advice) at her own appeal? And if so, will she and her forces again falsely claim that she is being tried in absentia? That wouldnt win her points in Italy.

4. Further Background

Click here:   1. Could The Italian Authorities Be Starting A Wave Of Libel + Slander Investigations?

Click here:   2. Interrogation Hoax: Knox Hearing On Calunnia Charges, Then Trial To Resume June 16

Click here:   3. Calunnia Claims At The Core Of The Problem For Amanda Knox - And Her Parents

Click here:   4. Knox Calunnia Hearing: Amanda Knox Enters Court Via The Underground Entrance

Click here:   5. Another In Seeming Never-Ending Disasters For Hapless Knox Campaign

Click here:   6. A Perugian Media Report (Neutral As Usual) In Italian On Knox’s Calunnia Hearing

Click here:   7. Curt Knox And Edda Mellas Defamation Trial To Go Ahead On July 4

Click here:   8. Umbria’s Chief Prosecutor Will Proceed Against Knox And Sollecito And Also Aviello

Click here:   9. The Curt Knox And Edda Mellas Diffamazione Trial Will Resume In Perugia 30 March.

Click here:   10. False Allegations Against Italian Officialdom Sparking Increasingly Tough Legal Reaction

Click here:   11. An Overview From Italy #2: Current Perceptions In Italy, Sollecito Case, Mignini’s Full Vindication

Click here:   12. With Diffamazione Complaint Against False Claims In Oggi Knox’s Legal Prospects Continue To Slide

Click here:   13. Expected Calunnia And Diffamazione Trials Could Reverse Another Attempt To Take Justice Down A Peg

Click here:   14. Questions For Knox: Did You Undergo An Illegal Interrogation By Mignini Or Did You Try To Frame Him?

Click here:   15. Desperate Ghirga Urges Amanda Knox To Show At Florence Appeal, But She’s Created More Problems

Click here:   16. Pushback Against Mafia Playbook Gathers Speed With Denial Of False Accusation of “Satanic Theory

Click here:   17. Why It Will Be Republic Of Italy v Knox And Sollecito For The Myriad False Claims They Have Made

Click here:   18. False Claims By Amanda Knox & The Book Team May End Up Costing $10 Million


Wednesday, March 11, 2015

Precise Reasons For Arrests Of Sollecito, Lumumba And Knox On 6 Nov 2007

Posted by Our Main Posters



From the east. Foreground, Perugia’s main courts, background judges & prosecutors’ offices

1. The Warrant For Three Arrests

This key document has now been obtained and translated and included in the Wiki casefile. Some context is offered in Part 2.

The arrest warrant was drafted and signed by Dr Mignini. He did so in the prosecutors’ offices in Perugia’s central courthouse (image at top) at 8:40 am.

Note that, critically, it includes reference to Knox’s spontaneous chatter and her knowledge of the dynamics of the crime.

PUBLIC PROSECUTOR’S OFFICE, COURT OF PERUGIA

N. 19738/07 R.G. Mod. 44

DETENTION ORDER ISSUED BY THE PUBLIC PROSECUTOR

(artt. 384, comma 1 c.p.p)

TO THE JUDGE OF PRELIMINARY INVESTIGATION OF THE COURT OF PERUGIA

The public prosecutor Dr. Giuliano Mignini

Based on the records of the above-mentioned proceeding;

Having found that there are serious indications of the crimes of complicity in aggravated murder Article 576 n.5 c.p.e. and sexual assault for which we are proceeding, against DIYA Lumumba, born in Kindu (Zaire) on 5.05.1969, KNOX Amanda Marie and SOLLECITO Raffaele, already identified, for the following reasons:

Regarding KNOX and DIYA, the first made glaringly contradictory and not credible statements during the investigation. In particular KNOX claimed to have spent the night between November 1st and 2nd in the company of SOLLECITO Raffaele whom she met a few days before the event while he, after initially confirming the statements made by KNOX, confessed to have lied instructed by KNOX and made clear that he separated from KNOX at 21.30 of November 1st 2007, remaining at his house where he received a phone call from his father on the land line at 23:30.

Furthermore from the data relating to the phone traffic of the number 3484673590 in use by KNOX there emerges a lack of phone traffic from 20:35 of November 1st to 12:00 November 2nd. Same lack of phone traffic from 20:42 of November 1st to 06:02 of November 2nd is found in the phone traffic of 3403574303 in use by SOLLECITO Raffaele.

At 20:35 of November 1st was found an outgoing text message from the number 3484673509 belonging to KNOX sent to 3387195723 belonging to the co-defendant PATRICK to whom she communicates “see you later” which confirms that in the following hours KNOX was together with DIYA in the apartment where the victim was.

KNOX, in the statement made today has, in the end, confessed the dynamics of the committed crimes against KERCHER: the accused, in fact, first claimed to have met with DIYA, as communicated to him with the text message found in the phone memory of her cell phone by the operating Postal Police, text message sent at 20:35 in reply to a text message from DIYA sent at 20:18, detected thanks to the analysis of the phone traffic related to KNOX.

This last text message is not present in the cell phone memory.

KNOX in her witness statement from today has then confessed that, meeting DIYA in the basketball court of Piazza Grimana, she went together with DIYA to Meredith’s house, where DIYA, after having sex with the victim, killed her.

The sexual intercourse must be deemed violent in nature considering the particularly threatening context in which it took place and in which KNOX has surely aided DIYA.

In addition to this it should be pointed out that KNOX, in her spontaneous declarations from today, has consistently confirmed to have contacted DIYA, to have met with him on the night between November 1st and 2nd and to have gone with him to the apartment where the victim lived. She then said that she stayed outside of Meredith’s room while DIYA set apart with her and also added that she heard the girl’s screams.

KNOX reported details that confirm her own and Sollecito Raffaele’s involvement in the events, like the fact that after the events she woke up in the bed of the latter.

As far as the essential facts against SOLLECITO there are numerous verifiable inconsistencies in his first declarations, in respect to the last ones and the fact that, from a first inspection, the print of the shoe found on SOLLECITO appears to be compatible in its shape with the one found on the crime scene.

Moreover, there is the fact that KNOX claimed to not remember what happened between the victim’s screams up until she woke up in the morning in SOLLECITO’s bed, who was also found in possession of a flick knife that could abstractly be compatible for dimension and type (general length of 18cm, of which 8,5 blade), with the object that must have produced the most serious injury to the victim’s neck.

Having considered all the elements described and all converging findings of the intense and detailed investigations conducted after the discovery of Kercher’s body and culminating with the confession and indicated complicity of DIYA, also known as “Patrick” by KNOX, there is substantial serious evidence of the crimes for which we are proceeding to allow the detention, given the limits of the sentence.

Likewise there must be considered a founded and valid danger of flight especially for DIYA since he is a non-EU citizen and in consideration of the specific seriousness and brutality of the crimes, especially that of sexual violence and the possibility of the infliction of a particularly heavy sentence.

In regards to KNOX she has shown a particular ruthlessness in lying repeatedly to the investigators and in involving in such a serious event the young SOLLECITO.

Having regard to Art.384 comma 1 c.p.p.

ORDERS

The detention of DIYA Lumumba, KNOX Amanda Marie and SOLLECITO Raffaele, already identified, and to be taken to the local District Prison.

We proceed to request validation of the detention in the separate document.

Forward to the Secretary area of authority with regard to recognition of Diya Lumumba and Amanda Marie Knox, born in Washington (USA) on 07/09/1987, based in Perugia, Via della Pergola 7, and Raffaele Sollecito, also already identified.

Perugia, November 6th 2007, h.8,40

PUBLIC PROSECUTOR

(DR. GIULIANO MIGNINI)

2. The Context Of The Arrests

Knox had turned up at the central police station unannounced, apparently to keep tabs on RS. After a delay in finding something for her to do, and in getting the interpreter by her side, she sat with Rita Ficarra building a list of possible perps with phone numbers and residences on maps.

Having been told in a rather low-key way that Sollecito had just said she was not with him on the fateful night for several hours, and she had made him lie (see the post just below), there was a tension-filled pregnant pause while Knox apparently racked her brains for a Plan B.

By 1.45 AM, having explosively fingered Patrick when a message to him fortuitously showed up on her mobile phone, and after considerable spontaneous chatter, she had insisted on writing and signing this statement.

Three hours later Dr Mignini had arrived and discussed this development with others. Then he advised Knox of her rights, including the right to have her lawyer there.

Heedless of that advice, after more spontaneous chatter (actually referred to in the arrest warrant below), Knox insisted on writing and signing this statement while all the court officers sat idly by.


Monday, March 09, 2015

The Meredith Case Wiki Now Has The Key Sollecito Statement 6 Nov 2007 In Full

Posted by Our Main Posters



Perugia’s central police station where Sollecito made the statement posted here


The ever-expanding Wiki can of course be found here.

A post follows soon with guidance to the numerous new documents it contains. This was an extremely well documented case with discussions carefully recorded and decisions explained every step of the way.

We have frequently noted for example that RS and AK were provided with an extraordinary total of SIX opportunities in 2007 and 2008 to head off a trial and to be released.

Each opportunity is very well documented (Matteini hearings, Ricciarelli hearings, Mignini hearings, Supreme Court rulings, and the two Micheli rulings) and the transcripts and reports make very clear why RS and AK failed each time.

Not one of those transcripts or rulings has been “explained” or rebutted by the RS and AK apologists. It is very clear now that their falsifying efforts are being left way back there in the dust.

Document after document after document proving the case is going live in English for which they have been able to create no response.  For example, the “brutal” Knox “interrogation” on 6 November is absolutely vital to their body of claims.

But document after document has shown that to be simply a huge hoax.  Dumb silence is the only response.

This new translation of Sollecito’s statement of 6 November 2007 in the central police station, complete for the first time, has just gone live on the Wiki here. As always, we sure appreciate the translation help.

Note: Many of the claims here were proved wrong by phone and computer records and those dropping Knox in the soup contradict claims by Knox.

Sollecito never agreed to testify or be cross-examined on this or many other statements . Smart move, from his point of view. At the same time from 20007 to 2016 Sollecito NEVER testified that Knox was simply at his home all of the 5 November 2007 night. 

Perugia Police Headquarters
Flying Squad
General Affairs Area.

SUBJECT: Witness statement of person informed of the facts given by SOLLECITO Raffaele, already identified.

On November 5th 2007 at 22:40 in the offices of the Flying Squad of the Perugia Police Headquarters. Before the undersigned of the Criminal Investigation Dept. Deputy Commissioner MONICA NAPOLEONI, Chief Inspector Antonio FACCHINI Vice Superintendent of Police Daniele MOSCATELLI, Assistant Chief Ettore FUOCO is present the above-mentioned who, to supplement the declarations made [November] in these Offices, in regards to the facts being investigated, declares as follows: [*A.D.R. = Question Answer = QA]

QA I have known Amanda for about two weeks. From the night that I met her she started sleeping at my house. On November 1st, I woke up at around 11, I had breakfast with Amanda then she went out and I went back to bed. Then around 13:00-14:00 I met her at her house again. Meredith was there too. Amanda and I had lunch while Meredith did not have lunch with us.

QA Around 16:00 Meredith left in a hurry without saying where she was going. Amanda and I stayed home until about 17:30-18:00.

QA We left the house, we went into town, but I don’t remember what we did.
QA We stayed there from 18:00 until 20:30/21:00. At 21:00 I went home alone because Amanda told me that she was going to go to the pub Le Chic because she wanted to meet some friends.

QA At this point we said goodbye and I headed home while she headed towards the center.

QA I went home alone, sat at the computer and rolled myself a spliff. Surely I had dinner but I don’t remember what I ate. Around 23:00 my father called at my home number 075.9660789. During that time I remember Amanda had not come back yet.

QA I browsed at my computer for another two hours after my father’s phone call and only stopped when Amanda came back presumably around 1:00.

QA I don’t remember how she was dressed and if she was dressed the same way as when we said goodbye before dinner.

QA I don’t remember if we had sex that night.

QA The following morning around 10:00 we woke up, she told me she wanted to go home and take a shower and change clothes.

QA In fact at around 10:30 she went out and I went back to sleep. When she went out that morning to go to her house, Amanda also took an empty bag telling me she needed it for dirty clothes.

QA At around 11:30 she came back home and I remember she had changed clothes; she had her usual bag with her.

QA I don’t know the contents of her bag.

QA I remember we immediately went to the kitchen, we sat down and talked for a while, perhaps we had breakfast. In that circumstance Amanda told me that when she got to her house she found the entrance door wide open and some traces of blood in the small bathroom and she asked me if it sounded strange. I answered that it did and I also advised her to call her housemates. She said she had called Filomena but that Meredith was not answering.

QA At around 12:00 we left the house; passing through Corso Garibaldi we arrived in Piazza Grimana, then we went through the Sant’ Antonio parking lot and reached Amanda’s house. To walk there it took us about 10 minutes.

QA As soon as we got there she opened the door with her keys, I went in and I noticed that Filomena’s door was wide open with some glass on the floor and her room was in a complete mess. The door to Amanda’s room was open and I noticed that it was tidy. Then I went towards Meredith’s door and saw that it was locked. Before this I looked to see if it was true what Amanda had told me about the blood in the bathroom and I noticed drops of blood in the sink, while on the mat there was something strange - a mixture of blood and water, while the rest of the bathroom was clean.

QA I went to the kitchen and saw that everything was in order, then went around the rest of the house, I went to Laura’s room and noticed it was tidy. In that moment Amanda went inside the big bathroom, next to the kitchen and came out frightened and hugging me tight telling me that earlier, when she took the shower, she had seen feces inside the toilet, while now the toilet was clean. QA I just took a rapid glance at the bathroom trusting what Amanda had told me.

QA At that point I was asking myself what could have happened and I went out to find Meredith’s window to see if I could climb to it. I went outside with Amanda and she tried to climb to it, I immediately stopped her telling her to not do it because it was dangerous. I then told Amanda that the best solution was to break down the door, I tried to kick it and shoulder it open but I didn’t manage to open it. Then I called my sister on her cellphone and asked her what I should do since she is a Carabinieri lieutenant. My sister told me to call the Carabinieri (112, the Italian emergency number), which I did, but in the meantime the Postal Police showed up.

QA In my previous statement I told a load of rubbish because Amanda had convinced me of her version of the facts and I didn’t think about the inconsistencies. I heard the first statements that she made to the Postal Police who intervened at the place.

QA She always carried a big bag that she also had the night of November 1st.

The investigating officials acknowledge that the deposition ends at 3:30 (AM) of November 6th 2007.


Thursday, March 05, 2015

Ten Of The Ways In Which The FOA Petition That The State Department Accepted Is Dishonest

Posted by Our Main Posters




1. Post Overview

It is hard to believe that the Knox PR is guided by a professional - good PR operatives know to just shade the truth.

Again and again in sharp contrast the Knox PR tries to go 180 degrees the other way. Down is up. Black is white. “Don’t believe your lying eyes” stuff.

Instead of making one or two mistakes, it makes hundreds - and then lets them stand when challenged. Many amount simply to childish tantrums.

In Italy all the lawyers (on both sides), and all the judges, and all the media, simply ignore them.

This is made easy enough, as they are usually pushed out only in English in relative safety across the Atlantic.

This is a great example.

2. The ChangeOrg Petition by The Knox PR

The guilt of the pair was confirmed by the Nencini appeal court in Florence six weeks ago. What was particularly telling was the stark two-day presentation of the massive evidence by Prosecutor Crini.

It caused Sollecito to miss the second day and then head off “secretly” to the Dominican Republic to seek help there. 

It also caused this shrill and inaccurate petition in which, tellingly, none of the defense lawyers played any part - possibly as they have been highly critical of previous scaremongering.

The petition consists mostly of blustery innuendo. No supporting facts are pointed to. It is inaccurate on the judicial sequence, on official motives throughout, and on Italian law. It omits the prosecution case which took Prosecutor Crini two days to present.

In the shrill tone and false claims it resembles the Knox email to Judge Nencini ten weeks previously, and numerous attempts by Knox apologists Heavey & Bremner and Italian MP Rocco Girlanda to influence top leaders (all failures).

Any Italian court would take this to be an attempt to throw an ongoing legal process through dishonest means, a mafia technique, which is a felony (vilipendio) in Italy.

These are some of the major errors. 

1) Unspecified claim of corruption by Italian state?

Neither defense team ever claimed this. There was demonstrably no official corruption at any point, and no obvious reason for it. The entire legal process was closely supervised by a series of judges including Supreme Court justices and fully documented.

There IS public proof of corruption (the Hellmann appeal court was subverted) but that was effected by the defense teams.

2) Unspecified claim of abuse of RS and AK?

Neither defense team ever claimed this. Both were treated extremely well. Knox conceded that at trial. There was no abuse of the pair, ever, and significantly no paper trail of complaints by either the two defenses or the US Embassy monitoring the process.

In fact the defenses have almost invariably inclined the other way, stating that claims of abuse by the PR are a foolish way to go. In 2008 they publicly requested that Knox stop lying.

3) Claim of abusive interrogation of Knox?

Neither defense team ever claimed this. There was no abusive interrogation of Knox on 5-6 Nov - in fact, there was no interrogation at all. In great detail what happened was described at trial.

Knox had insisted on being there, and when asked she agreed to list possible perps, all of whom the cops extensively checked out. She herself incessantly offered explanations on the night (all part-true and part-false) when she was told Sollecito did not support her latest alibi.

She herself insisted on putting them in writing. The investigators tried hard on the night to calm her as she herself confirmed at trial.

4) Legal representation denied?

Neither defense team ever claimed this. Knox was repeatedly told she should have a lawyer present when she explosively “confessed” on 5-6 November 2007. Knox herself shrugged off the need for a lawyer on that night as her statements came pouring out - even after Dr Mignini had read her her rights - as multiple witnesses testified.

Knox still cant explain why she twice claimed she headed out alone on the night, leaving Sollecito behind. Or why she lied about Dr Mignini abusively questioning her at her first session finishing at 1:45 am when in fact he was home in bed.

5) The pair held unfairly before trial?

Neither defense team ever claimed this. RS and AK had SIX opportunities between November 2007 and January 2009 to get themselves freed or moved to house arrest. They failed each time and all courts gave detailed reasoning. In one of those it was the Court of Cassation which turned them down. Each often blamed the other.

The supervising magistrate Judge Matteini documented an extensive list of evidence against them and ruled that if allowed house arrest they could flee or cause harm to witnesses. This was not based on a single fact as claimed.

6) Guede’s process unfair to them?

Neither defense team ever claimed this. The claims about Guede in that petition are upside down. He did not target the pair in 2008 - in reality they went gunning for him and sustained that right through trial on a daily basis to the final appeals.

This was public knowledge in mid 2008 as this UK report shows.

Claims have been made of a pact between Knox and her Italian former boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito, 24. It is alleged their lawyers have agreed to work together to blame the murder on Rudy Guede, 21, a part-time gardener from the Ivory Coast and the third accused.

Now, Guede’s lawyers are threatening to call for a separate trial for him alone - well away from the legal teams of the other two whom they fear could prejudice his case.

It is a pact, says Guede’s lawyer Walter Biscotti, that can be traced back to July when Sollecito sent Knox a bouquet of yellow flowers on her 21st birthday which both celebrated in prison.

‘There is a clear desire to make Rudy the guilty party, and it’s clear they will try anything,’ Biscotti said.

Added: In July 2013 lawyer James Raper put up this post: Did Guede’s Separate Trial REALLY Impact Negatively On RS And AK?

7) Guede fingered the pair?

Neither defense team ever claimed this. Guede did not testify at the 2009 trial, he just sat there mute and then went away. In sharp contrast, the RS and AK teams introduced witness after witness attempting to do maximum harm to him long before his own legal process was concluded. For example: 

    (a) The witness who said Guede was in his apartment; but he had not even reported that to the cops, and Judge Micheli concluded he was a publicity hound at best.

    (b) The two lawyers who said someone broke into their office; but even they hinted it was really a work-related hit as legal documents had been gone though and some probably copied and removed in a car by several persons.

    (c) The head of the pre-school in Milan; but she could not even call Guede’s presence a break-in, because he must have been given a key to get in.

    (d) Both defenses labeled him a drifter, drug dealer, woman-molester and habitual thief. No proofs for any of these charges was presented.

This was highly unfair to Rudy Guede. His own legal process was far from over. Neither he nor his lawyers were even in court to cross-examine or repudiate any of those witnesses. The prosecution took zero role - merely observed, and asked zero questions - so in reality it was the RS and AK defenses and not Guede who had an unfair edge here.

8) Courts wrongly tied them with Guede?

Neither defense team ever claimed this. The closed sessions at trial in 2009 showed conclusively to the judges that there had been THREE attackers which the defenses simply had to agree to.

The Sollecito defense put Alessi and Aviello on the stand. Bizarrely, the mafioso Aviello pointed AWAY from Guede; he claimed two others had done it; then he claimed the Sollecito defense team had offered payment.

Cassation did not say in ending Guede’s process that it must have been RS and AK along with Guede at the crime. It left who they were open.  Cassation simply agreed that there were three

9) Guede did the crimes by himself?

Neither defense team ever claimed this, for the reason explained directly above: too much evidence. This was not a one man crime by a rapist or burglar (a burglar at 8:00 in the evening, with cars around and some tenants probably at home in the house?). It was provably a 15-minute torture and humiliation pack-attack, fueled by rage, drugs,  and quite probably jealousy.

Knox’s trial and appeal courts both concluded that she plunged in the knife. Sollecito and Guede have shown strong signs of not having not been pre-warned, and remaining sore and resentful of Knox ever since.

10) Omitted is enormous factual evidence

As usual with the PR a huge amount about the case and RS and AK is simply left out. Here is a comment from another thread attacking CBS which explains how this lies-of-omission approach works (or doesn’t work) and the same omissions apply to the petition.

If you watch the numerous CBS videos or read the numerous attacks on Italy on their site, do you spot a trend? CBS 48 Hours is prone to leaving an awful lot out.

Where is CBS’s translation of even one major document? Where is evidence of knowledge of even one court transcript? Where is the real reason the appeals were allowed? Where are the six opportunities RS and AK were given before trial to prove they had no role? Where are the bad times the defense had in 2009? What about the lengthy trial sessions behind closed doors? Where are the numerous conflicting alibis?  Where are the numerous whacks at one another by RS and AK? Where is AK’s disastrous stint on the stand? Where is any mention of the dealer Knox screwed for drugs? Where is the current trial of RS for his book? Where is the trial of Oggi for Knox’s book? Where is the Knox interrogation hoax? Where is the Carabineri lab nailing the “science” of C&V? Where is the known corruption of the Hellmann court? Where is the downfall of defense witnesses Alessi and Aviello? Where is the Guede/lone-wolf hoax?  Where is the downward spiral of Frank Sforza now on trial in Italy and wanted by US and Canadian police? Where is any fair remark about the Italian system or its staff? Where is the long overdue expose of the Preston hoaxes? Why are Spetzi’s many losses in court not there? Where is the truth about the Narducci 22? Where is Dr Mignini’s total rebound and promotion after Cassation sharply repudiated a rogue prosecutor and judge in Florence?  Why does CBS feel such a need to defame so many Italians in English from so far? Where is any mention of the PR’s corrupting very big bucks?

We have no problem seeing the foolish petition remain up - but in their own best interests Knox herself and Sollecito himself should want the incriminating thing taken down. It will merely further annoy the courts.

And they really should tell the blundering Marriott and his online thugs to get lost.

3. Even Knox Supporters Despise This

Not the first time the forever-grandstanding Pruett spikes anger among her own people. This is from one of their myriad sites; she has often claimed she is closer to Curt Knox than any of them.

This person, Karen, is not worth the time or attention she is getting. She has no expertise in any remotely relevant subject matter, does not speak a word of Italian, and has largely exaggerated the slenderest of ties to the victim. She did not even attend high school at the same time as Knox’s father - she is 59 years old FFS.


Tuesday, December 16, 2014

Knox Interrogation Hoax #17: Fifth Opportunity Knox Flunked: RS Supreme Court Appeal

Posted by Our Main Posters



Media outside the Cassation back entrance waiting for news of the ruling

1. Where This Series Stands

Dozens of people have very aggressively gone to bat for Knox over her “interrogation” and still do.

They trust that one or other of her versions of the 5-6 November 2007 police-station session is right.

We have been demonstrating the rock-solid evidence that Knox and her supporters have lied and lied and there will be more evidence of this to come.

We’ve shown in this series that Knox insisted on being there; she was merely helping to build a list; she was treated kindly and taken for refreshments; she was the only one overheard by anyone to raise her voice, when she screamed about Lumumba “He did it!”; it was Sollecito not the police saying that she had been lying and had made him lie; and there is documentary evidence that the police investigators who sat with Knox told the truth.

Coming soon, we are going to post hundreds of very nasty claims by Knox shills, all sparked by and never reigned in by Knox.

2. The Pre-Trial Hurdles Knox Failed

Do you know how many major opportunities before her 2009 trial started Knox was given to get the murder charges dropped? This is not something Knox supporters trumpet about, if they even know.

In fact there were six, and Knox dismally failed them all.

In 2007 there were (1) the Matteini hearing and (2) the Ricciarelli hearing in November and (3) the Mignini interview in December.  And in 2008 there were (4) the separate Knox appeal and Sollecito appeal to the Supreme Court in April, and (5) the first Micheli hearings in September, and (6) the second Micheli hearings in October, which dispatched Knox and Sollecito for trial.

In all six instances Knox’s team also had the opportunity to get the charges against Knox for calunnia against Lumumba dropped.

3. Sollecito’s appeal to the Supreme Court

In Knox Interrogation Hoax #16 we described the fourth pre-trial hurdle Knox failed to make. That was her appeal to the Supreme Court against the Matteini and Ricciarelli rulings that much evidence pointed to her and for the safety of others she needed to be kept locked up.

Knox hadnt really lifted a finger to deflect suspicion away from Sollecito and the same thing applied in reverse from 2007 right through to 2014 with the one bizarre exception of Sollecito’s book.

Catnip kindly provided this translation below of Cassation’s ruling on Sollecito’s appeal in April 2008 that much evidence pointed to him too and for the safety of others he also needed to be kept locked up.

If Sollecito had not fingered Knox at his own interrogation on 5-6 November 2007 which set her fireworks off, here was his second chance after his memo to Judge Matteini to set things straight and get her off the hook. 

So did he? No. He again left Knox dangling in the wind. 

Summary: Held: the decision to continue pre-trial prison detention for the suspect was reasonable.

THE REPUBLIC OF ITALY
IN THE NAME OF THE ITALIAN PEOPLE
THE SUPREME COURT OF CASSATION
SECTION 1 CRIMINAL DIVISION

Comprised of the most Honourable Justices:
Dr Torquato GEMELLI - President -
Dr Emilio Giovanni GIRONI - Member -
Dr Maria Cristina SIOTTO - Member -
Dr Umberto ZAMPETTI - Member -
Dr Margherita CASSANO - Member -

have pronounced the following

JUDGMENT

on the appeal lodged by:

(1) RS, born on X, against Order of 30/11/2007 Liberty Court of Perugia;

having heard the relation made by Member Emilio Giovanni Gironi;

having heard the conclusions of the Prosecutor-General Dr Consolo for its rejection;

having heard the defence advocates G and T (substituting for advocate M).

REASONS FOR THE DECISION

The order referred to in opening confirmed, at the Re-examination stage, the one by which the GIP [the Preliminary Investigation Magistrate] had applied pre-trial prison detention of RS for participation in the murder of MSCK, the which occurring in Perugia on the evening of the 1st of November 2007 by means of a cutting weapon, in an alleged context of sexual assault by a group, in which there would have taken part, in addition to S, his girlfriend AK and a RHG, who had left behind a palm print on the bloodied pillow on which the victim’s body was resting and whose DNA was found on the vaginal swab taken from the body of the same and on faecal traces found in a bathroom of the house that the victim was sharing with Ms AK and two Italian students.

The picture of circumstantial evidence specifically concerning S consists of the identification of a print left in haematic material present at the scene of the crime of a sports shoe held to be compatible, because its dimensions and configuration of the sole, with the type of footwear, “N” brand size 42.5, used by the suspect; of the recovery ““ in the kitchen of his house ““ of a kitchen knife bearing traces of Ms AK’s DNA on the handle and on the blade traces of Ms MK’s DNA; and of the collapse of the alibi put up by the young man (having been disproven by technical investigations carried out), in which, as asserted by him, he had interacted with his computer during the hours in which, according to the forensic pathologist’s reconstruction, the criminal fact would have occurred, that is between 22:00 and 23:00 of the 1st November 2007; from the investigations carried out up until now it would appear, in fact, that the last interaction with the machine on 1 November occurred at 21:10 and that the subsequent one took place at 5:32 the day after, when S also reactivated his mobile phone, acts witnessing thereby an agitated and sleepless night. Equally disproven was that the young man had received a phone call from his father at 23:00 on the night of the murder, it resulting, instead, that said call had happened at 20:40.

Against S, caught at the time of arrest with a switchblade initially considered compatible with the wounds found on the neck of the victim, would line up, in addition, the mutability of the stories given to the investigators by the same and by his girlfriend, having initially maintained they had remained the whole evening and night in the young man’s house, later to state, instead, that at a certain point Ms AK would have left to meet the Ivorian [sic] citizen PDL, manager of a pub in which Ms AK was undertaking casual employment, she making a returning to her boyfriend’s house only around one in the morning.

It must, finally, be added that the same Ms AK had, amongst other things, initially referred (not confirming, in any case, the thesis in confused and contradictory subsequent versions) to having taken herself to her own house with L, where this latter (he also was struck with a custody order, later revoked after the previously mentioned identification of G’s DNA) had had sexual relations with Ms MK, and to having, while she herself was in the kitchen, heard her friend scream, without, further, remembering anything else of the subsequent events, up until the occurrences of the day after, marked by the discovery of traces of blood in the small bathroom next to Ms MK’s room and culminating in the discovery of the body, after the intervention of the forces of law and order (the police appear, in particular, to have intervened prior to the call to 112 effected by S); in particular, the young woman was specifically pointing out not being able to remember whether S were also present in the victim’s house on the occasion of the events just described.

The Re-examination Court concluded recognizing, for the purposes of maintaining pre-trial detention, the persistence of all the types of pre-trial exigencies mentioned by Article 274 Criminal Procedure Code.

The S defence has indicated an appeal, on the grounds of, with new reasons as well:

““ reference to Ms AK alone of the circumstantial evidence constituted by the presence of biological traces from her and from the victim on the knife found at S’s house;

““ absence, at the scene of the crime, of biological traces attributable to the suspect [ndr: note, this was before the bra-clasp tests had been done];

““ arbitrary transference onto S of the weighty circumstantial evidence against Ms AK, on the unfounded assumption that the pair could not have been anything but together at the moment of the homicidal fact;

““ inexistent evidential value of the phases relative to the discovery of the body;

““ absence of blood traces from the soles of the “N” shoes worn by the suspect even at the moment of his arrest;

““ absence of any evidential value of merit, alleged failure of the alibi, constituting the use of his computer, of which the falsity has not in any case been ascertained, of the lack of interaction by the subject with the machine after the last operation at 21:10 not permitting the inference that the computer was not, however, engaged in downloading files (being, to be specific, films);

““ irrelevancy of the mistake revealed between the indicated time of the phone call to the father furnished by S and the actual time of the call, given the uncertainty of the time of death of the victim, depending on the time, otherwise uncertain, of the consumption of the dinner (according to various witness statements coinciding with 18:00), it being well able, therefore, for the time indicated by the forensic pathologist (23:00) to be revised backwards to 21:00, a little before which time the witness P had referred to having made a visit to S, finding him at home and not on the verge of going out;

““ interpretability of the so-called unlikelihood of the versions supplied by the suspect as attempts to cover for (aid and abet) another subject;

““ attribution of the victim’s biological traces found on the knife seized at S’s house to chance contamination not related to the homicidal fact;

““ insufficiency of the pre-trial exigencies, having diminished in a probative sense after the return to Italy of G; those relating to risk of flight lacking in specificity and concreteness; and with reference to the conventional content of blogs posted on the internet by the suspect, those relating to danger to society illogically reasoned;

““ missing appearance of the young man’s walk, via security cameras installed along the route that the aforesaid would have had to traverse to go from his house to that of the victim’s.

THE APPEAL IS UNFOUNDED

As regards what this Court is permitted to appreciate, not being able here to proceed with a re-reading of the investigative results nor with an alternative interpretation of the factual data referred to in the custody order, the appellant defence substantially contests the recognition, as against S, of the necessary requisite of grave indicia of culpability. The question thus posed and submitted for scrutiny by this bench of the well-known limits of the competence of the court of merit, it must be held that the finding expressed by the Re-examination judges concerning the gravity of the frame of circumstantial evidence is not susceptible to censure.

Not upheld, in the first place, is the defence submission according to which the knife bearing the genetic prints of Ms AK and of Ms MK found in S’s house would constitute a piece of evidence relevant solely as against the young woman, even if privy of traces attributable to the suspect, the utensil has as always been found in the young man’s house, and the testimony acquired up until now has led to the exclusion that it formed part of the inventory of the house inhabited by the victim, and which, at the time, and until proved to the contrary, must be held to be the same available for use by the suspect and which had been used in MK’s house, there being contested no access by her to S’s house.

Given the multitude of group contributive possibilities, the fact is not significative, then, in itself being a neutral element, that on the scene of the crime there are no biological traces attributable to S, to which, in any case, is attributable the “N” brand shoe print considered compatible, by dimensions and sole configuration, with the footwear worn by the suspect at the time of arrest. Although having the same impugned order excluded, at the time, the certainty of the identification constitutes as, in any case, a certain datum that the print in question had been made in haematic material found in Ms MK’s room by a shoe of the kind and of the dimensions of those possessed by the appellant, while it remains to be excluded that this could have originated from G’s shoe, who wore a size 45 and, therefore, dimensions notably larger. The revealed coincidence, notwithstanding the residual uncertainty on the identification, assumes particular valency in relation to the restricted circle of subjects gravitating to the scene of the homicide, with not even Ms AK, who made admissions about her presence on site at the same time as the execution of the offence, excluding the presence of her boyfriend in the victim’s house in the same circumstance; nor can it be held that the print could have been left by S the following morning, he never having claimed to have entered into the room wherein the body was lying.

It does not answer, therefore, to verity that, as against the young man, there had been recognized, by a phenomenon of transference, items of circumstantial evidence in reality pointing solely to Ms AK.

The last finding held unfavourable to S is constituted by the failed proof of the alibi constituted by the argument of the suspect as having remained at home on the computer until late at night; it being a matter of, properly speaking, an alibi failing up till now and not of a false alibi and the defence, correctly, does not refute the technico-judicial valency of the circumstantial evidence, but it remains, in any case, acquired into the case file that the accused had not been able to prove his absence from the locus of the crime at the same time. An item up until now assumed as certain is, instead, the fact that S had interacted with his computer at 5:32 the morning following the murder, at around the same time reactivating his own mobile phone, a contradiction of the assumption of a waking up only at 10:00 and a symptomatic tell-tale of a more or less sleepless night; likewise as symptomatic was held to be the nearly simultaneous cessation of telephonic traffic as much by Ms AK, in his company the evening of 1 November 2007.

The proof of a permanent stay in his house by the suspect can, all told, be considered as acquired up until 20:40 ““ coincident with P’s visit ““ who confirmed his presence, or up until 21:10, the last interaction time on the computer, but this does not cover the time of the homicide, located between 22:00 and 23:00.

As for the proposed argument that S’s conduct were interpreted as aiding and abetting, this does not result, in the event, as being supported by anything emerging from the investigations and its plausibility cannot be verified by the judges of merit.

In conclusion, the Re-examination Court’s evaluation as to the gravity of the circumstantial evidence picture are removed from the audit of this court.

There remains, finally, the finding that for what concerns the pre-trial exigencies, those of a probative nature are not able to be considered as ceasing from the sole fact of G’s re-entry into Italy (amongst other things significantly never invoked in the statements by the suspect and by his girlfriend, who instead co-involved L in the proceedings), given the existence of an investigative picture in continual evolution, in which the positions of the various protagonists so far remain unclear, the changing versions of which are marked by reticence and mendaciousness (the same suspect had, in truth, admitted to having, at least initially, told “˜a load of balls’); but the permanence of pre-trial exigencies had been held reasonablely even under the aspect of flight risk, in relation to the gravity of the charges and of the potential sanctions, not to mention danger to society, given the revealed fragility of character and the specific personal traits of the subject, ““ which would narrowly evaluate as innocuous youthful stereotypes ““, in a context the more connoted by the noted habitual use of drugs.

FOR THESE REASONS

Rejects the appeal and sentences the appellant to payment of costs of the proceedings. Article 94 para 1 ter, and activating provisions, Criminal Procedure Code, applies.
Rome, 1.4.2008.

DEPOSITED IN THE REGISTRY ON 21 APRIL 2008


Tuesday, November 18, 2014

Knox Interrogation Hoax #16: Fourth Opportunity Knox Flunked: Gemelli Supreme Court Appeal

Posted by Our Main Posters



Media outside the Cassation back entrance waiting for news of the ruling

1. Where This Series Stands

Dozens of people have very aggressively gone to bat for Knox over her “interrogation” and still do.

They trust that one or other of her versions of the 5-6 November 2007 police-station session is right.

We have been demonstrating the rock-solid evidence that Knox and her supporters have lied and lied and there will be more evidence of this to come.

We’ve shown in this series that Knox insisted on being there; she was merely helping to build a list; she was treated kindly and taken for refreshments; she was the only one overheard by anyone to raise her voice, when she screamed about Lumumba “He did it!”; it was Sollecito not the police saying that she had been lying and had made him lie; and there is documentary evidence that the police investigators who sat with Knox told the truth.

Coming soon, we are going to post hundreds of false claims made by Knox shills, all sparked by and never reigned in by Knox.

2. The Pre-Trial Hurdles Knox Failed

Do you know how many major opportunities before her 2009 trial started Knox was given to get the murder charges dropped? This is not something Knox supporters trumpet about, if they even know.

In fact there were six, and Knox dismally failed them all.

In 2007 there were (1) the Matteini hearing and (2) the Ricciarelli hearing in November and (3) the Mignini interview in December.  And in 2008 there were (4) the separate Knox appeal and Sollecito appeal to the Supreme Court in April, and (5) the first Micheli hearings in September, and (6) the second Micheli hearings in October, which dispatched Knox and Sollecito for trial.

In all six instances Knox’s team also had the opportunity to get the charges against Knox for calunnia against Lumumba dropped.

As you will have seen in previous posts, Knox’s team pussyfooted about without conviction in the few brief instances when the 5-6 November session was discussed. In the Mignini hearing of 17 December 2007 they eventually advised her it would be in her best interests to shut up.

This post covers the third hurdle, specifically why in April 2008 the First Criminal Section of the Supreme Court ruled that for reasons of evidence and psychology Knox and Sollecito should remain locked up and the judicial process against them should go forward.

Please consider this meticulous (and for the pair, damning) statement, which denied their release, in light of a couple of explanations which follow in Part 4 below.

3. Catnip Translation: Gemelli Report On Knox

Shown in bold in the statement on Knox below are:

(1) the defense appeal against the use of Knox’s 5-6 November statements framing Lumumba (reason given was ONLY no lawyer being present - a need which Knox herself had shrugged off when she herself insisted on writing out the 1:45 am and 5:45 am and noon statements) and there is zero mention of abuse;

(2) Cassation’s reasoning why the first 2 Knox statements (the 1:45 and 5:45) can indeed be used, in the “sub-trial” addressing the calunnia against Patrick, and the third (scribbled around noon) can be used in the main trial.

In neither statement is there any ruling of “illegal” regarding any actions by any interrogators. The Knox shills often falsely claim there was.

The Judgment

REPUBLIC OF ITALY
IN THE NAME OF THE ITALIAN PEOPLE
THE SUPREME COURT OF CASSATION
FIRST CRIMINAL DIVISION

Comprised of the Most Honorable Justices
Dr Torquato GEMELLI ““ President
Dr Emilio Giovanni GIRONI ““ Member
Dr Maria Cristina SIOTTO ““ Member
Dr Umberto Zampetti ““ Member
Dr Margherita CASSANO ““ Member

has pronounced the following

JUDGMENT

on the appeal lodged by AMK born on X

against the Order of 30/11/2007 Liberty Tribunal of Perugia

having heard the relation [legal analysis] made by the Counsellor [Judge] Margherita Cassano

having heard the conclusions of the Prosecutor-General Dr S Consolo who has prayed the rejection of the appeal

HAVING FOUND IN FACT

1. With the order of 30 November 2007 the Perugia Court, as constituted under Article 309 Criminal Procedure Code, rejected the submission to review lodged by AMK and, as a consequence, confirmed the precautionary prison custody measures disposed in her matter on the 9th November 2007 by the GIP of the same Court in relation to the offences of aggravated wilful homicide in company and in sexual assault by a group, committed on the day of 1 November 2007 against MSCK.

2. According to the reconstruction put forward by the judges of merit, on the 2nd November 2007, around 12:35, the State Police, to whom had been signalled the discovery in the garden of a house of two mobile phones, both resulting to be in the service of the American [sic] citizen MSCK, intervened at an apartment in Via della Pergola in use by Ms K and AMK and two Italian women. At the place were found AMK and her boyfriend RS, the which declared they were expecting the arrival of the Carabinieri, called by them after having discovered that the window of one of the rooms of the habitation presented with broken glass.

The crime scene inspection immediately carried out inside the apartment led to the discovery in the bedroom occupied by Ms K, locked under key, of the body of the woman, which, at the level of the head, was immersed in a lake of blood, was dressed only in two tops pulled above the breast and was covered with a blanket. Beneath this latter was found the print of a shoe in haematic material, collected, besides in the room of the offence, also in a small bathroom adjacent to the same. In a second bathroom, used by the two Italian lessees of the apartment, were found faeces and other natural biological residues. The autopsy immediately carried out permitted the establishment of the cause of death, collocatable around 22 hours of the day of 1st November 2007, to have been due to a haemorrhagic shock from vascular lesions to the neck from an edged blade and that the instrument used to restrain her was constituted of a pointed instrument capable of penetration and with a sharpened profile capable of cutting tissue.

The victim’s body did not present unequivocal signs of sexual assault even though there were found things of some medico-legal interest, in the sense of the observed anal dilation of two-three centimetres, the discovery of minute ecchimoses on the posterior part of the anal ring (otherwise compatible with situations of constipation) and, above all, mauvish marks on the inner face of the labia minore, suggestive of a sexual rapport carried out with haste and occurring a little before the death.

3. The Court had found that grave indicia of guilt as against the suspect were constituted by the following elements:

(a) the autopsy results and the medico-legal report;

(b) the discovery of a knife with dimensions of 14cm for the handle and of about 17 for the blade, seized from inside a drawer of cutlery located in the kitchen of the home of S, carrying, on the handle, traces of DNA referable to Ms K and, on the blade, traces of DNA ascribable to the victim;

(c) statements made by persons informed of the facts, FR and LM, housemates of the victim, who without contradiction excluded that the seized knife were part of the their apartment’s endowment and made mention that Ms K, on the day of the fact, was wearing a top, which has not yet been found;

(d) outcome of the technical tests carried out on a pair of shoes, N brand, size 42.5, property of S, evidencing a perfect correspondence between the aforesaid footwear and the print found at the location of the homicide, as well as on the door of the Via della P apartment which did not present signs of forced entry;

(e) results of technical tests carried out on the palm print found on the pillow on which the victim had been placed and resulting as belonging to RHG, a citizen of the Ivory Coast, nicknamed “˜the Baron’, known to AMK;

(f) presence of RHG’s DNA on the vaginal swab taken from the cadaver during the autopsy and on the fragment of toilet paper taken from inside the larger bathroom of the apartment, where faeces had been found, resulting as being from G;

(g) outcome of biological tests carried out on the blood found in the apartment’s small bathroom, in use by the victim and Ms K, which permitted the establishment that to the victim were attributable the bloodstains present on the mat, to Ms K those found on the washbasin, and to both of the women the blood traces found on the bidet;

(h) statements made by the American [sic] citizen RCB, the which, having returned home to her country a few days after the fact, referred to the Authorities that Ms K, while waiting to be interviewed by the Police on the morning of the 2nd November 2007, had told her of having seen M’s body on a wardrobe (or reflected on a wardrobe) with a blanket on top of her and of having seen her friend’s foot after a police officer had opened the door, circumstances conflicting with the modality of intervention at the apartment;

(i) statements made by the friends of MSCK, the which without contradiction said that the woman had spent the afternoon of the 1st November 2007 in their company and had left their house in the company of SP, who, reaching her own domicile in Via del L around 20:55, had parted from the victim, whose apartment in Via della P was less than 10 minutes’ distance from Via del L;

(l) statements made by FR and PG, contacted by A after ascertaining that the front door of their house was open, that there were blood stains and that the window of MSCK’s room presented with broken glass

(m) statements made by S on the 2nd, 5th and 6th November regarding his movements both alone and with AMK between the day of 1 November 2007 and the following 2 November, in regards to what was found inside the Via della P apartment, to the call for help to law enforcement, not to mention the reference to the search for strong emotion contained in various of his writings posted on his blog;

(n) statements made on 6 November 2007 at 1:45 by Ms K which indicated L, entranced by M, as the author of the murder after a sexual relation with the victim;

(o) spontaneous statements made by Ms K on 6 November 2007 at 5:45 from which it emerged that L and M had gone to her room, that, at a certain point, M had started to scream, such that A, so as not to hear, had put her hands on her ears, that maybe S was also present in the house;

(p) contents of the account written by Ms K which repeated having heard M scream, to having removed herself into the kitchen and of having blocked her ears with her hands so as not to hear her friend’s scream and of having seen blood on S’s hand during the dinner that had taken place around 23:00 hours on the day of 1 November 2007 in S’s apartment;

(q) contents of a recorded conversation in prison on 17 November 2007 relating to a discussion between Ms K and her parents in the course of which the woman, amongst other things, said “It’s stupid, because I can’t say anything different, I was there and I can’t lie about this, there is no reason to do it”;

(r) tests carried out on the computer and on the mobile phone used by S, from which it emerged that, contrary to the defensive stance of the suspect, his computer had not been used during the night and had been activated only at 5:32 on 2 November 2007 and that, likewise, his mobile phone also had been off during the night and had been first used at dawn on 2 November 2007.

The Re-examination judges concluded recognizing, for continuing the precautionary custody measure, the continuance of all the typologies of precautionary requirements mentioned under Article 274 Criminal Procedure Code.

4. Against the cited order there has been submitted an appeal to Cassation, through her lawyers, by AMK, the which, also by means of a defence memorandum, alleges:

(a) violation of Article 309 paragraph five Criminal Procedure Code with reference to the omitted transmission to the Re-examination Court of the statements made by the suspect RHG arrested in Germany in the execution of a European Arrest Warrant, constituting, contrary to what was adopted by the Re-examination Court, an element favourable to the suspect, relevant for the indication of the author of the offence, identified as an individual of the male gender and, contrary to what as held by the Court, fully usable, given the basis of their acquisition into evidence under Articles 22 and 28 of the law on international judicial representation in criminal matters of 23 December 1982;

(b) Violation of Article 250 paragraph seven, and 357 paragraph two, Criminal Procedure Code, being placed at the foundation of the custody order and of the subsequent provisioning by the Re-examination Court, which indicative elements, the statements made by Ms K on 6 November at 1:45, without defence safeguards, the “spontaneous statements” made at the time of 5:45 hours, are not classifiable as such, given the procedural status invested on her in the meantime, all acts fully non-usable inasmuch acquired in patent violation of Article 63 Criminal Procedure Code;

(c) Violation of law, deficiency and manifest lack of logic in the reasoning with reference to the picture of circumstantial gravity, having regard: (a) to the personality of the suspect, a young foreigner with unblemished record, with a perception of reality altered by cannabis use, a substance which also may have been influencing her excessive and dreamlike behaviours; (b) to the seriously lacunose character of the translation of passages of the suspect’s hand-written account, analysed in a partial manner; (c) to the not unambiguous reading of the contents of the recorded conversation of 17 November 2007 between the suspect and her parents in prison; (d) to the non-probative nature of the DNA traces found on the seized knife, of the suspect’s blood stains on the mat and basin in the small bathroom of the apartment occupied by, amongst others, the victim and Ms K;

(d) Lack and manifest illogicality in the reasoning with reference to the considered circumstantial value, as against the suspect, of the results of tests carried out on the vaginal swab and on the knife in custody, with an un-reasoned devaluation of the considerations put forward by the defence;

(e) lack and manifest illogicality of the reasoning, distortion of the fact with reference to the considered presence of the suspect on the location of the fact and to her contribution purportedly made to the consummation of the offence;

(f) violation of law, deficiency and illogicality of reasoning as to the configurability of the precautionary requirements, given: (1) the absence of a specific danger in evidentiary acquisition even in the light of investigative developments which have evidenced Ms K’s extraneity to the commission of the offence and have allowed the acquisition of statements by fellow-suspect G; (2) the lack of an objective risk of flight in the light of international cooperation between Italy and the USA which would permit, once the suspect’s responsibility has been definitively ascertained, full judicial cooperation; (3) the lack of danger of repetition of the offences.

Observes as of law.
The Appeal Is Unfounded.

1. With reference to the deduced violation of Article 308 paragraph five for omitted transmission to the Re-examination Court of elements appearing favourable to the person placed under investigation (in the type of statements made by G to the German Judicial Authority in the ambit of European Arrest Warrant procedure), this Bench observes as follows.

For “elements in favour of the person placed under investigation” must be understood to mean those objective results, of probative value, suitable for being of positive influence in the evaluative complex of the custody picture (Cass., Sez. IV, 22 giugno 2005, rv. 231749) and in the concrete usable for exculpating the suspect (Cass., Sez. I, 26 settembre 2000, Corrente, rv. 217611) and not information that resolves itself into mere reformulations of the prosecutorial hypothesis or in the advancing of alternative hypotheses (Cass., Sez. Un. 26 settembre 2000, Mennuni).

In line with this interpretative stage there are to be excluded from the enumerated elements appearing favourable and as a consequence obligated to be transmitted to the Re-examination Court, under Article 309 paragraph five Criminal Procedure Code, statements made, as in the case under examination, in the ambit of an extradition procedure against the fellow-suspect who limits himself to giving his own defensive version and to affirm his own extraneity to the facts, without however releasing the other accused subjects from the same crime. It is, therefore, under this profile that the defence petition does not merit granting, it is rejected, rather, by the Re-examination Court on the basis of the erroneous assumption that RHG’s statements were unusable through omission with respect to due process, in reality assured by the German Judicial Authority, which ““ in conformity with the principles contained in the decision-framework of the Council of Ministers of the Union of 13 June 2002, relating to European arrest warrants and the handover procedure between member States (2002/584/GAI) ““ have, amongst other things, pre-emptively made the suspect informed: (1) of the European arrest warrant and its contents, even to the ends of allowing him to consent, if necessary, to the handover; (2) of the right to legal and interpretive assistance during the procedure.

2. With reference to the second appeal ground by the defence, the Court observes that circumstantial statements are characterized by a different usability regime under a subjective aspect. In the case in which these originate from a person against whom there already is sustained circumstantial evidence as regards the same crime, that is to a crime connected with or tied to the one attributed to a third party, the same cannot be used not only against themselves, but neither in relation to co-accused in the same crime (or of those accused of connected or related crimes).

The regime of absolute unusability under Article 63 paragraph two Criminal Procedure Code is, instead, to be excluded in the case in which the declarant, whether called to respond, in the same or another matter, for a crime or for crimes attributed to others, which have no procedural ties with the one for which they are being proceeded against, with respect to which the person assumes the character of witness.

In fact, in the first case, due to the close connection and interdependence between the fact itself and the other one, there arises the necessity to also safeguard the declarant’s right to silence; in the second case, the declarant’s extraneity and indifference with respect to the facts in cause renders them immune to possible sanctions carried out by the investigative bodies (Cass., Sez. Un. 13 febbraio 1997, Carpanelli).

On a par with these principles, the statements made by AMK at 1:45 on 6 November 2007, ““ at the end of which the interview was suspended and the woman was placed at the disposition of the relevant judicial Authority, revealing circumstantial evidence against herself ““, are usable only contra alios, while the “spontaneous statements” from 5:45 are not usable, neither against the suspect nor against other subjects accused of participation in the same crime, inasmuch as they were made without due process safeguards by a person who had formally assumed the status of suspect.

On the contrary, the account written in English by Ms K and translated into Italian is fully usable, under Article 237 Criminal Procedure Code, since it is a document originating from the suspect, who had been its spontaneous material author for a defence purpose. The disposition under examination allows attribution of probative relevance to the document not only as regards it and its representative contents, but also in the strength of its particular ties, which tie it to the suspect (or accused), thereby illuminating the review of admissibility which the judge had held to be in operation.

3. The fourth, fifth and sixth grounds of the petition also lack merit. The circumstantial evidence picture specifically concerning AMK is based, in the first place, on the autopsy results, evidencing multiple contusions and ecchimotic areas on various parts of the body (nose, lip, oral cavity, cheek, mandibular and sub-mandibular region, upper and lower limbs, inner face of labia minore, abdomen, dextral latero-cervical region), an ample dilation, in the order of two to three centimetres, of the anal ring with the presence of small ecchimoses, a large wound, disposed obliquely, in the caudal-lateral sense, fully diastased, with sections of underlying tissue right to the cartiliginous layer in the left latero-cervical region, the complete sectioning of the upper right thyroidal artery, the fracture of the hyoid bone in proximity of the left median. The medico-legal tests, carried out after the necroscopic examination of the body of the victim, permitted the confirmation that the cause of death, around 22:00 hours on 1 November 2007, is ascribable to meta-haemorrhagic shock from the vascular lesion on the neck from an edged blade, occasioned by a pointed implement, capable of penetration, and with a sharpened edge able to cut tissues. The anal dilation, the observation of minute ecchimoses on the posterior part of the anal ring and, above all, the mauvish marks on the inner face of the labia minore, are suggestive of a sexual rapport carried out hastily, before the victim had had time to produce adequate lubrication, occurring in a time period proximate to that of the observation, but in any case before death, by reason of the ecchimotic lesions and their colour.

The impugned provision highlights that the complex of these medico-legal conclusions assumes a particular evidential value, in the event that place in correlation with other elements: (a) the statements made by the friends of MSCK, who without contradiction stated that the woman had spent the evening of [1] November 2007 in their company, had started to dine with them from 18:00 hours onwards and had left the house in company with SP, who, reaching her home in Via del L around 20:55, had parted from the victim, whose apartment in Via della P was less than ten minutes’ walk from Via del L; (b) the outcome of the search effected at the house of RS, romantically linked to AMK, which permitted the discovery and seizure in the apartment’s kitchen, from the cutlery drawer, of a knife, having an approx. 14cm long blade and 17cm handle. The knife, not forming part of the inventory of the house occupied by AMK, MSCK and two Italian women (cf on the matter, the statements made, as persons informed of the facts, by FR and LM), presented traces of DNA on the handle attributable to AMK and on the blade traces of DNA ascribable to the victim.

Weighing against the suspect, in the opinion of the judges, there are, in addition, even in their mutability, statements by RS, who, after firstly having claimed to have remained home all evening and night with his girlfriend, stated, afterwards (cf. Interviews of 5 and 6 November 2007) that, at a certain time, Ms K had left and had come back to his house at only around one in the morning.

The judges of merit have underlined the strict correlation found between the interviews given by S on 5 and 6 November 2007, and the following further elements: (a) statements made by citizen RCB, who, returning to her country of origin, referred to the relevant Authorities the confidence received on 2 November 2007 from AMK regarding the position of the victim’s body and its condition, circumstances that, contrary to the stance of the suspect, she could not have been able to perceive on the occasion of the intervention by the police at the apartment, an intervention that unfolded in a way irreconcilable with the version furnished by Ms K to the friend; (b) statements made by persons informed of the facts FR and LM, who said that Ms K, the day of the fact, was wearing a top, which has not been found since.

The impugned provision, with logically reasoned argumentation, observes that the content of these declarative acts appears even more significant when evaluated also in the light of the written account produced by the suspect, containing relevant references to M’s scream on the night of the fact, to her reactions, consisting of huddling in the kitchen with her hands over her ears, to the presence of a man, to traces of blood noted by her on RS’s hand during the dinner that took placed at 23:00 on 1 November 2007.

Under the same lens appearing imbued with unequivocal circumstantial value is the contents of the recording, effected on 17 November 2007 inside the prison where Ms K found herself restricted to and between the woman and her parents, in the course of which there was pronounced by the accused the following words: “It’s stupid, because I cannot say anything else, I was there and I cannot lie about this, there is no reason to do so”;

These elements must, in their turn, be inserted into a larger circumstantial evidence context, cross-correlated by the identification of a print left in haematic matter present on the scene of the crime from a sports shoe, held to be compatible, by its dimensions and configuration of the sole, with the type of footwear brand “N” used by the suspect and by the failure of the alibi put forward by the young man, being demolished by the technical investigations that were carried out, by which, as he asserted, he had interacted with his computer in the hours in which, according the medico-legal reconstruction, the criminal fact would have occurred, just as also remained demolished that the young man had received a phone call from his father at 23:00, it resulting, instead, said call had occurred at 20:40.

From the same perspective, light has been shone, with precise and logical reasoning, on the circumstance that in the course of the evening of 1 November 2007, almost at the same time, telephonic traffic for AMK and RS ceased, after the latter had received a call on his mobile phone from his father at 20:40, of which reference has been made earlier and, in addition, that S, contrary to what was by him stated, did not spend the night of 1 and 2 November 2007 sleeping, it having been ascertained that the computer and mobile phone at his disposal were reactivated at dawn on 2 November 2007.

The judgment reasons, further, on the concourse aspect of the consummation of the homicide and sexual assault, on the basis: (1) of the outcome of the technical tests carried out on the palm print found on the pillow on which the victim had been placed, and it results as belonging to RHG, known to AMK; (b) of the presence of RHG’s DNA on the vaginal swab taken from the cadaver during the autopsy and on the fragment of toilet paper collected from inside the larger bathroom in the apartment, where there had been found faeces, resulting to have been G’s; (c) of the outcome of biological tests carried out on the blood found in the smaller bathroom of the apartment in use by the victim and by Ms K, which permitted the finding that the blood stains on the mat were referable to the victim, those found on the basin to Ms K, and to both the women the blood traces found in the bidet.

The Court, with thorough and logical reasoning, has illustrated, with full reference to the factual circumstances ““ inasmuch such are unreviewable in this seat of legitimacy ““ the reasons for the attribution of pregnant circumstantial value to the elements above recalled, proving the presence on the scene of the consummation of the homicide and sexual assault of AMK, RS, RHG (these last two both known to Ms K), has explained, with articulate and logically correct reasoning, the reasons for which they cannot find agreement with the defence deductions in terms of erroneous interpretation and reading of the recorded conversation of 17 November 2007, of the account written by Ms K on 6 November 2007, of the results of biological and medico-legal tests, of the unreliability of the technical investigations carried out on the computer and mobile phone belonging to S, and has at length examined, including in the light of aspects formulated by the defence, the entire case file, explaining the reasons of its unequivocal value.

So, the argumentative development of the judgment reasoning is founded on a coherent critical analysis of the circumstantial evidence and on its cohesion in an organic interpretative framework, in the light of which the attribution to said elements of the requisite of gravity appears supplied with adequate logical and judicial plausibility, in the sense that they have been considered drivers, with a high level of probability, with respect to the theme of investigations concerning the responsibility, amongst others, of AMK, as to the crimes put against her.

From which, given the evaluation carried out the Re-examination Court on the level of inference of the circumstantial evidence and, therefore, on the more or less demonstrative character of the same in terms of probabilistic qualification of guilt even if not of certainty, it has to be highlighted that the impugned order exceeds the threshold of legitimacy demanded by this Court, whose bench cannot hold itself back from a checking of the respect of rules of logic and of conformity with legal canons which govern the appreciation of grave indicia of guilt, as prescribed by Article 273 Criminal Procedure Code for the ordering of provisions restricting personal liberty, without being able to draw on the intrinsic consistency of the evaluations reserved to the judges of merit.

4. Unfounded, finally, are the censures formulated by AMK’s defence, on the matter of custody requirements, the Re-examination Court having correctly evaluated them, with reference to the parameters to which letters (a), (b), (c) of Article 274 Criminal Procedure Code apply the extreme gravity of the crimes carried out, having had regard to their nature and their method of consummation, the negative personality of the suspect, which emerges from the outcomes of the investigations and from the served case conduct, the specific and binding requirements relevant to the investigations in relation to the clear and present danger for [evidence] acquisition and probative genuineness, considering the necessity for completing the testing and of proceeding with the gathering of other means of declarative proof, the outcome of the handover to Italian authorities, of RHG, as well as allowing corroborations to be made, also permeates the current contrast between the different versions so far furnished of what happened, the clear danger of flight, taking into account the foreign citizenship aspect of the suspect and of the penalty of more than two years’ imprisonment, impacting on the outcome of the recognition of her criminal responsibility.

5. Refusal of the appeal leads in law to the appellant ordered to pay procedural costs.

The Registry will provide for its carrying out as prescribed by Article 94 paragraph 1-ter, and actuating provisions Criminal Procedure Code.

FOR THESE REASONS

Rejects the appeal and orders the appellant to pay procedural costs. Disposes transmission via the Registry a copy of the provision to the Director of the penitentiary institution per Article 94 paragraph 1-ter, and actuating provisions Criminal Procedure Code.

So decided in Rome, in Chambers, 1 April 2008.

DEPOSITED IN THE REGISTRY 21 APRIL 2008


4. Catnip Translation: Gemelli Report On Sollecito

Summary

Held: the decision to continue pre-trial prison detention for the suspect was reasonable.


THE REPUBLIC OF ITALY

IN THE NAME OF THE ITALIAN PEOPLE

THE SUPREME COURT OF CASSATION

SECTION 1 CRIMINAL DIVISION


Comprised of the most Honourable Justices:

Dr Torquato GEMELLI - President -

Dr Emilio Giovanni GIRONI - Member -

Dr Maria Cristina SIOTTO - Member -

Dr Umberto ZAMPETTI - Member -

Dr Margherita CASSANO - Member -

have pronounced the following


JUDGMENT

on the appeal lodged by:

(1) RS, born on X, against Order of 30/11/2007 Liberty Court of Perugia;

having heard the relation made by Member Emilio Giovanni Gironi;

having heard the conclusions of the Prosecutor-General Dr Consolo for its rejection;

having heard the defence advocates G and T (substituting for advocate M).


REASONS FOR THE DECISION


The order referred to in opening confirmed, at the Re-examination stage, the one by which the GIP [the Preliminary Investigation Magistrate] had applied pre-trial prison detention of RS for participation in the murder of MSCK, the which occurring in Perugia on the evening of the 1st of November 2007 by means of a cutting weapon, in an alleged context of sexual assault by a group, in which there would have taken part, in addition to S, his girlfriend AK and a RHG, who had left behind a palm print on the bloodied pillow on which the victim’s body was resting and whose DNA was found on the vaginal swab taken from the body of the same and on faecal traces found in a bathroom of the house that the victim was sharing with Ms AK and two Italian students.

The picture of circumstantial evidence specifically concerning S consists of the identification of a print left in haematic material present at the scene of the crime of a sports shoe held to be compatible, because its dimensions and configuration of the sole, with the type of footwear, “N” brand size 42.5, used by the suspect; of the recovery ““ in the kitchen of his house ““ of a kitchen knife bearing traces of Ms AK’s DNA on the handle and on the blade traces of Ms MK’s DNA; and of the collapse of the alibi put up by the young man (having been disproven by technical investigations carried out), in which, as asserted by him, he had interacted with his computer during the hours in which, according to the forensic pathologist’s reconstruction, the criminal fact would have occurred, that is between 22:00 and 23:00 of the 1st November 2007; from the investigations carried out up until now it would appear, in fact, that the last interaction with the machine on 1 November occurred at 21:10 and that the subsequent one took place at 5:32 the day after, when S also reactivated his mobile phone, acts witnessing thereby an agitated and sleepless night. Equally disproven was that the young man had received a phone call from his father at 23:00 on the night of the murder, it resulting, instead, that said call had happened at 20:40.

Against S, caught at the time of arrest with a switchblade initially considered compatible with the wounds found on the neck of the victim, would line up, in addition, the mutability of the stories given to the investigators by the same and by his girlfriend, having initially maintained they had remained the whole evening and night in the young man’s house, later to state, instead, that at a certain point Ms AK would have left to meet the Ivorian [sic] citizen PDL, manager of a pub in which Ms AK was undertaking casual employment, she making a returning to her boyfriend’s house only around one in the morning.

It must, finally, be added that the same Ms AK had, amongst other things, initially referred (not confirming, in any case, the thesis in confused and contradictory subsequent versions) to having taken herself to her own house with L, where this latter (he also was struck with a custody order, later revoked after the previously mentioned identification of G’s DNA) had had sexual relations with Ms MK, and to having, while she herself was in the kitchen, heard her friend scream, without, further, remembering anything else of the subsequent events, up until the occurrences of the day after, marked by the discovery of traces of blood in the small bathroom next to Ms MK’s room and culminating in the discovery of the body, after the intervention of the forces of law and order (the police appear, in particular, to have intervened prior to the call to 112 effected by S); in particular, the young woman was specifically pointing out not being able to remember whether S were also present in the victim’s house on the occasion of the events just described.

The Re-examination Court concluded recognizing, for the purposes of maintaining pre-trial detention, the persistence of all the types of pre-trial exigencies mentioned by Article 274 Criminal Procedure Code.

The S defence has indicated an appeal, on the grounds of, with new reasons as well:

  reference to Ms AK alone of the circumstantial evidence constituted by the presence of biological traces from her and from the victim on the knife found at S’s house;

  absence, at the scene of the crime, of biological traces attributable to the suspect [ndr: note, this was before the bra-clasp tests had been done];

  arbitrary transference onto S of the weighty circumstantial evidence against Ms AK, on the unfounded assumption that the pair could not have been anything but together at the moment of the homicidal fact;

  inexistent evidential value of the phases relative to the discovery of the body;

  absence of blood traces from the soles of the “N” shoes worn by the suspect even at the moment of his arrest;

  absence of any evidential value of merit, alleged failure of the alibi, constituting the use of his computer, of which the falsity has not in any case been ascertained, of the lack of interaction by the subject with the machine after the last operation at 21:10 not permitting the inference that the computer was not, however, engaged in downloading files (being, to be specific, films);

  irrelevancy of the mistake revealed between the indicated time of the phone call to the father furnished by S and the actual time of the call, given the uncertainty of the time of death of the victim, depending on the time, otherwise uncertain, of the consumption of the dinner (according to various witness statements coinciding with 18:00), it being well able, therefore, for the time indicated by the forensic pathologist (23:00) to be revised backwards to 21:00, a little before which time the witness P had referred to having made a visit to S, finding him at home and not on the verge of going out;

  interpretability of the so-called unlikelihood of the versions supplied by the suspect as attempts to cover for (aid and abet) another subject;

  attribution of the victim’s biological traces found on the knife seized at S’s house to chance contamination not related to the homicidal fact;

  insufficiency of the pre-trial exigencies, having diminished in a probative sense after the return to Italy of G; those relating to risk of flight lacking in specificity and concreteness; and with reference to the conventional content of blogs posted on the internet by the suspect, those relating to danger to society illogically reasoned;

  missing appearance of the young man’s walk, via security cameras installed along the route that the aforesaid would have had to traverse to go from his house to that of the victim’s.

The appeal is unfounded.

As regards what this Court is permitted to appreciate, not being able here to proceed with a re-reading of the investigative results nor with an alternative interpretation of the factual data referred to in the custody order, the appellant defence substantially contests the recognition, as against S, of the necessary requisite of grave indicia of culpability. The question thus posed and submitted for scrutiny by this bench of the well-known limits of the competence of the court of merit, it must be held that the finding expressed by the Re-examination judges concerning the gravity of the frame of circumstantial evidence is not susceptible to censure.

Not upheld, in the first place, is the defence submission according to which the knife bearing the genetic prints of Ms AK and of Ms MK found in S’s house would constitute a piece of evidence relevant solely as against the young woman, even if privy of traces attributable to the suspect, the utensil has as always been found in the young man’s house, and the testimony acquired up until now has led to the exclusion that it formed part of the inventory of the house inhabited by the victim, and which, at the time, and until proved to the contrary, must be held to be the same available for use by the suspect and which had been used in MK’s house, there being contested no access by her to S’s house.

Given the multitude of group contributive possibilities, the fact is not significative, then, in itself being a neutral element, that on the scene of the crime there are no biological traces attributable to S, to which, in any case, is attributable the “N” brand shoe print considered compatible, by dimensions and sole configuration, with the footwear worn by the suspect at the time of arrest. Although having the same impugned order excluded, at the time, the certainty of the identification constitutes as, in any case, a certain datum that the print in question had been made in haematic material found in Ms MK’s room by a shoe of the kind and of the dimensions of those possessed by the appellant, while it remains to be excluded that this could have originated from G’s shoe, who wore a size 45 and, therefore, dimensions notably larger. The revealed coincidence, notwithstanding the residual uncertainty on the identification, assumes particular valency in relation to the restricted circle of subjects gravitating to the scene of the homicide, with not even Ms AK, who made admissions about her presence on site at the same time as the execution of the offence, excluding the presence of her boyfriend in the victim’s house in the same circumstance; nor can it be held that the print could have been left by S the following morning, he never having claimed to have entered into the room wherein the body was lying.

It does not answer, therefore, to verity that, as against the young man, there had been recognized, by a phenomenon of transference, items of circumstantial evidence in reality pointing solely to Ms AK.

The last finding held unfavourable to S is constituted by the failed proof of the alibi constituted by the argument of the suspect as having remained at home on the computer until late at night; it being a matter of, properly speaking, an alibi failing up till now and not of a false alibi and the defence, correctly, does not refute the technico-judicial valency of the circumstantial evidence, but it remains, in any case, acquired into the case file that the accused had not been able to prove his absence from the locus of the crime at the same time. An item up until now assumed as certain is, instead, the fact that S had interacted with his computer at 5:32 the morning following the murder, at around the same time reactivating his own mobile phone, a contradiction of the assumption of a waking up only at 10:00 and a symptomatic tell-tale of a more or less sleepless night; likewise as symptomatic was held to be the nearly simultaneous cessation of telephonic traffic as much by Ms AK, in his company the evening of 1 November 2007.

The proof of a permanent stay in his house by the suspect can, all told, be considered as acquired up until 20:40 ““ coincident with P’s visit ““ who confirmed his presence, or up until 21:10, the last interaction time on the computer, but this does not cover the time of the homicide, located between 22:00 and 23:00.

As for the proposed argument that S’s conduct were interpreted as aiding and abetting, this does not result, in the event, as being supported by anything emerging from the investigations and its plausibility cannot be verified by the judges of merit.

In conclusion, the Re-examination Court’s evaluation as to the gravity of the circumstantial evidence picture are removed from the audit of this court.

There remains, finally, the finding that for what concerns the pre-trial exigencies, those of a probative nature are not able to be considered as ceasing from the sole fact of G’s re-entry into Italy (amongst other things significantly never invoked in the statements by the suspect and by his girlfriend, who instead co-involved L in the proceedings), given the existence of an investigative picture in continual evolution, in which the positions of the various protagonists so far remain unclear, the changing versions of which are marked by reticence and mendaciousness (the same suspect had, in truth, admitted to having, at least initially, told “˜a load of balls’); but the permanence of pre-trial exigencies had been held reasonablely even under the aspect of flight risk, in relation to the gravity of the charges and of the potential sanctions, not to mention danger to society, given the revealed fragility of character and the specific personal traits of the subject, ““ which would narrowly evaluate as innocuous youthful stereotypes ““, in a context the more connoted by the noted habitual use of drugs.

FOR THESE REASONS

Rejects the appeal and sentences the appellant to payment of costs of the proceedings. Article 94 para 1 ter, and activating provisions, Criminal Procedure Code, applies.

Rome, 1.4.2008.

DEPOSITED IN THE REGISTRY ON 21 APRIL 2008


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