Category: Steve Moore

Friday, January 16, 2015

The Sollecito Trial For “Honor Bound” #1: History Of How This Ill-Fated Saga Began

Posted by Our Main Posters

The “supertanker” the PR forces worked hard to turn has become a Titanic for them now

1. The Latest Legal Developments

A new phase of the Florence trial of Raffaele Sollecito and Andrew Gumbel is scheduled to start on Thursday of next week.

Why is this the iceberg in the Titanic’s path? Because Sollecito and later Knox made numerous demonstrably false and damaging claims that so many others then made, most usually worse.

See Sollecito go down here, or withdraw his claims, for lack of any proof, and the legal liabilities of all those others stretch to the horizon and beyond.

This trial puts Knox herself and her parents with her wild book and their wild claims at more risk. 

For reasons explained below, the investigation of the myriad claims by an Italian, beamed only at Americans, of official crimes and alternative “facts” couched in a jeering, sneering anti-Italy tone was taken behind the scenes by the Florence prosecution early in 2013.

The charges and target defamatory passages selected out of numerous passages falsely describing facts of the case and falsely accusing officials of crimes have not been formally reported even in Italy yet, except for a website update last October by the indefatigable journalist Andrea Vogt.

2. Chronology 2009-2011: The Trial And Appeal

In 2011 what is widely known in Italy to have been a bent Hellmann appeal court ran a cartoonish and illegal retrial of Sollecito and AK.

This illegal retrial, mostly annulled by the Supreme Court in March 2013, was lacking a few things. Such as most evidence, most witnesses, and all of the 2009 prosecution case and the compelling prosecution summations at the end. An illegal DNA consultancy which should never have occurred at appeal is also believed to have been bent.

3. Various Flashing Warning Lights

On 3 October 2011 Judge Hellmann told RS and AK they were free to go, despite the fact that no legal process for murder and some other crimes is considered final in Italy until no party pursues any further appeals or the Supreme Court signs off. Most still accused of serious crimes (as in the UK and US) remain locked up. Hellmann, pathetically trying to justify this fiasco ever since, was firmly edged out and still the target of a possible charge.

Other flashing warnings should have made Sollecito’s family and legal team and book writers very wary. They included the immediate strong warning of a tough prosecution appeal to the Supreme Court. They also included the pending calunnia trials of Knox and her parents, the pending trial of the Sollecitos for attempting to use politics to subvert justice, the pending trials of Spezi, Aviello, and Sforza, and so on. 

A major flashing warning was right there in Italian law. Trials are meant to be conducted in the courtroom and attempts to poison public opinion are illegal. They can be illegal in the US and UK too but, for historical reasons to do with the mafias and crooked politicians, Italian laws in this area are among the world’s toughest. So mid-process, normally no books are ever published

4. Chronology 2012-2013 The United States Track

Knox quickly headed back to the US West Coast and Sollecito soon came after her there.

After three-plus years of Sollecito and his camp being very iffy about Knox he suddenly - to his father’s open frustration - could not get enough of her.

Very quickly Sollecito found a book agent, Sharlene Martin,  who lives just a couple of miles from the Mellases and Knoxes, and she lined up a shadow writer, Andrew Gumbel, who lives in LA and had been based in Italy in the 1990s.

Both Sharlene Martin and Andrew Gumbel soon revealed that their “knowledge” of the case was paper-thin and dangerously biased.

Sollecito’s Italian lawyers seemingly did not have a clue what was going on on this book front - lately an angry Giulia Bongiorno made that plain enough.

Sollecito’s father and sister did have growing concerns (among much fallout in Italy of their own such as Vanessa losing a plum Carabinieri job) and in March they hopped on a flight to Seattle to try to ditch Knox and presumably the book and drag Sollecito home.

Even Knox at times seemed to want the clingy nuisance gone, and she produced a claimed new love-interest to help to keep him at bay.

Throughout 2012 the hubris of the Knox camp within which Sollecito had embedded himself was immense. David Marriott and Bruce Fischer both posted that it was their efforts that had got the two released, making no mention of a court the defenses had bent.

On 18 September Honor Bound hit the shelves. If Sharlene Martin or Andrew Gumbel or Simon & Schuster had done any due diligence on the book, such as reading court documents, or even run it in final draft in Italian past Sollecito’s lawyers in Italy, that due diligence sure did not show. (A legal case for the Sollecito family to pursue?)

Seemingly irresponsible or incompetent and not caring who in Italy they hurt, Sharlene Martin and Andrew Gumbel then assisted Sollecito in a triumphalist but mostly unconvincing sweep of the US crime shows.

The flagship interview was with Katie Couric on ABC right before the book came out. It really hurt. She had an advance copy and had done her homework. See our suggested questions and report and posts and Kermit’s great spoof here , here , here , here , and here.  The book promotion tour ended in Seattle thus..

Late April 2013 Knox’s book came out. Strong differences with Sollecito emerged both in the books and publicly in the media as described here and here.

Sharlene Martin later set up a panel of the useful idiots Michael Heavey and John Douglas and Steve Moore in a Congressional room for hire, an odd role for an agent of a book, which nobody of importance attended. Just as well. Truth was scarce.

Sollecito repeatedly visited the United States (and the Caribbean) though he was provisionally a convicted felon, not least in a desperate, cynical and hurtful attempt, after the sharp rebuff by Amanda Knox, to find an American wife.

You can read the rest of Sollecito’s US saga in the top posts here. His last visit to the United States was in late 2013.

5. Chronology 2012-2013 The Italy Track

The book was written and published only in English; Francesco Sollecito said no Italian publisher would touch it (surprise, surprise).

In Italy, from our post of 27 September 2012, this media explosion is what happened next.

In Italy Sollecito’s wildly inaccurate and hyper-aggressive book has already set himself up for two kinds of trouble

The Gumbel and Sollecito book was released in English on 18 September 2012 and within ten days all of Italy knew that the book was a crock.

Sollecito’s own father and own lawyer Maori have already been forced to admit the book contains serious lies. Prosecutors are considering whether there should be new charges

Sollecito’s own father Francesco was made to concede by the host and all other guests on the popular Porta a Porta TV show last week that Sollecito lied in claiming that the prosecution had sought a deal under which Sollecito would frame Amanda.

Such a deal would be illegal so Sollecito was falsely accusing prosecutors of a very serious crime. Francesco Sollecito backed down even more in some interviews later. One of Sollecito’s own lawyers, Luca Maori, also had to deny in frustration that the offer of any deal either way ever happened.

Now the prosecution has announced that they are weighing whether there should be new charges lodged against Sollecito.

Sollecito has suddenly claimed in the book, nearly five years after he said it happened, in face of vast evidence including his own writings to the contrary, that police interrogated him over 10 hours, and abused and threatened him.

But he was demonstrably not ever interrogated over 10 hours, and he folded fast when they showed him his phone records, which contradicted his earlier alibis, and so he promptly laid the blame on Amanda.

Prosecutors and police have all already stated that he simply lied here too, and again prosecutors are considering whether there should be new charges

Thereafter we posted a number of times about false claims others and we ourselves identified in the book -  one of three (with Preston’s and Knox’s) probably the most defamatory ever written about any justice system or justice officials anywhere. Our next posts will pick up that thread.

5. Italy Officially Reacts

Finally for now, we posted on 18 February 2013 on a formal move against the book by the Florence Courts, with a Breaking News addendum that (very unusually) the prosecution and supervising magistrate had taken the investigation behind closed doors.

That secrecy order to counter the toxic PR still persists, right up to now, and it will only be next Thursday that the results of the investigation and the charges against Sollecito and Gumbel become widely know.

Next post: selected examples of Sollecito’s and Gumbel’s false claims.

Thursday, August 14, 2014

Advisor Ted Simon Jumps Ship? With Legal And Financial Woes Will The Other Paid Help Stay?

Posted by Peter Quennell

Paid help Robert Barnett, Linda Kulman, Carlo Dalla Vedova, and Luciano Ghirga


Knox seems to badly need several kinds of professional help.

But Ted Simon simply parroting the foolish Steve Moore and the foolish Bruce Fischer was not really what we had in mind. If Ted Simon really is Knox’s ex-lawyer what a legal and financial mess he leaves behind.

In America there is a common legal remark on TV: that the coverup is often worse than the crime. It is often for the coverup that perps get sentenced to the longest time - often that is the only sentence they get.

Had the Knox and Sollecito forces been smart enough to take the route Dr Mignini hinted at in 2007 - that this was a hazing with sexual humiliation that spiraled out of control - and shown remorse as Guede to some extent did - the two might have faced lesser charges, been out early, and brought to an early end some of the terrible agony inflicted on Meredith’s ailing family over nearly seven years.

The paid and unpaid help might now be doing just fine.

But of course the smart route was ignored. The coverup for Knox seems totally on the rocks. Italy holds all the cards. As described in the past several posts, legal and financial nightmares for the Knox and Sollecito paid and unpaid help could be ahead. For one thing, they could all end up unpaid.

• Remember, the prosecution case presented at trial in 2009 was powerful and decisive, and the defenses were so demoralised in the summer and fall that two defense lawyers were said to have nearly walked.


• Remember, the Knox forces never tell you this, as Steve Moore etc make inane charges about corruption on the prosecution side, but the ONLY known corruption in the case was on the defense side.

It is openly known in Italy that the judicial appointments to the 2011 appeal court were corrupt. It was a hijacked court.

Judge Chiari and Prosecutor Comodi both publicly made this quite plain, Dr Galati said Cassation would set things right, the CSM edged Judge Hellmann into retirement (where he still waffles on with trademark incompetence) and the Supreme Court did set things right, with the unique ferocity that we saw.

Knox’s serial lying in her own coverup was very well known (after all, it was for lying that she served three years) but the flashmob attempts at coverup based on her invented claims went on regardless, even escalated in the past several years with the arrival of new dupes. Saul Kassin and John Douglas and the seriously out-to-lunch Jim Clemente come to mind.

The Knox book bizarrely parrots Steve Moore and Bruce Fischer, presumably with Ted Simon’s okay. Now it has put her paid help’s problems on steroids. All of them including Ted Simon could be legally and financially liable in several different ways. The past several posts described some of those.

Take for example this statement Knox puts into the public domain about her Perugia lawyer Carlo Dalla Vedova, in which she is accusing him of all people of falsely accusing police and prosecutors of crimes:

Carlo [Dalla Vedova], who’d never sugarcoated my situation, said, “These are small-town detectives. They chase after local drug dealers and foreigners without visas. They don’t know how to conduct a murder investigation correctly. Plus, they’re bullies. To admit fault is to admit that they’re not good at their jobs. They suspected you because you behaved differently than the others. They stuck with it because they couldn’t afford to be wrong.”

Really? He said that?

Read all the transcripts at trial and Mr Dalla Vedova’s public statements nowhere near resemble that. They were careful, honest and respectful, to say the least. He had numerous opportunities to complain. But he didnt, not once.

As we’ve remarked in the posts just below, back in 2008 he and Mr Ghirga had to publicly advise Knox to please not keep inventing things. So to this claim of Knox, when her book comes up for trial, what can Mr Dalla Vedova say?

Either he committed a new crime or his client did?

There is a good reason Giulia Bongiorno is not defending Sollecito for his own radioactive book. On that, she has already jumped ship.

Last one out the door, please turn off the lights.

Thursday, June 12, 2014

Fifty Of The Most Common Myths Still Promoted Without Restraint By The Knox PR Campaign

Posted by The Machine

Fooled ya! Knox’s parents have the mythmaking machine’s pedal to the floor, and arent slowing it

Introduction

I’ve listed the 50 most common myths circulating in the media with regard to the Amanda Knox/Meredith Kercher case and refuted them using as far as possible the official court documents and court testimony.

1. Knox was called to the Perugia central police station on 5 November 2007.

Neither the police nor the prosecutors brought Knox in for questioning on 5 November 2007. She was there unwanted, and stayed after it was suggested she go home and sleep.

Amanda Knox herself testified in court that she wasn’t called to come to the police station on 5 November 2007.

Carlo Pacelli: “For what reason did you go to the Questura on November 5? Were you called?”

Amanda Knox: “No, I wasn’t called. I went with Raffaele because I didn’t want to be alone.”

Monica Napoleoni, the head of Perugia’s homicide squad, said they told Knox she should go home to rest, but Knox insisted on staying:

Amanda also came that evening, the evening of the 5th. We said to Amanda that she could go home to rest. Since, during those days, she was always saying, always complaining that she wanted to rest, wanted to eat, we said: “˜Look, you’ve eaten; you can go and rest yourself. If there’s a need, we’ll call you.’

Instead, she was very nervous, and insisted on staying there.

Inspector Rita Ficarra was the one who led the discussion on a list of possible perps with Knox.

Rita Ficarra: My astonishment was that I saw, I found her there, and I found her doing ““ demonstrating ““ her gymnastic abilities: she was doing a cartwheel; she had shown the back arch, she had done the splits, and it seemed to me, sincerely, a bit out of place, that is to say given the circumstances, the moment and the place. For which [reason] I admonished her, and I even asked her what she was doing there.

She, and my colleagues also confirmed this, said to me that she had come because they had called Raffaele Sollecito, he had been invited that evening to give another recap, and she had accompanied him.

Judge Massei [GCM]: You said this to her in English or in Italian?

RF: In Italian. I reiterate that she speaks Italian, with me she speaks only in Italian. I do not understand a word of English, so “¦ My colleagues confirm that there was Sollecito who was there in another room and in that moment the Deputy Commissioner Napoleoni and other colleagues were listening to him.

And continuing to speak, the girl told me that she was rather shocked at the fact, annoyed at the fact that she had been called and recalled several times by the Police and [that] she was totally tired.

At that point, I also admonished her because I said: you’re tired, yet nonetheless you came this evening, when nobody has invited you: you could have gone to rest. And furthermore ““ I said ““ you don’t understand that we are talking about a murder, of a person that you say was your friend, [who] lived in the same house as you, it happened in your house. If the Police call you, put yourself in our shoes: we need useful information.

2. Knox was subjected to an all-night interrogation on 5/6 November.

According to Barbie Nadeau in The Daily Beast, Amanda Knox’s questioning began at about 11:00pm.

“Since Knox was already at the police station [in the company of Raffaele Sollecito], the head of the murder squad decided to ask her a few questions. Her interrogation started at about 11pm.”

After Amanda Knox had made her witness statement at 1:45am, she wasn’t questioned again that evening. She decided to made another witness statement at 5:45am, but she wasn’t asked any questions.

3. Knox wasn’t provided with an interpreter for her questioning on 5 November 2007.

This claim is completely false as shown through the trial testimony of Knox and her interpreter. Knox’s interpreter on 5 November 2007, Anna Donnino, testified at length at trial about Knox’s convesrsation that evening. And Amanda Knox herself spoke about her interpreter when she later gave testimony at the trial.

4. Knox wasn’t given anything to eat or drink.

Reported by Richard Owen, in The Times, 1 March 2009:

Ms Napoleoni told the court that while she was at the police station Ms Knox had been “˜treated very well. She was given water, chamomile tea and breakfast. She was given cakes from a vending machine and then taken to the canteen at the police station for something to eat.’

Also reported by Richard Owen, in The Times, 15 March 2009:

Ms Donnino said that Ms Knox had been “˜comforted’ by police, given food and drink, and had at no stage been hit or threatened.

John Follain in his book Death in Perugia, page 134, also reports that Knox was given food and drink during her questioning:

During the questioning, detectives repeatedly went to fetch her a snack, water, and hot drinks, including chamomile tea.

This is from the relevant court transcript:

Monica Napoleoni: Amanda was given something to drink several times. She was brought hot chamomile; she was taken to the bar of the Questura to eat. First she was given brioches from the little [vending] machine.

Carlo Pacelli: These methods of treatment, how did they translate into practice? With what behaviour/actions [were they carried out] in actual fact? Earlier, you recalled that they actually brought her something to eat”¦

MN: It’s true. That morning, I remember that Inspector Ficarra actually took her to the bar to eat as soon as it opened. But before [that], we have little [vending] machines on the ground floor, and she was brought water, she was brought hot drinks, she was brought a snack. But also Raffaele, he was given something to drink; it’s not as though they were kept “¦ absolutely.

Giuliano Mignini:  Had types of comfort been offered to her?

Anna Donnino:  Well, during the evening, yes, in the sense that I remember that someone went down to the ground floor; it was the middle of the night, so in the station at that hour there are those automatic distributors; there’s nothing else; someone went to the ground floor and brought everybody something to drink, some hot drinks and something to eat. I myself had a coffee, so I believe that she also had something.

Above: Several of the myth inventors and disseminators: Sforza, Mellas, Preston

5. Knox was beaten by the police.

The witnesses who were present when Knox was questioned, including her interpreter, testified under oath at the trial in 2009 that she wasn’t hit. (Under Italian law, witnesses must testify under oath, while defendants do not, so are not required by law to be truthful on the stand.)

These are from the relevant court transcripts:

Giuliano Mignini: Do you recall, shall we say, that night between the 1st and then the spontaneous declarations and then the order for arrest, who and what was with her, other than you, whether there were other subjects that spoke with us, how they behaved? Did [she] undergo/experience violent [sic: NdT: “violente” in Italian, probably typo for “violenze” = “violence/force/assault”] by any chance?

Rita Ficarra: Absolutely not.

GM: Was she intimidated, threatened?

RF: No. I, as I said earlier, I came in that evening and there were some colleagues from the Rome SCO, I was with Inspector Fausto Passeri, then I saw come out, that is come out from the entry-door to the offices of the Flying [Squad] the Assistant Zugarini and Monica Napoleoni, who appeared for an instant just outside there, then we went back in calmly, because the discussion we had with her was quite calm.

Giuliano Mignini: ... violence, of “¦

Monica Napoleoni: But absolutely not!

Mignini:  You remember it”¦ you’ve described it; however, I’ll ask it. Was she threatened? Did she suffer any beatings?

Anna Donnino: Absolutely not.

GM: She suffered maltreatments?

AD:  Absolutely not.

Carlo Pacelli:  In completing and consolidating in cross-examination the questions by the public prosecutor, I refer to the morning of the 6th of November, to the time when Miss Knox had made her summary information. In that circumstance, Miss Knox was struck on the head with punches and slaps?

Anna Donnino:  Absolutely not.

CP:  In particular, was she struck on the head by a police woman?

AD:  Absolutely not!

CP:  Miss Knox was, however, threatened?

AD:  No, I can exclude that categorically!

CP:  With thirty years of prison”¦ ?

AD:  No, no, absolutely not.

CP:  Was she, however, sworn at, in the sense that she was told she was a liar?

AD:  I was in the room the whole night, and I saw nothing of all this.

CP:  So the statements that had been made had been made spontaneously, voluntarily?

AD:  Yes.

Carlo Della Valla:  This”¦

Giancarlo Massei:  Pardon, but let’s ask questions”¦ if you please.

CP:  You were also present then during the summary informations made at 5:45?

AD:  Yes.

CP:  And were they done in the same way and methods as those of 1:45?

AD:  I would say yes. Absolutely yes.

CP:  To remove any shadow of doubt from this whole matter, as far as the summary information provided at 5:45 Miss Knox was struck on the head with punches and slaps?

AD:  No.

CP:  In particular, was she struck on the head by a policewoman?

AD:  No.

Even Amanda Knox’s lawyer, Luciano Ghirga, distanced himself in the Italian media from these allegations and never lodged any complaint:

There were pressures from the police, but we never said she was hit.

6. Knox was refused a lawyer.

Rita Ficarra and Anna Donnino testified that Knox was several times advised to have a lawyer, but each she declined the offer:

Anna Donnino:  ...she was asked if she wanted a lawyer.

Giuliano Mignini:  And what was her response?

AD: She had answered no; I remember that she replied with no.

Before she insisted on drafting her 1:45 and 5:45 am accusations Knox was advised to have a lawyer advise her, but she declined and pressed on.

Dr Mignini has wondered if the Supreme Court really understood this in banning the two unprovoked accusations from Knox’s main trial.

7. Knox was tag-teamed by two police officers every hour.

According to Anna Donnino, who arrived at the police station at about 12:30am, there was a total of three people in the room with Knox:

Anna Donnino: “I had been made to enter a room where in fact there was Inspector Ficarra at a small table, another colleague from SCO (I only remember his first name; he was called Ivano), a police officer, and there was Miss Knox seated. I seated myself beside her.”

Above: Several of the main myth inventors and disseminators: Fischer, Sforza, Moore

8. Knox was asked to imagine what might have happened.

According to the corroborative testimony of the three others present, including Rita Ficarra and Anna Donnino, Amanda Knox voluntarily and spontaneously accused Patrick Lumumba of murdering Meredith.

Here is Rita Ficarra.

We found only that one [text message] sent by her. She was given the mobile into her hand, and it was said, who is this person, and did you go out later or not? She said the name of Patrick Lumumba, and gave the declaration that then ...

GM: And what behaviour did she then adopt/assume?

RF: She suddenly put her hands to her head, burst out crying and said to us “It’s him, it’s him, it was him, he killed her”. It was the only time that I saw her cry.

GM: This behaviour, did she then continue like that during the course of that morning, by now we were at what time?...

RF: No, she was as if she was giving vent in that moment, she cried, she began to say that he was crazy, he was crazy.

Here is Anna Donnino:

Judge Massei: This change, at what moment did it happen, and in what did it consist of?

Anna Donnono: The change had occurred right after this message, in the sense that the signorina said she hadn’t replied to the message from Patrick, when instead her reply message was shown to her she had a true and proper emotional shock. It’s a thing that has remained very strongly with me because the first thing that she did is that she immediately puts her hands on her ears, making this gesture rolling her head, curving in her shoulders also and saying “It’s him! It’s him! It was him! I can see/hear him or: I know it.[Lo sento]” and so on and so forth.

Carlo Pacelli:  So the statements that had been made had been made spontaneously, voluntarily?

Anna Donnino:  Yes.

Here is Judge Massei.

[After hearing and weighing up the testimony of these witnesses and Amanda Knox, Judge Massei stated that it couldn’t be claimed that] “Amanda Knox was persuaded by the investigators to accuse Diya Lumumba, aka Patrick, by means of various pressing requests which she could not resist.” (Massei report, page 388.)

[He noted that there had been] “no corroboration of the pressing requests which Amanda was seemingly subjected to in order to accuse Diya Lumumba of the crime committed to the detriment of Meredith.” (Massei report, page 389.)

Judge Massei concluded at trial in 2009 that Knox had freely accused Patrick Lumumba of Meredith’s murder and awarded her a prison sentence for calunnia confirmed in 2013 by the Supreme Court for which there is no further appeal.

9. Amanda Knox claimed she had had a “dream-like vision” in her witness statements.

Amanda Knox makes no mention of a dream or vision in her two witness statements. She categorically states that she met Diya Lumumba at Piazza Grimana and that they went to the cottage on Via della Pergola. In her first witness statement, she claims that Lumumba killed Meredith.

This is from the 1:45 am statement.

I responded to the message by telling him that we would see each other at once; I then left the house, telling my boyfriend that I had to go to work. In view of the fact that during the afternoon I had smoked a joint, I felt confused, since I do not frequently make use of mind-altering substances, nor of heavier substances.

I met Patrik immediately afterward, at the basketball court on Piazza Grimana, and together we went [to my] home. I do not recall whether Meredith was there or arrived afterward. I struggle to remember those moments, but Patrik had sex with Meredith, with whom he was infatuated, but I do not recall whether Meredith had been threatened beforehand. I recall confusedly that he killed her.

This is from the 5:45 am statement.

I wish to relate spontaneously what happened because these events have deeply bothered me and I am really afraid of Patrick…  I met him in the evening of November 1st 2007, after sending him a reply message saying “I will see you”. We met soon after at about 21.00 at the basketball court of Piazza Grimana. We went to my apartment in Via della Pergola n. 7.

I do not clearly remember if Meredith was already at home or if she came later, what I can say is that Patrick and Meredith went into Meredith’s room, while I think I stayed in the kitchen. I cannot remember how long they stayed together in the room but I can only say that at a certain point I heard Meredith screaming and as I was scared I plugged up my ears.

10. Amanda Knox was questioned in Italian

The police provided Amanda Knox with an interpreter, Anna Donnino, so that she could be questioned in English.

11. Dr Mignini questioned Knox on 5 November 2007.

Dr Mignini did not question Amanda Knox that evening. She wanted to make further declarations, and he came to the police station on the night only because he was on duty and had to witness Knox being cautioned. After Knox was cautioned that she need not say anything without a lawyer, Knox nevertheless insisted that she draft a second statement in front of him.

Mr Mignini explained what happened in his e-mail letter to Linda Byron, a journalist for King5 in Seattle:

All I did was to apply the Italian law to the proceedings. I really cannot understand any problem.

In the usual way, Knox was first heard by the police as a witness, but when some essential elements of her involvement with the murder surfaced, the police suspended the interview, according to article 63 of the penal-proceedings code.

But Knox then decided to render spontaneous declarations that I took up without any further questioning, which is entirely lawful.

According to article 374 of the penal-proceedings code, suspects must be assisted by a lawyer only during a formal interrogation, and when being notified of alleged crimes and questioned by a prosecutor or judge, not when they intend to render unsolicited declarations.

Since I didn’t do anything other than to apply the Italian law applicable to both matters, I am unable to understand the objections and reservations which you are talking about.”

In Amanda Knox’s written witness statement, she explicitly states that she’s making a spontaneous declaration:

I wish to relate spontaneously what happened because these events have deeply bothered me and I am really afraid of Patrick, the African boy who owns the pub called Le Chic located in Via Alessi, where I work periodically.

12. Knox didn’t confess until 6am.

Amanda Knox’s first written statement was made at 1:45am. It was not a confession, it was a false accusation.

13. Knox retracted her allegation against Lumumba immediately.

Amanda Knox didn’t retract her accusation immediately. In fact, she never did formally. Knox reiterated her allegation in her handwritten note to the police late morning of 6 November 2007, which was admitted in evidence: From the Massei report:

[Amanda] herself, furthermore, in the statement of 6 November 2007 (admitted into evidence ex. articles 234 and 237 of the Criminal Procedure Code and which was mentioned above) wrote, among other things, the following:

I stand by my [accusatory] statements that I made last night about events that could have taken place in my home with Patrick”¦in these flashbacks that I’m having, I see Patrick as the murderer”¦

This statement was that specified in the notes of 6 November 2007, at 20:00, by Police Chief Inspector Rita Ficarra, and was drawn up following the notification of the detention measure, by Amanda Knox, who “requested blank papers in order to produce a written statement to hand over” to the same Ficarra. (Massei report, page 389.)

Knox did not withdraw the false accusation at her first hearing in front of a magistrate on 8 November.

The Massei court took note of the fact that Amanda Knox didn’t recant her false and malicious allegation against Diya Lumumba during the entire time, two weeks, he was kept in prison.

14. In the days following Meredith’s murder, Knox voluntarily stayed in Perugia to help the police

This claim is contradicted by Amanda Knox herself. In the e-mail she wrote to her friends in Seattle on 4 November 2007 she categorically stated she was not allowed to leave Italy:

“i then bought some underwear because as it turns out i wont be able to leave italy for a while as well as enter my house”

Knox actually knew on 2 November 2007 that she couldn’t leave Italy. Amy Frost, a friend of Meredith, reported the following conversation (Massei report, page 37):

“I remember having heard Amanda speaking on the phone. I think that she was talking to a member of her family, and I heard her say, “˜No, they won’t let me go home; I can’t catch that flight.’ “

15. All of Meredith’s friends left immediately.

The police also told Sophie Purton that they needed her to stay on in Perugia on precisely the same basis as Amanda Knox. Sophie had been counting on leaving Perugia to fly back home as soon as her parents arrived, but the police called to tell her they needed her to stay on; they would let her know when she could leave. Her father stayed on with her.

In chapter 19 of Death in Perugia John Follain states that Sophie Purton was questioned by Mignini and Napoleoni in the prosecutor’s office on 5 November 2007.

16. There were only two tiny pieces of DNA evidence that implicated her, but they were probably contaminated.

The Italian Supreme Court explained how DNA evidence should be assessed in court; i.e., contamination must be proven with certainty, not supposition. The Court stated that the theory “anything is possible” in genetic testing is not valid.

The burden of proof is on the person who asserts contamination, not the person who denies it.

In other words, if the defence lawyers claim the DNA evidence was contaminated, they must describe the specific place and time where it could have plausibly occurred. Nobody has ever proved that the bra clasp and knife evidence were contaminated. Even Conti and Vecchiotti excluded contamination in the laboratory:

“Laboratory contamination was also excluded by these experts [Conti and Vecchiotti].” (The Supreme Court report, page 92.)

(1) The bra clasp

The fact that the bra clasp was not collected immediately because defense witnesses were not available is irrelevant. The cottage was a sealed crime scene and nobody entered the room during this time:

...the flat had been sealed and nobody had had the opportunity to enter, as shown in the case file.” (The Italian Supreme Court report, page 92.)

Alberto Intini, the head of the Italian police forensic science unit, excluded environmental contamination because “DNA doesn’t fly.”

Even Conti and Vecchiotti excluded contamination in the laboratory because Dr Stefanoni last handled Sollecito’s DNA twelve days before she analysed the bra clasp.

Professor Francesca Torricelli testified that it was unlikely the clasp was contaminated because there was a significant amount of Sollecito’s DNA on it.  His DNA was identified by two separate DNA tests. Of the 17 loci tested in the sample, Sollecito’s profile matched 17 out of 17.

David Balding, a Professor of Statistical Genetics at University College London, analysed the DNA evidence against Sollecito and concluded that the evidence was strong”

“...because Sollecito is fully represented in the stain at 15 loci (we still only use 10 in the UK, so 15 is a lot), the evidence against him is strong”¦”

(2) The knife

Dr Stefanoni analysed the traces on the knife six days after last handling Meredith’s DNA. This means that contamination couldn’t have occurred in the laboratory. Meredith had never been to Sollecito’s apartment, so contamination away from the laboratory was impossible. 

The knife and bra clasp are not the only pieces of DNA evidence.

According to the prosecution’s experts, there were five samples of Knox’s DNA or blood mixed with Meredith’s blood in three different locations in the cottage. After the trial in 2009, The Kerchers’ lawyer, Francesco Maresca, said the mixed-blood evidence was the most damning piece of evidence against Amanda Knox.

The Scientific Police experts concluded it proves that Meredith and Knox were bleeding at the same time.

17. The knife has essentially been thrown out.

The knife hasn’t been thrown out. A further DNA sample (36-I) was extracted from the blade last year and tested by the Carabinieri RIS DNA experts Major Berti and Captain Barni. The sample was attributed to Amanda Knox, the second. Judge Nencini stated in his report that Knox stabbed Meredith with the knife.




Above: Several of the myth inventors and disseminators: Hampikian, Burleigh, Heavey

18. The knife doesn’t match any of the wounds on Meredith’s body.

The prosecution experts, multiple defence experts and Judge Massei in his report have all agreed that the double DNA knife DID match the large wound on Meredith’s neck.

“On these matters, the considerations already made must be recalled which led this Court to evaluate the outcome of the genetic investigation as reliable, and this knife as absolutely compatible with the most serious wound.” (Massei report, page 375.)

Barbie Nadeau, an American journalist based in Rome, reported directly from the courtroom in Perugia that multiple witnesses for the defence, including Dr. Carlo Torre, conceded that the double DNA knife was compatible with the deep puncture wound in Meredith’s neck.

According to multiple witnesses for the defense, the knife is compatible with at least one of the three wounds on Kercher’s neck, but it was likely too large for the other two. (Barbie Nadeau, Newsweek.)

He (Dr. Carlo Torre, defence expert) conceded that a third larger wound could have been made with the knife, but said it was more likely it was made by twisting a smaller knife. (Barbie Nadeau, The Daily Beast.)

19. The DNA on the blade could match half the population of Italy.

Vieri Fabani, a lawyer for the Kerchers, pointed out that there is the possibility of 1 in 1 billion 300 million that the DNA on the blade does not belong to Meredith. 

20. Meredith’s DNA wasn’t found on the blade of the knife.

A number of independent forensic experts—Dr. Patrizia Stefanoni, Dr. Renato Biondo, Professor Giuseppe Novelli, Professor Francesca Torricelli and Luciano Garofano—have all confirmed that sample 36B was Meredith’s DNA.

Even American experts Elizabeth Johnson, Greg Hampikian and Bruce Budowle, who have been critical of the Scientific Police’s work in this case, have conceded that the DNA was consistent with Meredith’s DNA profile.

It should be noted that none of these American experts testified at the trial or played any official role in the case. They became involved in the case after being approached by supporters of Amanda Knox. They had no bearing on the legal proceedings in Florence.

Judge Nencini accepted that Judge’s Massei and the prosecution’s assertions that Meredith’s DNA was on the blade of Sollecito’s kitchen knife and that it was the murder weapon.   

21. No other knives were taken from Sollecito’s apartment.

Judge Massei discusses a jack-knife that was 18cm long with an 8cm blade at some length and the results of the DNA tests that were carried out on it:

“He [Armando Finzi] recalled they found another knife whose total length was 18cm, with an 8cm blade”¦” (Massei report, page 106.)

“On the jack”‘knife, four samples were taken, with negative results where blood-derived substances had been looked for; on the fourth sample, which involved the handle, the genetic profile was found to be of Sollecito plus Knox.” ( Massei report, page 194.)

22. The knife was chosen at random.

Armando Finzi was the police officer who bagged the knife. He testified that he thought it was the murder weapon because it was compatible with the wound on Meredith’s neck. Andrea Vogt explained this in the same article:

“Armando Finzi, an assistant in the Perugia police department’s organized crimes unit, first discovered the knife in Sollecito’s kitchen drawer. He said the first thing he noticed upon entering the place was a “˜strong smell of bleach.’ He opened the drawer and saw a “˜very shiny and clean’ knife lying on top of the silverware tray.

” “˜It was the first knife I saw,’ he said. When pressed on cross-examination, he said his “˜investigative intuition’ led him to believe it was the murder weapon because it was compatible with the wound as it had been described to him. With gloved hands, he placed the knife in a new police envelope, taped it shut with Scotch tape, then placed it inside a folder, he said. There were smaller and bigger knives in the drawer, but no others were taken into evidence from the kitchen, he said.” (Andrea Vogt, The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 28 February 2009.)

23. No control tests were done.

John Follain pointed out in Death in Perugia that the control tests had been filed with another judge:

“The tests had been filed with an earlier test, and Judge Pratillo Hellmann later admitted them as evidence.” (Death in Perugia, Kindle edition, page 409.)

The judges at the Supreme Court in Italy noted in their report that the negative controls had been carried out:

“...since all the negative controls to exclude it [contamination] had been done by Dr Stefanoni”¦” (Supreme Court report, page 93.)

The judges at the Italian Supreme Court criticised the court-appointed independent experts Conti and Vecchiotti for assuming they hadn’t been done.

24. There is no evidence of Amanda Knox at the actual crime scene.

The crime scene involves the whole cottage and isn’t limited to Meredith’s room. Knox and Sollecito were both convicted of staging the break-in in Filomena’s room. Furthermore, there is plenty of evidence placing Amanda Knox in Meredith’s room on the night of the murder.

For example, her DNA was found on the handle of the murder weapon, her bare bloody footprints were revealed by Luminol in the hallway and her own room and, according to the Scientific Police, her blood was mixed with Meredith’s blood in different parts of the cottage. Knox’s lamp was found in Meredith’s room, and a shoeprint in her size of shoe.

25. None of the Luminol* stains contained Meredith’s DNA.

Two of the traces revealed by Luminol contained Meredith’s DNA:

“Amanda (with her feet stained with Meredith’s blood for having been present in her room when she was killed) had gone into Romanelli’s room and into her [own] room, leaving traces [which were highlighted] by Luminol, some of which (one in the corridor, the L8, and one, the L2, in Romanelli’s room) were mixed, that is, constituted of a biological trace attributable to [both] Meredith and Amanda”¦” (Massei report, page 380.)

[* Luminol is a substance used in crime-scene investigations to reveal blood that has been cleaned up. It reacts with the microscopic particles of iron in the blood and turns it fluorescent.]

26. Mignini is persecuting Amanda Knox.

As shown above Dr Mignini was absent when Knox made her false accusation. Because of checks and balances, prosecutors in Italy have far less power than their American counterparts. The decision to send Knox to trial was actually made by Judge Micheli in 2008, not by Dr Mignini.

Judge Massei, Judge Cristiani and six lay judges found Knox guilty of murder in Perugia in 2009, and Judge Nencini, Judge Cicerchia and six lay judges confirmed Knox guilty of murder at the appeal in Florence in January 2014. 

Dr Mignini is just one of several prosecutors who have been involved in the case. Manuela Comodi was Mignini’s co-prosecutor at the the trial in 2009.  Giancarlo Costagliola was the main prosecutor in the first appeal, which was annulled by the Italian Supreme Court. He and Giovanni Galati appealed against the 2011 acquittals. Dr Mignini played no part in the new appeal in Florence. Alessandro Crini was the prosecutor.

27. Mignini claimed Meredith was killed as part of a satanic ritual.

Mignini has never claimed that Meredith was killed during a satanic or sacrificial ritual, and that’s the reason why no one has been able to provide a verbatim quote from Mignini supporting this false accusation.

Mignini specifically denied claiming that Meredith was killed in a sacrificial rite, in his letter to the Seattle reporter Linda Byron:

“On the “˜sacrificial rite’ question, I have never said that Meredith Kercher was the victim of a “˜sacrificial rite.’ “

Mignini also made it quite clear that he has never claimed that Meredith was killed as part of a satanic rite in his interview with Drew Griffin on CNN:

Drew Griffin: “You’ve never said that Meredith’s death was a satanic rite?”

Mignini: “I have never said that. I have never understood who has and continues to say that. I read, there was a reporter ““ I don’t know his name; I mention it because I noticed it ““ who continues to repeat this claim that, perhaps, knowing full well that it’s not like that.

“I have never said that there might have been a satanic rite. I’ve never said it, so I would like to know who made it up.”

Above: Several of the myth inventors and disseminators: Kassin, Dempsey, Douglas

28. Mignini claimed Meredith was killed in a sex game that went wrong.

Mignini didn’t say anything about there being a sex game that went wrong when he presented his timeline to the court at the trial. Please be warned that there is some extremely graphic content below:

[Timeline of the attack on Meredith]

23:21: Amanda and Raffaele go into the bedroom while Rudy goes to the bathroom.

23:25: A scuffle begins between Amanda, helped by Raffaele, and Meredith. The English girl is taken by the neck, then banged against a cupboard, as shown by wounds to the skull. She resists all this. Rudy Guede enters.

23:30: Meredith falls to the floor. The three try to undress her to overcome her; they only manage to take off her trousers. The girl manages to get up, she struggles. At this point, the two knives emerge from the pockets of Amanda and Raffaele: one with a blade of four to five centimetres, the other, however, a big kitchen knife. Meredith tries to fend off the blades with her right hand. She is wounded.

23:35: The assault continues. Sollecito tries to rip off the English girl’s bra.

23:40: Meredith is on her knees, threatened by Amanda with the knife while Rudy holds her with one hand and with the other hand carries out an assault on her vagina. There is first a knife blow on her face, then straight away another. However, these blows are not effective. The three become more violent. With the smaller knife, Sollecito strikes a blow: the blade penetrates 4 centimetres into the neck.

There is a harrowing cry, which some witnesses will talk about. Amanda decides to silence her, still according to the video brought to court by the prosecutors, and strikes a blow to the throat with the kitchen knife: it will be the fatal wound. Meredith collapses on the floor.

23:45: Meredith is helped up by Rudy and is coughing up blood. The English girl, dying, is dragged along so that she can continue to be undressed.

29. Mignini called Amanda Knox a “she-devil.”

It wasn’t Mignini who called Amanda Knox a “she-devil”;  it was Carlo Pacelli, the lawyer who represents Diya Lumumba, at the trial in 2009.

Carlo Pacelli’s comments were widely reported by numerous journalists who were present in the courtroom. Barbie Nadeau describes the moment he asked if Knox is a she-devil in some detail in Angel Face:

“”˜Who is the real Amanda Knox?’ he asks, pounding his fist in the table. “˜Is she the one we see before us here, all angelic? Or is she really a she-devil focused on sex, drugs, and alcohol, living life on the edge?’

“She is the luciferina—she-devil.’” (Barbie Nadeau, Angel Face, Kindle edition, page 124.)

30. Dr Mignini was convicted of a felony and faced prison.

The Florence Appeal Court and Cassation scathingly threw out a malicious prosecution for which both the prosecutor and judge suffered. Dr Mignini has never faced the slightest risk of prison.  Often now seen on national TV, Dr Mignini is expected to be the next Prosecutor General of Umbria.

31. Rudy Guede was a drifter.

Rudy Guede lived in Perugia from the age of five, and he had his own apartment at the time of the murder.

32. Guede had a criminal record at the time of the murder.

Rudy Guede didn’t have any criminal convictions at the time of Meredith’s murder. He was not a drug dealer and not a police informant. As Judge Micheli scathingly noted, there is no proof that he committed any break-ins.

33. Guede left his DNA all over Meredith and all over the crime scene.

There was only one sample of Guede’s DNA on Meredith body and there were only five samples of his DNA at the cottage. His DNA was found on a vaginal swab, on the sleeve of Meredith’s tracksuit, on her bra, on the zip of her purse and on some toilet paper in the bathroom that Filomena and Laura shared. 

“...also a genetic profile, from the Y haplotype on the vaginal swab, in which no traces of semen were found; DNA on the toilet paper in the bathroom near the room of Mezzetti, where unflushed faeces were found; on the bag found on the bed; on the left cuff of the blue sweatshirt (described as a “zippered shirt” in the first inspection, discovered smeared with blood near the body and partly underneath it); and on the right side of the bra found by the foot of Kercher’s body”¦” ( Judge Giordano sentencing report, page 5.)

34. Guede left his semen at the crime scene.

Guede’s DNA semen wasn’t found at the crime scene.

“...also a genetic profile, from the Y haplotype on the vaginal swab, in which no traces of semen were found”¦” (Judge Giordano sentencing report, page 5.)

“In one of these swabs was found biological material belonging to a male subject identified as Rudy Hermann Guede. This material, which turned out not to be spermatic [158], could be from saliva or from epithelial cells from exfoliation”¦” (Massei report, page 158.)

35. Guede left his DNA inside Meredith’s bag.

According to the Micheli report, which was made available to the public in January 2009, Guede’s DNA was found on the zip of Meredith’s purse, and not inside it.

“...b) traces attributable to Guede: ...on the bag found on the bed”¦”  (Judge Giordano sentencing report, page 5.)

36. Guede left his bloody fingerprints all over the crime scene.

He left zero fingerprints. According to the Micheli report, the Massei report and Rudy Guede’s final sentencing report, Guede was identified by a single bloody palm print:

“...b) traces attributable to Guede: a palm print in blood found on the pillow case of a pillow lying under the victim’s body ““ attributed with absolute certainty to the defendant by its correspondence to papillary ridges as well as 16-17 characteristic points equal in shape and position”¦” (Judge Giordano sentencing report, page 5.)

It is confirmed that Guede was identified by a bloody palm print in the Micheli report (pages 10-11) and the Massei report (page 43).

37. Guede left his hair at the crime scene.

The Scientific Police didn’t find any hair that belonged to Rudy Guede at the crime scene. That’s why there’s no mention of this in any of the court documents.

38. Guede pleaded guilty or confessed.

Rudy Guede has never pleaded guilty or confessed to Meredith’s murder. He offered to testify against Knox and Sollecito at trial in 2009, but the prosecutors did not want to give him any breaks. 

39. Guede’s prison sentence was reduced because he made a deal with the prosecutors.

Guede was sentenced to 30 years in prison by Judge Micheli in 2008. However, his sentence was reduced because he opted for a fast-trial, which means he automatically received a third off the sentence of Knox and Sollecito. Generic mitigating circumstances—i.e., his young age—were also taken into consideration.

40. Guede didn’t implicate Knox and Sollecito until much later.

Rudy Guede first implicated Knox and Sollecito whilst on the run in Germany on 19 November 2007 in an intercepted Skype conversation with his friend Giacomo:

Giacomo: “So they [Knox and Sollecito] killed her while she was dressed.”

Guede: “Yes, here it says that they [clothes] were washed in the washing machine, but that’s not true. She was dressed.”

41. Amanda Knox didn’t know Rudy Guede.

Amanda Knox testified in court that she had met Rudy Guede on several occasions.

Here’s the court transcript:

Carlo Pacelli (CP), Patrick Lumumba’s lawyer: In what circumstances did you meet him (Rudy)?

Amanda Knox (AK): I was in the center, near the church. It was during an evening when I met the guys that lived underneath in the apartment underneath us, and while I was mingling with them, they introduced me to Rudy.

CP: So it was on the occasion of a party at the house of the neighbors downstairs?

AK: Yes. What we did is, they introduced me to him downtown just to say “This is Rudy, this is Amanda”, and then I spent most of my time with Meredith, but we all went back to the house together.

CP: Did you also know him, or at least see him, in the pub Le Chic, Rudy?

AK: I think I saw him there once.

CP: Listen, this party at the neighbors, it took place in the second half of October? What period? End of October 2007?

AK: I think it was more in the middle of October.

42. Raffaele Sollecito had never been in trouble with the police.

Raffaele Sollecito had a previous brush with the police in 2003.

“...Antonio Galizia, Carabinieri [C.ri] station commander in Giovinazzo, who testified that in September 2003 Raffaele Sollecito was found in possession of 2.67 grams of hashish.” (Massei report, page 62.)

43. Sollecito had an impeccable track record.

Sollecito was monitored at university after being caught watching hardcore pornography featuring bestiality:

“...and educators at the boy’s ONAOSI college were shocked by a film “˜very much hard-core…where there were scenes of sex with animals with animals,’ at which next they activated a monitoring on the boy to try to understand him. (Pages 130 and 131, hearing 27.3.2009, statements by Tavernesi Francesco).” (Massei report, page 61.)

44. Sollecito couldn’t confirm Knox’s alibi because he was sleeping.

The claim that Sollecito couldn’t confirm Knox’s alibi because he was sleeping is completely contradicted by Sollecito’s witness statement:

“Amanda and I went into town at around 6pm, but I don’t remember what we did. We stayed there until around 8:30 or 9pm.

“At 9pm I went home alone and Amanda said that she was going to Le Chic because she wanted to meet some friends. We said goodbye. I went home, I rolled myself a spliff and made some dinner.” (Aislinn Simpson, The Daily Telegraph, 7 November 2007.)

Police said Raffaele Sollecito had continued to claim he was not present on the evening of the murder. He said:

“I went home, smoked a joint, and had dinner, but I don’t remember what I ate. At around eleven my father phoned me on the house phone. I remember Amanda wasn’t back yet. I surfed on the Internet for a couple of hours after my father’s phone call, and I stopped only when Amanda came back, about one in the morning, I think. (The Times, 7 November 2007.)

Above: The two provisionally convicted who originated some of the cancerous myths.

45. Amanda Knox had never been in trouble with the police.

According to Andrew Malone in an article on the Mail Online website, Amanda Knox was charged with hosting a party that got seriously out of hand, with students high on drink and drugs, and throwing rocks into the road, forcing cars to swerve. He claimed the students then threw rocks at the windows of neighbours who had called the police. Knox was fined $269 (£135) at the Municipal Court after the incident (crime No: 071830624).

Barbie Nadeau also reported that Knox had had a previous brush with the law:

...and her only brush with the law was a disturbing-the-peace arrest for a house party she threw.” (Barbie Nadeau, Angel Face, Kindle edition, page 6.)

According to the police ticket written by Seattle Police officer Jason Bender, Knox was issued with an infraction for the noise violation and warned about the rock throwing:

I issued S1/Knox this infraction for the noise violation and a warning for the rock throwing. I explained how dangerous and juvenile that action was.

46. Amanda Knox was retried for the same crimes.

All criminal cases in Italy are subject to three levels of review. No verdict is final until it has been confirmed by the Supreme Court.

Amanda Knox was not retried. She simply appealed her provisional 2009 convictions. The first appeal was held in Perugia in 2011, where she was provisionally acquitted by Judge Hellmann.

However, the Italian Supreme Court annulled the acquittals because Hellmann was found to have made a series of grave legal errors, and ordered a new appeal in Florence.

47. The Italian Supreme Court ruled that Amanda Knox’s interrogation was illegal.

The Italian Supreme Court has never stated that Amanda Knox’s recap/summary session on 5 November 2007 for the building of a list of names was illegal.

Bruce Fischer, who runs the Injustice in Perugia website and had heatedly denied this, eventually admitted this was not true on Perugia Murder File.net website:

“When it comes to the admissibility of the written statements, you are technically correct. The interrogation itself was never ruled illegal.”

Note that as stated above it was not an interrogation.

48. The Supreme Court threw out Amanda Knox’s statements.

The Supreme Court ruled that the 1:45am and 5:45am statements Knox insisted upon couldn’t be used against her in the murder trial because she wasn’t represented by a lawyer when she made them, even though she declined the presence of a lawyer.

However, both her statements were used against her at the calunnia component of the trial.

49. Dr. Stefanoni and the forensic technicians broke international protocols.

There is no internationally accepted set of standards. DNA protocols vary from country to country, and in America they vary from state to state. For example, New York state accepts LCN DNA tests in criminal trials.

Conti and Vecchiotti cited obscure American publications such as the Missouri State Highway Patrol Handbook and the Wisconsin Crime Laboratory Physical Evidence Handbook, not international protocols.

50. Amanda Knox is being railroaded or framed.

It would be immensely difficult in the Italian system for police or prosecutors to frame anyone and sustain this through two levels of appeal. With all its checks and balances and its professional career paths, it may be the system least prone to false final convictions in the world.

A number of Knox’s supporters, including Judy Bachrach, Paul Ciolino and Steve Moore, have claimed in the US media that Amanda Knox is being railroaded or framed, but they mis-state multiple facts and provide no hard proof or any reason why. The Hellmann appeal was wiped off the books, but they wrongly still draw upon that.

The collection of the DNA and forensic evidence was videotaped by the Scientific Police and, as the judges at the Supreme Court noted, defence experts were actually in the police labs to observe the DNA tests and reported nothing wrong:

“...the probative facts revealed by the technical consultant [Stefanoni] were based on investigative activities that were adequately documented: sampling activity performed under the very eyes of the consultants of the parties, who raised no objection”¦” (The Supreme Court report, page 93.)

The legal proceedings against Sollecito and Knox have been monitored throughout by US officials from the Rome embassy, and they at no time have ever expressed any concerns about the fairness or legitimacy of the judicial process.

Sources

Court documents
The Micheli report
The Massei report
Judge Giordano sentencing report
The Supreme court report
The Nencini report

Court testimony
Amanda Knox
Anna Donnino
Monica Napoleoni

Articles
The Daily Mail
The Times
The Telegraph
The Daily Beast
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer

Books
Death in Perugia, Kindle edition, John Follain
Angel Face, Kindle edition, Barbie Nadeau

Television programmes
Drew Griffins’ interview with Giuliano Mignini on CNN

Websites
The Freelance Desk: http://thefreelancedesk.com
Perugia Murder File.org: http://www.perugiamurderfile.org
Perugia Murder File.net: http://perugiamurderfile.net
CPS website: http://www.cps.gov.uk/publications/prosecution/lcn_testing.html
Seattle-Post Intelligencer: http://blog.seattlepi.com/seattle911/files/library/knoxincidentreport.pdf

Sunday, May 11, 2014

Knox Interrogation Hoax #1: Masterlist Of Posts Re Pre-Trial Events And Hoax Overview

Posted by Our Main Posters

Perugia Central Police Station at night (left-center)

1. Masterlist Of Posts In The Series

The Interrogation Hoax series will consist of a total of 24 posts.

These posts quote from a large number of transcripts only recently acquired and translated. There are no serious conflicts, no gray areas. One can assume with total certainty that this is the real thing (see Part 3 below), and that any other versions (see Part 4 below) are fabricated.

Numbering of posts 1-24 is not chronological, it represents the original order of postings.

1. What Happened At AK & RS Q&A Prior To 6 Nov

Click for Post: #19: ALL Knox Q&A Sessions 2-6 November 2007 WERE Recorded #1

Click for Post: #20: ALL Knox Q&A Sessions 2-6 November 2007 WERE Recorded #2

2. What Happened At Knox Q&A 6 Nov Ending 1:45 AM

Click for Post: #2: Trial Testimony From Rita Ficcara On Realities 5-6 Nov

Click for Post: #3: More Defense Pussyfooting Toward Rita Ficcara, Key Witness

Click for Post: #4: More Hard Realities From Rita Ficcara, More Nervousness From Defense

Click for Post: #12: Ficarra & Knox Notes PROVE Knox Merely Worked On Visitors Names List

Click for Post: #5: Key Witness Monica Napoleoni Confirms Knox Self-Imploded 5-6 Nov

Click for Post: #7: Testimony Of Witness Lorena Zugarini On The Knox Conniption 5-6 Nov

Click for Post: #8: Testimony Of Interpreter Donnino On Events Night Of 5 November

3. What Happened At Sollecito Q&A 6 Nov Ending 3:30 AM

Click for Post: #6: Sollecito Transcript & Actions Further Damage Knox Version

Click for Post: #9: Officer Moscatelli’s Recap/Summary Session With Sollecito 5-6 Nov

4. What Happened At Knox-Rights Session Ending 5:45am

Click for Post: #15: Knox Is Told Her Rights And Repeats Fake Murder Charge

5. What Of Relevance Happened In Ensuing Months

Click for Post: #13: The First Two Pre-Trial Opportunities Which Knox Flunked

Click for Post: #14: The Third Pre-Trial Opportunitty Which Knox Flunked

Click for Post: #16: The Fourth Pre-Trial Opportunity Which Knox Flunked

Click for Post: #17: Sollecito April 2008 Before Supreme Court Again Coldshoulders Knox

Click for Post:#18: The Final Pre-Trial Opportunities Which Knox Flunked

Click for Post: #21: Illustrating How Batshit Crazy The Interrogation Hoax Has Become

6. Why Investigators’ Version Won Hands-Down At Trial

Click for Post: #10: Why Prosecution And Defenses Never Believed Knox’s Version #1

Click for Post: #11: Why Prosecution And Defenses Never Believed Knox’s Version #2

2. Explaining Overall Arc Of Events

Much of the testimony listed above was about events at the central police station pre-arrest in early November 2007 and subsequent court attempts to achieve some believability and relief.

Early in 2009 at trial Knox and Sollecito sat glumly through all of the investigators’ pre-arrest testimony and cross-examination at trial. They were downhearted and apprehensive, and there were no smiles and few interruptions.

Subsequently Sollecito chose not to get on the stand, so from his team there really was never a rebuttal.

But Knox HAD to get on the stand, in July, for two days. She had no other way to defend herself against the serious felony crime of falsely framing Patrick for murder.

It was her word against theirs. It contradicted in many places what she had heard months earlier in sworn testimony from many investigators.

Knox’s version inevitably weakened a lot under cross-examination, and was ultimately a fail at trial and several appeals, even the annulled one.

Knox ended up serving three years. While on the stand she confirmed that she had been treated well, stiffing thousands of supporters duped into believing she had not been.

3. Explaining Court-Accepted Narrative For 6 Nov

This is an overview of Knox’s so-called “interrogation” at Perugia’s central police station, the subject of the first ten posts.

It led to her arrest and three years served. To make this picture really firm we will quote a lot of the testimony at trial. The Case Wiki carries all of these transcripts, many in English translation, and more. 

Senior Inspector Rita Ficarra testified that she arrived back at the police station late on 5 November, and finds her way blocked by a cartwheeling Knox.

She rebukes Knox, who testily responds that she is tired of the investigation. Rita Ficarra tells Knox to go home and get some sleep. Knox testily refuses, and remains there.

Shortly after, Ficarra suggests to Knox that if she really wants to help, she could add to the list of possible perps - men who Meredith knew and who might have visited the house.

This was a recap/summary, a simple checking of facts with someone who might or might not be of help. This could have been done on a street corner or in a house by a single officer. It was not a witness or suspect interrogation. From the transcript:

Ghirga: “While this interrogation - let’s call it thus - was in progress, some colleagues arrive…”  Ficarra: “It was not an interrogation, Attorney.” Ghirga: “They are called recaps/summaries.

Knox eagerly agrees. So they begin on the list.

This goes slowly because of language problems, until an interpreter, Anna Donnino, arrives. In total only Knox and four others (three of them women) are present.

Knox builds a list of seven people and adds maps and phone numbers (placed in evidence) in a calm proceeding. These were the names: Peter Svizzero, Patrick, Ardak, Juve, Spiros, Shaki and “a South African [Guede]” who played basketball near the house.

At several points in the evening Knox is provided with refreshments. No voices are ever raised, no bathroom breaks are refused.

In a separate wing Inspector Napoleoni and a couple of colleagues are seeking facts from Sollecito. Shown conflicts between what he has said and what his phone records show, Sollecito backtracks, and declares that Knox went out alone on the night, and made him lie.

Napoleoni moves through the questura to suggest to Ficarra to discuss the night of the attack with Knox in more detail and clarify who might have been present. Knox is not informed of Sollecito’s backtrack. She is asked for more names and spontaneously shares her phone. There is an outgoing to Patrick but no prior incoming. Knox is asked who Patrick is.

Suddenly, to the considerable surprise of others present, Knox has a yelling, head-clutching conniption (the first of several that night) and says “It’s him, it’s him, it was him, he killed her”. The session is halted.

Despite warnings she should not do so without a lawyer, Knox insists on a recorded statement which says she headed out to meet Patrick that night after he texted her. She accuses Patrick of killing Meredith. 

Efforts are made throughout the next several hours to try to help Knox to calm down. Knox is put on hold, given more refreshments, and made comfortable on some chairs so she might try to get some sleep.

A second session ending at 5:45 is intended as merely a formal reading of Knox’s legal status and her right to a lawyer, with Dr Mignini presiding. She is to be held as a material witness and for her own protection.

Again warned that she should not speak without a lawyer, and no questions can be asked, Knox still insists on a second spontaneous accusation culminating in a second recorded statement.

This also says she went out to meet Patrick that night, also accuses Patrick of killing Meredith, and now also hints that Sollecito may have been there. 

Just before noon, now under arrest and about to be taken to Capanne Prison, Knox insists on writing out at length a third statement this time in English.

She gleefully hands it to Rita Ficcara who cannot read it as she as no English. In the statement, Knox included this damning remark, without any mention of having been coerced: “The questions that need answering, at least for how I’m thinking are… 2. Why did I think of Patrik?”

Knox’s lawyers never ever substantially challenge this version, and never lodge any complaint. At trial in 2009 they accept on the record that there was no interrogation, and leave standing that Knox insisted on all three statements, and dont ever pursue Knox’s claims that she was coerced.

Courts all noted that there is no mention in that third note of Knox having been coerced, although this note was her idea and she could put in it anything she liked. From this there never was any going back.

In July 2009 at trial, in face of days and days of prior investigator testimony, Knox brashly tried to substitute this scenario above with the one below. Of course she was disbelieved.

For the calunnia framing of Patrick Lumumba Judge Massei in 2009 sentenced her to a year more than Sollecito, amended by Judge Hellmann in 2011 to three years served.

The Supreme Court definitively overruled her calunnia appeal so for her false framing of Patrick she is a felon for life.

4. Explaining Knox Family & PR Alternative

Knox’s Italian lawyers were not a part of this; in contrast the American PR lawyer Ted Simon sought to introduce major confusion.

In Italy, lawyers are REQUIRED to report tales of abuse of their clients or face possible criminal charges. Contrariwise, if they knowingly report false charges they can face similar charges. So what they do is a strong indicator of truth. 

Amanda Knox’s lawyers not only did not ever report any abuse. They even announced publicly, in face of incessant claims of abuse by Knox, family, and PR forces, that they had seen no evidence of abuse and so would not be reporting. 

Though her precise claims vary and often contradict one another, Knox herself has on and off ever since November 2007 tried to put the investigators on trial - tried to blame the police for causing her conniption and her false accusation of Patrick for the death of Meredith.

Her fail rate has been spectacular.

Knox failed to convince (1) Supervising Magistrate Matteini and (2) the Ricciarelli review panel in November 2007, (3) failed to convince Prosecutor Mignini in December 2007, (4) failed to convince the Supreme Court in April 2008, (5) failed to convince the Micheli court in late 2008, (6) failed to convince the judges and jury at trial 2009, (7) failed at annulled appeal 2011, (8) failed at repeat appeal 2013, (9) failed to convince the Supreme Court in 2012 and (10) failed again in 2015.

As Knox’s team simply did not ever believe her, they may not have given this their hardest shot. It was not part of their largely spurious complaint to the EC HR.

And yet despite all of these failures, the huge and very nasty Knox PR effort went full-bore ahead with the abuse allegations anyway.

Read this post of 11 February 2009 which was about two weeks before the Knox “interrogators” were cross-examined at trial, and several months before Knox herself took the stand. Dozens of media reports repeated the Knox claims as if true.

Knox repeated them in her April 2013 book, and her December 2013 email to Judge Nencini, and her appeal to EHCR Strasbourg, and in some TV and newspaper interviews, including one with the Italian weekly Oggi which caused that paper legal harm.

This version has been blown up by Knox PR shills in internet posts, articles, TV interviews, and books. Among others propagating it have been Raffaele Sollecito (in his book), Doug Preston, Saul Kassin, Steve Moore (especially), John Douglas, Jim Clemente, Paul Ciolino, Michael Heavey, Greg Hampikian, Chris Halkidis, Mark Waterbury, Doug Bremner, Candace Dempsey, Nina Burleigh, Bruce Fischer, and many posters on the Knox sites and Fischer sites and on Ground Report.

Main claims included 50-plus hours of “interrogation”, numerous officers in teams, no food or drink, no sleep, no bathroom breaks, no lawyer, no recording, and much abuse and yelling and suggestions and threats. Way beyond anything even Knox herself and notably her own lawyers ever claimed. 

• Here is Steve Moore claiming that around a dozen cops in rotating tag teams of two assaulted a starving and sleepless Knox over 20/30/40 hours, threatened her, and refused her a lawyer throughout.


• Here is Saul Kassin claiming that Knox was interrogated over the entire night of 5-6 November, until she was finally broken and a coerced “confession” emerged - even though the “false confession” actually framed Patrick and was in reality a false accusation. That Kassin ignores.


• Here are several former FBI profilers blatantly embellishing the same claims in a book, with (today) 60 five-star reviews.

And yet Knox’s own Italian lawyers specifically denied her accusations! No complaint against the police was ever lodged. All courts disbelieved her. Knox served her three years. But still the PR-driven hoax keeps resounding.

Posted by Our Main Posters on 05/11/14 at 09:30 PM • Permalink for this post • Archived in Defendants in court,  Amanda Knox,  The officially involved,  Police and CSI,  Hoaxes against Italy,  10 Mignini MOF hoax,  Hoaxes Knox & team,  16 Interrogation hoax,  17 Fake memory hoax,  Hoaxes re Guede,  33 Sole attacker hoax,  Hoaxers from 2007,  Knox-Marriott PR,  More hoaxers,  Hoaxers from 2009,  Bruce Fischer,  Steve Moore,  Hoaxers from 2011,  John Douglas • Comments here (10)

Wednesday, January 15, 2014

Mignini And Giuttari Win Final Round In Spurious 2010 Conviction By Rogue Prosecutor And Judge

Posted by Peter Quennell

Poison pill sown in 2006

The entire edifice of the Knox PR campaign was always built on a foundation of sand. 

Years ago, the wannabe real-crime-reporter Doug Preston was shaken to the core when Dr Mignini and others figured out with the help of court-authorized wire-taps that he and Mario Spezi were planting evidence and using fake IDs to frame someone they had wrongly concluded was the “real” murderer in the Monster of Florence case.

In uncalled-for retaliation (he got off very lightly and could have faced a prison term) Preston went back to the US and, safe there, wrote a nasty and largely fictional book. He repeatedly claims it was really the cops and specifically Dr Mignini not Preston & Spezi who were dumb and blundering in not sufficiently investigating and charging the “real” murderer.

Fast-forward to 2008

Almost nobody in Italy supports Preston’s and Spezi’s “solution” to the MOF crime which they seemed to hope would bring them big bucks and whole new careers. That solution is widely regarded as a joke and there is voluminous evidence against it.

Nevertheless, Preston’s MOF book is published in the US, demonizing Mignini in great detail.

Knox PR aide David Marriot and his media pet poodles and online thugs, including the wild-eyed Paul Ciolino of CBS and the bizarro Frank Sforza of Perugia, were all over the notion that it was Mignini and not Preston & Spezi who had done something seriously wrong. 

The mafia always has an interest in taking Italian justice down a peg, and opportunities were increasingly seen here. The mafia’s various useful idiots in the US (John Douglas, Saul Kassin, Dempsey, Burleigh, Steve Moore, Michele Moore, Heavey, Fischer, Doug Bremner, Hampikian, Halkidis, and some others) who have plagued a correct understanding of the MOF and Perugia cases all helpfully all piled on.

Fast-forward to January 2010

Dr Mignini and the former head of Florence detectives Michele Giuttari were convicted in Florence on spurious grounds. See our posts back then by Commissario Montalbano and TomM.

The purpose of the Florentine investigation against Mignini and Giuttari was obviously a pretext, a ploy aimed at blocking the seemingly very threatening Narducci arm of the MOF investigation. In fact it was a pretext for the rogue Florence prosecutor seizing the Narducci case file back from Dr Mignini in Perugia and burying it out of sight.

Nevertheless,  the demonization of Mignini became even more shrill, multiplied globally by the gullible Joel Simon of the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists in foolishly protecting the proven liar Frank Sforza who is now facing THREE trials.,

Fast-forward to November 2011

The Florence appeal court reverses the 2010 convictions because the case was brought by the SAME rogue Florence prosecutor who was caught on tape meddling in the Narducci investigation and who was one of those (there were others) trying to slow it down or destroy it. 

Fast-forward to January 2013

The Supreme Court scathingly endorses that reversal.  The attempt from within the Florentine court to de-legitimize the Narducci arm of the MOF investigation was from now on definitively at a dead end.

The investigations and trials of those who had for mysterious reasons been hampering the Narducci investigation were also put back on track by Cassation. Most threatened is Doug Preston’s mate Mario Spezi. He seems headed for a prison sentence for sure, leaving Preston (a major meddler in Meredith’s case) also legally very exposed..

Fast forward to April 2013

Dr Mignini is promoted, gaining very high marks in a competitive process. From this point on he will handle only appeals, and when Dr Galati retires (expected soon) Dr Mignini is expected to be the #1 prosecutor of the Region of Umbria.

Fast forward to summer 2013

The Turin prosecution office finally obtains the investigation file on Mignini and Giuttari from Florence as the Florence appeal judge and Cassation had instructed.

The investigation file should have been sent in November 2011 for action leading to full closure on the substance, but the Florence prosecutors illegally sat on it, presumably fearful of what could happen to him.

The Turin prosecution office had little interest in re-opening what seemed a dead-end and frivolous case. If this was what Mignini and Giuttari had wanted, the charges could have been dropped, but without any court finding of “not guilty”.

However, Dr Giuttari and Dr Mignini explained that they wanted a court finding of “not guilty” on the merits of the case. They WANTED the Turin court to read the evidence and to make a final ruling.

Fast forward to today

The Turin court did meet. Andrea Vogt posted this report.

For those keeping track of the various “sideshows” in the Amanda Knox case, a Turin court Wednesday definitively acquitted Perugia prosecutor Giuliano Mignini of three charges against him in connection to his investigations into the Monster of Florence case.  The court shelved another three charges because the statute of limitations had expired. One abuse of office charge involving the wiretapping of a La Stampa journalist will be heard in court on March 18, but its statute of limitations appears to expire just days before, so it is unclear if the case will go forward. None of the matters relate directly to the Amanda Knox case, but they were often referenced by the prosecutor’s detractors.

And what next

The Italian justice system protects its senior judges and prosecutors from criminal defamations intended to obstruct justice with some powerful measures. They were originally intended to keep the mafia in its place as defamation of police, prosecutors and judges is one of its mainstays.

All of the false claims about Dr Mignini are still out there. Preston’s book is still on sale. So is Burleigh’s, Dempsey’s, Fischer’s, and John Douglas’s. Joel Simon’s seriously wrong claims are still online. Not one has recanted or wound back.

Knox and Sollecito each repeated the baseless claims at length in their books, and even embellished them. Michael Heavey parrots them to the State Department. They are the main crutch of Bruce Fischer, Steve Moore, Michele Moore, Doug Bremner, and so on.

However, the required pushback by Florence prosecutors and others has begun, and with today’s ruling will accelerate. Frank Sforza is already on trial for calunnia and the Italian justice system is quietly zeroing in on many others, all the book publishers included.

On March 14 the magazine Oggi which published many of Amanda Knox’s baseless claims in Italian must appear in court in Bergamo. Knox and Sollecito themselves may find a heap of new legal troubles after the appeal verdict is announced on 30 January.

*****

Numerous posts by Kermit and Yummi still need to be linked to.

Posted by Peter Quennell on 01/15/14 at 08:07 PM • Permalink for this post • Archived in The officially involved,  The prosecutors,  The legal followups,  Italian related,  Hoaxes against Italy,  9 Mignini v Knox hoax,  10 Mignini MOF hoax,  Hoaxers from 2007,  Preston & Spezi,  Heavey, Bremner,  Paul Ciolino,  Steve Moore,  Nina Burleigh,  John Douglas • Comments here (20)

Sunday, November 03, 2013

Knox Apologists Attempt To Bend Congress; But Nobody Important Turns Up

Posted by Our Main Posters

From the left: Steve Moore, John Douglas, and Michael Heavey.

In a room for hire at the Congress they made presentations of their misleading takes on the case to a near-empty room.

Senator Cantwell was apparently there briefly but took off as soon as she could. No other elected leaders were seen to be there.

There was seemingly no media coverage except for a sole post by another Knox apologist on the Infamous Ground Report.

These are hardly the most impartial or for that matter truthful and accurate observers of the case.

Click through for our numerous takedowns of the hapless Steve Moore, and John Douglas, and Michael Heavey.

Posted by Our Main Posters on 11/03/13 at 06:35 PM • Permalink for this post • Archived in The wider contexts,  N America context,  Hoaxes against Italy,  2 Italian mileu hoax,  3 No evidence hoax,  4 No firm DNA hoax,  9 Mignini v Knox hoax,  12 Rabid media hoax,  Hoaxes Knox & team,  16 Interrogation hoax,  20 No-PR hoax,  Hoaxes Sollecito etc,  28 Not at house hoax,  32 No-PR hoax,  Hoaxes re Guede,  33 Sole attacker hoax,  34 Bad guy hoax,  Hoaxers from 2007,  Heavey, Bremner,  Steve Moore,  John Douglas • Comments here (0)

Monday, October 28, 2013

Some Hard Truths Sollecito PR Puppet Sharlene Martin Omits In Her Misleading Invite To The Congress

Posted by Our Main Posters

Dear Sharlene Martin:

Please dont say we didnt warn you before. In this notice of a Congressional “briefing” (read: paid highly misleading PR) you once again gloss over a number of hard truths.

You might well be advised to head to higher ground. The US Congress and the Administration will soon be left in no doubt about the correct facts of the case against Sollecito and Knox, as Italian law enforcement start to reach out to their counterparts in the FBI, and as they charge mischief-makers with obstruction of justice in the case, and as more and more reporters in the US and UK media wisen up.

Against your client, this was always a very strong case. And this alone has your client cooked. Here are some other corrections and correct background to the false claims you have just made.

1) Senator Cantwell was already burned by associating too closely with your radioactive group. She spoke out daffily for Amanda Knox several years ago - and then, duly warned, she went quiet again. Ask her congressional staff for the story to that. And read our past heads-ups for Senator Maria Cantwell here and here.

2) Your client Raffaele Sollecito wrote the most defamatory and misleading book about an Italian case in many years. Key claims have been repudiated by his own father on Italian TV. As his case is ongoing Sollecito is meant to fight it in the (very fair) Italian courts, not poison public opinion to lean on those courts. Sollecito is being considered for charges of obstruction of justice for the book and much else in the media, and you and the publishers may be charged too.

3) This is NOT a third trial. It is a re-run of a first appeal. If the very well-run and highly decisive Massei trial of 2009 had been run in the US or UK it is hard to see what grounds if any, any appeal judge would accept for appeal. Your client would be near the end of his sixth year in prison. And it is known that the Hellmann Appeal and the DNA consultancy were both bent by Sollecito’s and Knox’s own teams (corrective measures have been taken with more to come) so the 6-year process is essentially your own team’s fault.

4) John Douglas’s highly self-serving chapters on the case are among the silliest ever written in a crowded field. The very vain Douglas starts with the totally false premise that Knox was forced to confess after many many hours, and from there on out it is all downhill. He takes a faux position essentially identical to that of Saul Kassin. Read about Kassin’s own spurious and highly self-serving take on Knox’s “forced confession” here and here and here.

5) Steve Moore lacks the correct expertise to analyse this case and he was never the ace crime scene investigator you claim. A dozen or more posts here show how unreliable and rambling he is. Among other things he appeared on a disastrous panel (with a team almost identical to yours - and an audience that peaked at 35) at Seattle University a couple of years ago. Read what two very astute lawyers thought of his man-in-a-bubble performance here and here.

6) The hapless Michael Heavey was officially reprimanded for his bizarre intervention in the case. He was also on the disaster of a panel at Seattle University. He has got the basic facts wrong again and again and again. Here he is getting the facts wrong five years ago.  Here is his association with Frank Sforza, a key mis-stater of the key facts of the case and serial defamer of the Italian officials involved, who he was financially supporting - and who now faces three separate trials of his own.

7) And the hapless John Q Kelly? This is a tough field in which to come out ahead but John Q was perhaps the silliest talking head for Knox and Sollecito on TV. He babbled on in the media about a railroading that never took place. Read how even his own colleagues considered him to have been duped here and here.

A Congressional briefing panel that is not made in heaven, that is for sure. Stay tuned. There is more to come.

Posted by Our Main Posters on 10/28/13 at 05:06 PM • Permalink for this post • Archived in Defendants in court,  Raff Sollecito,  Hoaxers from 2007,  Raff Sollecito PR,  Heavey, Bremner,  More hoaxers,  Hoaxers from 2009,  Steve Moore,  Hoaxers from 2011,  John Douglas • Comments here (45)

Tuesday, October 08, 2013

Questions For Knox and Sollecito: Why Claim Rudy Guede Did It Alone When So Much Proof Against?

Posted by Marcello

1. Problems Of Your “Guede did it alone” Mantra

Your attempts to frame Guede for the entire attack sound racist, and they fly in the face of a multitude of hard facts.

Why are you and your more untethered supporters arguing to the media that Rudy Guede alone attacked Meredith (he could not have), that he was a drifter (he wasnt), a burglar (he wasnt), and drug dealer (he wasnt), and that his DNA traces are “all over Meredith’s room” (they werent)?

There are surprisingly few DNA traces of Guede in there, and outside Meredith’s door there is only evidence of (1) his prior use of the south bathroom, and (2) his shoeprints headed straight for the front door.

There is zero evidence that Rudy Guede was ever in the shared bathroom (the one with Sollectio’s bloody footprint on the bathmat) and zero evidence he was in Filomena’s room (the one with the broken window and the mixed DNA of Meredith and Knox). 

2. Evidence Against You Is Far, Far Stronger

Explain if you can about Sollecito’s bloody footprint. Explain if you can about the evidence of cleanup. Explain this and this about your multiple contradictory alibis.

Explain if you can why YOUR own witnesses Alessi and Aviello were such disasters for your side in court. Explain your cell phone actions (or non-actions) and the timing and content of your phone calls, and your computer actions (or non actions).

Explain why in Sollecito’s book he claims he sent several emails throughout the night; but there zero records of such emails with his email provider. Explain why both Sollecito and Knox framed Dr Mignini.

There are three compelling reasons above all why the Massei court and the Supreme Court will remain totally unbending on the point that Guede did NOT attack Meredith alone, and that it had to be a pack attack on Meredith.

• One is the full day of closed court testimony at trial by crime-scene experts from Rome who accounted for every point of evidence in Meredith’s room with a depiction of a 15 minute pack attack involving three people. This seriously upset the jury and your own defense was left essentially speechless.


• One is the prosecution’s video shown in closed court during Summations of the recreation of the attack on Meredith, which accounted for every point of evidence with a 15 minute pack attack involving three people.  This seriously upset the jury and your own defense was left essentially speechless
.

• One is that the entry of an attacker via Filomena’s room is so absolutely unbelievable. Your own defense always knew this, and barely tried to make that sale (hence the witnesses Alessi and Aviello).

There are seven other routes for a burglar to enter the house, all of them faster and quieter and five of them darker. You can see five in these images below: two via the east windows, three up onto the balcony and into the house via the louvre door or the kitchen window.

All seven routes would be obvious to any burglar, long before he walked all the way around the base of the house to beneath Filomena’s window (which he did several times in your scenario). 

3. The Numerous Questions From Which You Hide

On or after 6 November you have both promised to appear in the appeal court in Florence. You are apparently too nervous to face cross-examination under oath, but you have said you intend to try to explain things.

1) Rudy Guede had been to the apartment at least twice already on prior occasions and knew the boys who lived in the lower story. Why did Guede choose to NOT break-in to the lower story where he knew (or could ascertain) that all four boys were away on holiday, and therefore could break-in and rummage with some certainty of not getting caught?

2) Why did Guede choose to break-in to the upper story of the villa mid-evening, when he surely knew Knox and Kercher would be staying at the villa for the holidays and could have been there or returned at any time to “catch him in-the-act”?

3) Surely Guede would have verified that no one was present by circling the cottage and checking if any lights were on in the windows? But Guede “missed” the really easy way in: the balcony in the dark at the rear, used in 2 burglaries in 2009.

4) If Guede did circle the cottage to make sure no one was there before attempting the break-in, why would he then choose the most visible and more difficult path of entry through a second story window, as opposed to the more hidden and easier path of break-in at the back of the villa, which he would have noticed while circling the villa?

5) Why would Guede choose to break-in through a second story window that was highly exposed to the headlights of passing cars on the street as well as exposed to night lighting from the carpark?

6) Ms. Romanelli testified that she had nearly closed the exterior shutters. Assuming her memory is correct, there is no way a burglar could easily verify if the windows were latched and if the inner scuri were latched to the window panes, which would make access to the window latch impractical unless one was armed with a core drill or an ax. Why would Guede, who was certainly familiar with such windows, choose to attempt the break-in through a window that he could not easily verify would allow him quick access?

7) Assuming the shutters were closed, Guede would have to climb up the wall and open the shutters before smashing the window with the rock. The night of the murder, the grass was wet from rain the previous day. Why was there no evidence of disturbed grass or mud on the walls?

8) Guede had Nike sneakers, not rock climbing shoes. How did he manage the climb up the wall with that type of footwear?

9) If the shutters were closed, or somewhat closed, how did Guede manage to lift himself up to the sill with only an inch of sill available to grab onto?

10) Assuming Guede opened the shutters, how did Guede verify if the inner scuri where not latched to the window panes, which would prevent access to the window latch? There was no light inside Ms. Romanelli’s room to reveal that the scuri were ajar.

11) Assuming Guede managed to check that the inner scuro behind the right-hand window was not latched, how did he manage to break the glass with a 9 lb rock with one hand while hanging on to the sill with the other?

12) Assuming Guede managed check that the right-hand inner scuro was not latched, how did he break the glass with the rock without having glass shards fly into his face?

13) If Guede climbed down to the lob the 9 lb rock at the window from 3 meters below, how would he do so to avoid glass shards raining down on him?

14) If Guede climbed down to the lob the rock at the window from below, why would he choose a 9 lb 20 cm wide rock to lob up to a window 3 meters above him, with little chance of striking the window in the correct fashion?

15) If Guede climbed down again and climbed back up to the carpark (up a steep slope with slippery wet grass and weeds) to lob the 9 lb 20 cm wide rock from the car park, why is there no evidence of this second climb down on the walls?

16) Why did Guede choose a 9 lb 20 cm wide rock to throw from the car park, given that a large, heavy rock would be difficult to lob with any precision? Especially considering that the width of the glass in the window pane is only 28 cm wide, surely anyone, experienced or not, would have chosen a smaller, lighter rock to throw with greater precision.

17) If Guede lobbed a 9 lb 20 cm rock from the car park, such a lob would require some velocity and therefore force. Guede would have been roughly 11-12 feet away from the window, in order for the lob to clear the wood railing at the carpark. If the rock was thrown with some velocity, why is the upper 1/2 of the glass in the window pane intact, without any fracture cracks at all?

18) If Guede lobbed a 9 lb 20 cm rock from the car park, such a lob would require some velocity and therefore force. Why is there so little damage to the scuro the rock hit, so little damage to the terrazzo flooring impacted by the rock, and so little damage to the rock itself, which surely would have fractured more on impact with a hard terrazzo floor?

19) Why was there no evidence of glass shards found in the grass below the window?

20) If Guede climbed the wall to open the shutters, climbed down and up to the car park to throw the rock, then climbed back down and up again to the window, how does he manage to hoist himself onto the sill without cutting himself on the glass that was found on the sill?

21) If Guede climbed the wall to open the shutters, hoisted himself onto the sill, tapped the glass with a 9 lb rock to lightly break the glass in a manner more consistent with how the window was broken, why did he throw the rock into the room, rather than let it fall into the grass below?

22) Why was no dirt, grass, muddy shoeprints or similar trace evidence found on the window sill?

23) Why was no dirt, grass, muddy shoeprints or similar trace evidence found in Romanelli’s room?

24) If Guede climbed the wall to open the shutters, climbed down and up to the car park to throw the rock, then climbed back down and up again to the window again, hoisted himself onto the sill without cutting himself on the glass that was found on the sill, unlatched the window and stepped inside Filomena’s room, how did he manage to get glass on top of Romanelli’s clothing that was found under the window sill?

25) Why would Guede, who would have spent a good 10 minutes trying to break and enter with the climbing up and down from the carpark, waste valuable time throwing clothes from the closet? Why not simply open the closet doors and rifle through the clothes without creating more of mess?

26) Why did he disregard Romanelli’s laptop, which was in plain view?

27) Why did Guede check the closet before checking the drawers of the nightstand, where surely more valuable objects like jewelry would be found?

28) Why were none of the other rooms disturbed during the break-in?

29) Assuming Ms. Kercher arrived to the cottage after Guede’s break-in, presumably when Guede was in the bathroom, why did she not notice the break-in, call the police and run out of the cottage?

30) Assuming Guede was in the bathroom when Ms. Kercher returned, why go to the extent of attacking Ms. Kercher in her room rather than try to sneak out the front door, or through the window he had just broken, to avoid if not identification, at least more serious criminal charges?

31) Assuming Ms. Kercher was at the cottage while Guede broke-in, why did she not call the police the moment she heard the rock crash through the glass, loudly thud to the terrazzo floor and investigate what was happening in Romanelli’s room while Guede was climbing back down from the car park and climbing back up to the window?

32) Assuming Ms. Kercher was at the cottage while Guede broke-in, Guede could have been on the sill already because he had tapped the glass with the 9 lb rock to break it. Therefore perhaps Guede was already partially inside Romanelli’s room when he was discovered by Ms. Kercher. In this case Guede follows Ms. Kercher to her room in an attempt to dissuade her from calling the police and the assault ensues. But then, if this scenario is correct, when does Guede have time to rifle through Romanelli’s clothing and effects?

33) Why is there a luminol revealed footprint in Romanelli’s room that has mixed traces of Knox’s and Kercher’s DNA ?

34) Why does this footprint not match Guede’s foot size?

35) If multiple attackers were required to restain Ms. Kercher, holding her limbs while brandishing two knives and committing sexual violence, then who else was with Guede and why no traces of this 4th (or more) person(s) were found, either in shoeprints, footprints, fingerprints, DNA or otherwise?

36) If Guede and others were involved in the assault, why has Guede not acknolwedged them, and instead consistently hinted that, and finally admitting that Sollecito and Knox were with him during the assault?

37) If Guede and others were involved in the assault, why do the other shoeprints, footprints, DNA traces and fingerprints all point to Knox and Sollecito being present during the assault, in one way or another?

4. Italy Is Not Buying The Racist Mantra

If your racist mantra remains “the black guy did it alone” and “Italians are corrupt and stupid” you need to PROVE that. If you cannot answer all of these questions above, this will deservedly cook you.

You could be facing 30 years with the “mitigating factors” canceled and the new penalties you will incur for your dishonest books and PR campaigns.


[Five easier ways in: 3 via balcony (note two drainpipes, window grid below), 2 via side windows]

Posted by Marcello on 10/08/13 at 04:43 PM • Permalink for this post • Archived in Defendants in court,  Amanda Knox,  Raff Sollecito,  Rudy Guede,  Evidence & Witnesses,  Faked breakin,  The two knives,  News media & movies,  Hoaxes against Italy,  3 No evidence hoax,  5 No pack attack hoax,  6 No staging hoax,  Hoaxes Knox & team,  Hoaxes Sollecito etc,  30 Alessi hoax,  31 Aviello hoax,  Hoaxes re Guede,  33 Sole attacker hoax,  Hoaxers from 2007,  Knox-Marriott PR,  Heavey, Bremner,  Hoaxers from 2009,  Bruce Fischer,  Steve Moore,  Nina Burleigh,  Hoaxers from 2011,  Amanda Knox #2,  Raff Sollecito #2 • Comments here (41)

Saturday, January 12, 2013

How Much To Place Blame On Guede? IMMENSE Headache For RS & AK Teams

Posted by Cardiol MD

[Photo by Andrea Vogt as in December 2010 Supreme Court decides that Rudy Guede didnt act alone]

Zero To 100% Guede Was Claimed Sole Attacker

On a scale of 0% to 100% how much of the blame for the crime against Meredith has been heaped on Rudy Guede?

Well, it certainly varies. In trial court and first-appeal court it was never ever 100%.

Seemingly very scared of the harm Guede could do to their clients, if they provoked him into telling all, defense lawyers have acted consistently since 2008 and more-so since December 2010 as if they walk on eggshells around him.

In fact among the defendants and their teams only ONCE was Guede ever blamed 100%. 

Sollecito’s bizarrely-titled Honor Bound 2012 book, the factually unchecked one, which now is causing him and his defense team so much trouble, was the first instance ever among those accused to try to blame Guede for the crime 100%.

Our next post will look at the categoric claims against Guede by whoever wrote that book. Meanwhile, here and now, let’s start at the beginning.

Commencing from when they were arrested, Amanda Knox pointed decisively at a black man, but of course she pointed at the wrong one: Patrick Lumumba. Make that 0% . Not long after they were arrested, Knox and Sollecito were strongly questioning the role of one another. So 100% against each other, but still a zero against Mr Guede.

In his messages from Germany Guede blamed two hasty intruders though he had no choice but to say he was there. Perhaps 33% at this point.  After Guede was captured, Sollecito implied that they were at the crime scene together because he was worried that Guede would implicate him. Make that 50%.

At Guede’s short-form trial In October 2008, Judge Micheli blamed Guede 33% too. In sending Knox and Sollecito to full trial he dismissed the lone wolf theory (never really to be revived in court again) and he tentatively believed the evidence pointed to their being equally guilty.

In fact Judge Micheli tentatively blamed Knox for instigating both the attack on Meredith and the rearrangement of the crime scene.  In effect he allocated 50% of the blame to Amanda Knox and 25% each to Guede and Sollecito. 

Throughout trial in 2009 the Knox and Sollecito defense teams seemed to take great care not ever to blame Guede 100%, perhaps because (for murky reasons not made public) Rudy Guede had refused to testify against their clients.

Judge Massei assigned Guede 33% of the blame as he concluded that Guede had initiated the attack but that Knox and Sollecito had wielded the knives and that one of them had struck the final blow. 

During trial and thereafter, the defense lawyers for the three were often on Italian TV and as our main poster the Italian lawyer Cesare Beccaria exhaustively charted in a four-part series, each “gently” blamed the other two.

We can assume that is either 33% or 50% but never more than that.

On February 24. 2011, in the Supreme Court report, on its rejection of Guede’s final appeal of his sentence for involvement in killing Meredith, blamed Rudy Guede and two others equally. Some 33% of the blame each.

The Supreme Court relied upon three facts: the physical evidence of Guede’s presence at the flat, Guede’s actual admission of his presence, and Guede’s implicit admission of shared-guilt in his documented Skype InstaMessage to Giacomo Benedetti on Nov. 19, 2007 (“I was scared that they would say I was the only guilty person”).

In a nutshell, the situation at the start of the Sollecito and Knox appeal before Judges Hellmann and Zanetti in 2011 was this:

• The Supreme Court had decided that Rudy Guede acting ALONE could not have attacked Meredith with several knives over an estimated 15 minutes, left so little physical evidence upon her, staged the break-in via the absurd route of Filomena’s window while leaving zero DNA in her room, placed Sollecito’s DNA on Meredith’s bra clasp, engineered several traces of Knox’s and Sollecito’s footprints outside the room, and placed the mixed DNA of Meredith and Knox in several different locations outside Meredith’s locked door.
• But there remains zero evidence that perps two and three which the physical evidence strongly pointed to were anyone other than Knox and Sollecito. There’s really not one speck of hard evidence to the contrary. Defenses somewhat desperately tried to engineer some at first appeal from the seemingly perjured testimony of jailbirds Alessi and Aviello and some smoke-blowing over the DNA testing, but in terms of HARD evidence came up empty-handed. Alessi did a meltdown on the stand, while Aviello turned completely cuckoo, and Judges Hellmann and Zanetti had to invent arguments frantically to dig Knox and Sollecito out of that hole.

I have done a series of posts (to be read from the bottom upward) on the Hellmann-Zanetti outcome covering many other aspects of their strange arguments.

Back in late 2010 some of us at TJMK were impressed at the alacrity with which Judge Hellman selected Conti and Vecchiotti.

We were thinking that “he had already thought it all out” [we seem to have got that-much right], and that he was “being prudently responsive to the legal and political pressures bearing down on him, and knows the ruling also calls the defendants’ bluff.”

I had posted that the defenses of Knox and Sollecito seemed to be trying to exclude evidence that they themselves tried to destroy, essentially on the grounds that their destructive attempts failed to destroy all of it, and left behind only some of it.  Their argument had boiled down to whether the disputed DNA evidence is more unfairly prejudicial than probative.

It was my opinion that because it was the defendants’ deliberate conduct that nearly succeeded in extinguishing all their DNA, any US and UK courts would admit this highly relevant evidence, and let the participants duke out its fairness, in open court, in front of a jury.

I had thought that was what the Massei Court had already done, and was what the Hellmann/Zanetti court was then doing. The Hellmann/Zanetti court was doing that - but that was not all it was doing, as we now know and regret.

I had believed that the defendants would bitterly regret their petition for such DNA Expert-Opinion Review.  We should know in March 2013 if they regret it at all, let alone “˜bitterly’. So far they may not, but Sollecito’s current venture into special-pleading journalism in his book seems likely to accelerate their journey to a bitter and regretted destiny.

We were less impressed with how Judge Zanetti started the appeal hearings.

To his eternal discredit Judge Zenetti uttered words to the effect that “the only thing that is “˜certain’ in Meredith’s case is that Meredith is dead.” Nothing else. In effect, illegally promising a whole new trial at appeal level - very much frowned on by the Supreme Court.

Unless the word “˜thing’ is a mistranslation, that is not the only thing that was already certain in Meredith’s Case; Many Things were then certain in her case. 

For example, it is certain that the first-ever documented references to Meredith’s scream just before she was killed had already come both from the mouth of Amanda Knox herself, and from the hand of Amanda Knox, in the case of her contemporaneous personal hand-written notes.

Guede, himself, had certainly already made a documented reference to Meredith’s scream.

It was also certain that Guede had made documented references to his actual presence when Meredith screamed.

Some of these already-certain facts inconveniently undermined Hellmann’s and Zanetti’s already-assumed conclusions, so they then proceeded in-turn to undermine the “˜reliability’ of those facts, e.g. “˜it is not certain that the scream was Meredith’s scream; it could have been someone-else’s scream’; or even Amanda’s scream?

The Massei court had exhaustively presented the evidence from all sources in their conclusion that Knox and Sollecito were the ones who shared Guede’s guilt. But Hellmann/Zanetti then contradicted ALL the previous finders-of-fact with regard to Guede, essentially using five ploys in arguing:

• That Guede was Unreliable: “for example, in the questioning before the Prosecutor, he denies being known by the nickname of Baron, “¦.so as to result in a version completely incompatible with the reality of the facts as perceived and heard…” [Is that ever giving birth to a mouse?], and
• That the Supreme Court had “held Rudy Guede to be an Unreliable person”, and
• That “therefore, among the evidence against the two accused, the testimony given at the hearing of June 27, 2011 by Rudy Guede cannot be included because it is Unreliable, nor can the contents of the letter written by him and sent to his lawyers”, and
• That concerning Guede’s documented Skype InstaMessage to Giacomo Benedetti on Nov. 19, 2007 “”¦ the contents of the chat between Rudy Guede and his friend Giacomo Benedetti on the day of November 19,  2007,  also listened to by the Police,  can be considered in favour of the two accused”, because “he would not have had any reason to keep quiet about such a circumstance,”
• And that “So, in the course of that chat with his friend….. Rudy Guede does not indicate in any way Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito as the perpetrators…..” and “.....he would not have had any reason to keep quiet about such a circumstance….. he being…. certainly the perpetrator….. of the crimes carried out in via della Pergola, that if Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito had also participated, that he would at that moment have revealed this to his friend.”

So, summarising Hellmann and Zanetti, they have absurdly argued a contradiction:

• Because of Guedes notoriously unreliability, the public evidence in which he did accuse Knox and Sollecito cannot be considered as evidence of their guilt, but
• In spite of Guede’s notorious unreliability, because Guede did not accuse Knox and Sollecito in a private conversation this must be considered as conclusive evidence of their innocence.

We are not the audience to which Dr Galati’s appeal against Hellmann and Zanetti to the Supreme Court is directed. Most of us probably have some difficulty with its legalese, translated into English, so bear with it.

Dr Galati’s appeal against Hellmann and Zanetti refers to Guede’s documented Skype InstaMessage to Giacomo Benedetti on Nov. 19, 2007 as follows:

The Hellmann/Zanetti court, “has”¦ made “¦. completely anomalous use of the Skype call, accepting it for the time of Kercher’s death, but not for other circumstances which are also extremely relevant for judgment purposes, but which have been totally ignored.

In fact, in the call, Guede recounts having heard Meredith complaining about her missing money and of her intention of asking Ms Knox, with whom she had quarrelled, for an explanation (p. 10 of the call [transcript]), of having seen Meredith look in vain for the missing money in her drawer (p. 18), then of having seen Meredith look, still in vain, for her missing money in Amanda’s room (pp. 18-19 of the call [transcript]), and of having heard a girl enter the house, who could have been one of the roommates, thus Amanda (p. 11 of the call [transcript]), while the Ivorian found himself in the bathroom, just before hearing Meredith’s terrible scream which would have caused him [59] to exit the bathroom, about five minutes after the girl’s ingress (p 12 of the call [transcript])”... .

The Court has, in practice, without reason thrown the responsibility onto Guede for throwing the rock and clambering in (see pp 121-122 of the appealed judgment): in the same Skype call, Guede, however, repeatedly denies having seen the broken window in Romanelli’s room during the whole time in which he was in the house at Via della Pergola on that evening (pp 8, 20, 34 of the call [transcript]). Not only that: Rudy Guede also said that he was at Knox’s many times”› (pp 88 of the call [transcript]).

If the Court held the Ivorian citizen to be sincere in the tele-conversation with his friend Benedetti, then why not also believe him when he denies having broken in, or when he recounts Meredith having it out with Amanda, or when he says that he had been at the latter’s place many times”›?

Dr Galati’s appeal to the Supreme Court argues that the Hellmann/Zanetti appeal judgment, apart from being manifestly illogical, is manifestly contradictory with respect to the contents of the case file referred to (Article 606(e) Criminal Procedure Code). Here is what it says about their tortured interpretations of Rudy Guede.

And in the Skype call with Benedetti, intercepted unbeknownst to him, there emerge circumstances that confirm Guede’s court declarations. The Court takes the Skype call with his friend Benedetti into examination, valuing it “šin favour of the two accused”› both for what it does not say and also for what it does say, and this it does building from one, not only unexplained, datum but which would have taken little to deny: since Rudy was outside of Italy, he was in some sense safe”› and thus could well have been able to tell the whole truth (p 40 of the judgment).

Not in the least does the Court depart from the presupposition that in this call Rudy would have been telling the truth and, because in this call he would not have named the current defendants, these have got nothing to do with the homicide. The Court does not explain, though, that even in this call Rudy was tending to downplay his responsibility and, if he had named his co-participants, that would have easily allowed, by means of investigations and subsequent interviews, the bringing out of his causal contribution and of his responsibility.

[91] Of the things said in this Skype call, the Court seems at one moment to want to value the chronological datum from 9:00 PM to 9:30 PM to affirm that this would therefore have been the time of death of Meredith; successively, though the appeal judges, following the principle of plausible hypothesis, in relation to the outgoing calls on the victim’s English handset, have moved it to 10:15 PM, but they have not altered the reliability of the time indicated by Guede.

In truth, during the course of the conversation, Rudy recounts having heard Meredith complain about the missing money and of her intention to ask Knox, with whom she had argued, for an explanation (p 10 of the call); of having seen Meredith look in vain for the missing money in her drawer (see p 18); of having seen her search, again in vain, for the missing money in Amanda’s room (pp 18 and 19 of the call) and of having heard a girl enter the house ““ who must have been one of the flatmates, thus Amanda (p 11 of the call), ““ while he was in the bathroom, a little before hearing Meredith’s terrible scream which would have induced him to exit the bathroom, about five minutes after the ingress of the girl (p 12 of the call).

And also, on the subject of the break-in in Romanelli’s room ““ thrown without explanation onto Guede’s back (see the judgment being appealed from, at pp 121 and 122) ““ can remarks by the Ivorian citizen be found in the transcription of the intercept. Guede repeatedly denies having seen the broken window in Romanelli’s room for the whole time in which he was in the house at Via della Pergola that evening (pp 8, 20, 34 of the call).

If the [Appeal Court] had held as reliable what Rudy narrated in the Skype call relating to the time in which Meredith was killed, it supplies no reason at all, on the other hand, for why it does not believe him as well when he denies [92] having committed the break-in or when he recounts the quarrel of Meredith with Amanda.”

None of this changes my own beliefs that there are even many more things in evidence that are “˜beyond any reasonable doubt’.  For example:

• It is beyond any reasonable doubt that Meredith was restrained by hands other than the knife-wielding hand(s); and that Meredith was restrained by the hands of two, or three persons as she was killed.
• It is beyond any reasonable doubt that steps were taken to clean away smears made by Meredith’s blood in the place where she was killed, and tracks of Meredith’s blood transferred by her killers to other places.
• It is beyond any reasonable doubt that steps were also taken to simulate a break-in that never-was.

In the next post, we examine Dr Galati’s appeal further and the strident claims against Guede made in Sollecito’s own book which contradict some of the positions of HIS OWN LAWYERS. Note that Dr Galati has argued in the appeal that it was ILLEGAL for Hellmann and Zanetti not to have taken the Supreme Court’s ruling on three perps fully into account and having innored it or brushed past it. 

Verrrry tough situation for defense counsel to be in.

Posted by Cardiol MD on 01/12/13 at 07:34 PM • Permalink for this post • Archived in Various hypotheses,  Defendants in court,  Rudy Guede,  The officially involved,  The defenses,  Evidence & Witnesses,  Faked breakin,  The two knives,  Hoaxes against Italy,  5 No pack attack hoax,  6 No staging hoax,  Hoaxes Knox & team,  15 Single alibi hoax,  Hoaxes Sollecito etc,  27 Single alibi hoax,  30 Alessi hoax,  Hoaxes re Guede,  33 Sole attacker hoax,  34 Bad guy hoax,  35 Good guy hoax,  Hoaxers from 2007,  Knox-Marriott PR,  Raff Sollecito PR,  Heavey, Bremner,  Hoaxers from 2009,  Bruce Fischer,  Steve Moore,  Nina Burleigh,  Hoaxers from 2011,  Amanda Knox #2,  Raff Sollecito #2 • Comments here (44)

Saturday, January 05, 2013

We Mean You No Harm. Please Take Us To Your Leaders…  Oh Yes, But Of Course…

Posted by Kermit

Yes but of course. The self-appointed FOA leaders are now all physically or mentally AWOL. No sane credible adult is at the helm.

• Scammer Number One is physically absent without officlal leave. He may be hiding out in or near Perugia, probably broke and without a good lawyer as his lawyer walked off the job, facing court dates starting later this month and possible imprisonment in two countries and now also a further defamation suit - he in effect already lost one defamation suit last year when a court ordered Google to take down a site it hosted for him for all the defamation it had contained.
• Scammer Number Two is also physically absent without official leave, and may be hiding out in or near Verona, attempting on Facebook to make out that he is free and relaxed as a bird after nipping across to Manhattan for the New Year. Also that he is and always was loyal as hell to Amanda (give us a break) and that the devastating prosecution appeal and the devastating row of defamation suits about to hit him and his publisher and team sparked by his overheated book dont bother him or his dad a bit.
• Scammer Number Three is mentally absent without official leave. He is to be found squealing and blubbering these days in the stock-room of a fur-store on the north-west outskirts of Chicago, running low on new people to blame, his money-grubbing scams now publicly revealed for the toxic dishonesties on which they were based, his obergruppenführer presence on his internet boards despised now by many who had once gone along with his act, with the biggest defamation target of all on his own back as his vitriolic personal rants still populate the web, and with no Curt Knox or other deep-pockets any longer on his side.

First, here is an understanding word or two for the FOA sheep.

Dear sheep. Of course we dont mean to be unkind or unsympathetic in implying that the broad body of your movement which was elevating these three to gods in their own minds were simply sheep. Many FOA seem to us to be very nice and very well-meaning, if maybe a tad naive. The jaw-dropping revelations of the sums of money that you have been shelling out suggests that the myths you had been made to swallow had stirred your kind hearts to the core.

As a way of disengaging from the flock, and to fill the deliberate vacuum of hard facts, we would highly recommend that you now read all these posts and especially all of these posts here.  Our strongest advice to any ex-sheep would definitely be this.

Don’t shell our any more of your hard-earned cash to those three imposters listed here at the top.  They all face suits now for going way too far. Dont get mixed up in that. 

Okay. Back to Number One.

We are told that Frank may not even have made it to the viza section of the American Embassy in Rome. But let’s say it were true that Frank actually made it across the Atlantic and he showed up at the international arrivals zone of an American airport hours before his date with American justice last December 31.

Then any honest attempt to justify Frank’s non-appearance in court would take into account that Frank knew he wasn’t coming as a tourist, and that as someone with an arrest record (and seemingly having way overstayed a prior visa waiver for a visit limited to 90 days), he would have lots of paperwork to request a visa.

Yet, going back to the end of November when he was being released on bail from the Seattle jail , Frank and his pro-Knox handlers were in a huge hurry to hustle him out of the country following his latest arrest and questioning by police for domestic violence incidents, probably knowing that this might affect whether he could return.

The world waits for some coherent and direct explanations from this cornerstone of the public image defence of Amanda Knox.

Meanwhile, there’s absolute silence from Knox’s corporate PR firm Gogerty Marriott who continue to use the Knox contract as a showcase example of how successfully they work (they are joking, right?).

Many public figures and sheeples have been photographing themselves with Frank over the months presuming that he was in the US on a tourist visa for goodwill. Meanwhile, he was carrying on what the Committee to Protect Journalists has insisted is his money-making and therefore taxable profession,  and also earning at the same time “donated” income and gifts maybe up into the tens of thousands of dollars.

Mr Taxman please note.

Meanwhile, the vacuum left by Frank, a god in his own mind in the woven fabric of the Knox PR image, is turning that fabric into tatters. Someone will have to tie up the loose ends, and in particular give an explanation on where Frank’s absence leaves the very serious accusations of improper and abusive treatment by Prosecutor Mignini and the Flying Squad (neither were involved in his arrest).

Those false accusations all stem from Frank and Doug Preston and similar accusations of abuse are the main components of just about every explanations for Knox’s many conflicting alibis and her bizarre reactions to Italian investigators following the murder of Knox’s roommate Meredith Kercher.

As you may know, Frank claimed to have been beaten up by officers of the Flying Squad beholden to the “rogue” Prosecutor Giuliano Mignini because Mr Mignini was allegedly sufficiently upset by “Frank’s” many blog posts in favour of Knox to have sent his henchmen over to Frank’s house.

After promoting this fiction for months and now years, even many pro-Knox commenters are admitting bashfully that in fact the person who complained to Italian police about abuse by “Frank” was actually a female family member in his own home.

Mr Mignini was NOT involved, the Flying Squad was NOT involved, Frank was NOT beaten up (the wounds in evidence were on the cops) and he was NOT taken to a hospital to have him certified as mad. One big body of lies.

This line of physical abuse and malicious fabrications after the fact certainly fit with Frank’s more recent episodes of being arrested and/or questioned for complaints of domestic violence in Canada, Hawaii, and, now, Seattle.  Looks like, by his own hand, Frank is finally cooked.

More news in future posts about Scammers Two and Three.

Posted by Kermit on 01/05/13 at 06:05 PM • Permalink for this post • Archived in Hoaxes Knox & team,  20 No-PR hoax,  Hoaxers from 2007,  Knox-Marriott PR,  Raff Sollecito PR,  Francesco Sforza,  More hoaxers,  Bruce Fischer,  Steve Moore • Comments here (24)

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