Sunday, November 06, 2011

Meredith’s Perugia #30: Naples Where Meredith On A School Holiday First Got Deeply Hooked On Italy

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Posted by Our Main Posters on 11/06/11 at 04:40 PM in Concerning Meredith

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For the lovely Meredith and her wonderful family.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FK5VulNn3so&feature=related

Posted by Miriam on 11/06/11 at 11:59 PM | #

What beautiful videos!  Italy is a very beautiful and interesting country in every respect and the Italians should be rightly proud of themselves and their very rich heritage.  It is easy to see how Meredith fell in love with Italy. 

Although the justice system would seem to have failed her, it is not yet over and actually it is only one phase - albeit a very significant one - that has failed her. 

So MANY judges and experts had reviewed all the evidence and reached the same conclusions.  So MANY are questioning the result of the appeal.  Italy is honouring this young woman who had placed herself under its hospitality and, therefore, care. 

All credit to Italy for setting up a justice system that would not repeat the mistakes of history - even though that does make it seem soft on criminals. 

With their intelligent, sensitive humanity they will continue to follow their due process to obtain justice for Meredith.

Posted by thundering on 11/07/11 at 03:46 AM | #

On that note, though, will the slander trial proceed next Tuesday, 15 November?

Posted by thundering on 11/07/11 at 03:48 AM | #

I am waiting impatiently for the page that was promised on Sollecito to shed more light on his character and / or behavior.  I’m also wondering what news if any you have on the AK slander trial which was supposed to start soon, November 15?

Posted by believing on 11/07/11 at 06:10 AM | #

I am also waiting for the news of the slander trial.

What are the charges (these must have been filed already and are now known) and how she is going to defend them?

Several scenarios are possible:

1. I did not say any such thing (outright denial)
2. I have been misquoted (deny the details)
3. I did not mean it that way (communication error!)
4. I was under stress (justify the actions)
5. I was abused and I said so! (question the charges)

Here again the prosecution is on slippery ground:

1. They will be defensive (worst case)
2. They will be asked to show evidence of damage
3. They will be asked to prove that slander took place at all

Best bet that the prosecution will be in the offensive from the beginning…

These are just my imaginations and I am not a lawyer!

When God endowed human beings with brains, He did not intend to guarantee them.

Posted by chami on 11/07/11 at 08:39 AM | #

I’ll be surprised if Knox’s slander trial isn’t pushed back. One of the parties will argue that the Cassazione should rule on the appeal first, and the courts aren’t in any hurry to hear a case with no defendant and no recording of the interrogation.

I’m sure we’ll hear much more about Sollecito’s character, but he just described himself as an “honest, sweet lad with a big heart”. What more is there to discuss? 😉

Posted by brmull on 11/07/11 at 08:47 AM | #

Sollecito has stated that he wants the Kerchers to know the truth of what happened to Meredith.I think that having a polygraph test would be seen as an act of goodwill towards the Kerchers.

Louise Woodward had two polygraph tests before her trial (one was independent, the other commisioned by her defense). The two tests were 95% in her favour, but were inadmissable in court. She had voluntered for the tests in an effort to have the Eappen family know what had happened to their son.

Posted by starsdad on 11/07/11 at 03:01 PM | #

Hi believing, chami and brmull. We are in something of a watching and waiting mode both on Sollecito and the slander trial of Knox eight days away.

Those charges against Knox might not be dropped. Knox has already served a three year sentence for criminal libel and these claims of essentially the same are brought by the interrogating cops, not by Mignini, who was not even present at the time.

Kinda like the hare and the tortoise, it seems the more sensationalist part of the media might now move on as there are probably few sensations to come, maybe some turning on RS and AK after the exclusives.

Meanwhile the high-integrity part of the media in Italy etc quietly digs away. We doubt that the story settles down in any sort of steady state for 18 months or two years, and longer if there is a retrial. 

RS and AK will have to try hard to watch their tongues between now and then. We are told both families are on tenterhooks and probably best served to considerably tone down and lay low.

No word yet on those purported big-buck deals. Paying for stories is more the turf of the UK tabloids like the Daily Mail. Several networks here have observed that it would be outside ethical guidelines for them to pay big bucks.

Knox’s conviction which the family has apparently said it “might” appeal seems to have thrown a real spanner in the works. It sure set things up for Cassation to give Hellman a very hard time.

Next year the political-economic situation will be radically changed if Berlusconi is gone and a more left-wing pro-justice party in power and the Italian economy climbing back up. And the Obama administration focussed on things at home.

Posted by Peter Quennell on 11/07/11 at 03:51 PM | #

Hi Peter.

Thank you for your post and the ear-to-the-ground information.  I have been wondering whether the slander trial will go ahead as it is now only a week away or whether it will be postponed again. 

Yes, the Italian media is quietly digging away - there was an interesting link given on PMF the other day to a discussion programme in Italy involving Francesco Maresca, RG’s lawyer and some others.  Very honouring (in the main) of Meredith.

Posted by thundering on 11/07/11 at 04:26 PM | #

P.S. I sure hope that Cassation WILL give Hellman a VERY hard time.  The phrase, ‘rogue trader’, comes to mind in a distorted yet relevant sort of way - a kind of maverick do-it-my-way kind of person or ‘capricious judge’ as used by a PMF poster earlier.

Posted by thundering on 11/07/11 at 04:32 PM | #

Hi thundering. None of us are too impressed with Judge Hellman. He lost control of his court several times and spread the appeal out over nearly a year and as he has never handled a DNA case before he might have been imbued by the CSI Effect.

Hellman’s pet DNA consultants did not ever prove any contamination. The prosecution’s request for retests of the DNA then in question, which Hellman’s consultants failed to do for very weak reasons, was denied by Hellman.

Cassation will for sure look at that and if those retests are re-ordered and confirm the prosecution’s claims, then the verdict is back in the melting pot, and Hellman’s fig-leaf will be gone. 

The media is busy alerting us to all of this… oh no, of course they are not.

Posted by Peter Quennell on 11/07/11 at 05:14 PM | #

Hi again Peter.

Yes. The complete disregard for the fact that the Prosecution shot the ‘experts’ and their ‘report’ down in flames is the thing I find the most horrifying.  Added to that the fact that Hellman refused to grant the Prosecution their request to use the newest technology. 

I find it absolutely unbelievable that a court of law would be so shoddy in an inquisitorial system that sets out to find the truth.  I did think at times during the appeal that he had already made up his mind. 

WHY ON EARTH was he put in that position?  As you said, he is not experienced in DNA or criminal trials and was certainly (in my opinion) blown away by the CSI arguments shouted out by the AK camp. 

Even I, a lay person, would have the nous to look at the Massei Report and weigh up all the evidence.  Is there any evidence at all that they did?  Massei and his court were so painstakingly careful producing a very balanced, coherent, compelling and convincing reasoning but this rogue judge has basically kicked all the meticulous hard work into touch!  How does he sleep at night? 

No wonder the Defense lawyers looked shocked and shifty as the verdict was read and later in the subsequent TV interviews - because they KNOW the truth. 

Hellman basically unlocked the prison doors and turned his back whistling while the prisoners sauntered away.  He has presented Justice with the problem of what to do and how to get the criminals back where they should be. 

And I am very pleased to learn that the two families are disquieted at the news emanating from Italy.  No mega-buck deal on the table and AK’s family have her back now.  Now free and out of Capanne she will come across very differently indeed - they sure will see soon if they haven’t already.

(Sorry if I seem to be shouting 😊 Better stop and go to bed!)

Posted by thundering on 11/07/11 at 05:46 PM | #

11/7/11
I believe Amanda was having flashbacks of the crime during her first months in Capanne, which prompted her to write the Marie Pace story. That deals with a party scene, heavy smoke, beer cans on floor, too many people in the room, and a person carried out on a gurney.

I was reading “Cruel Death” by M. William Phelps about Erika and BJ Sifrit. Two more obvious sociopaths cannot be described. This dreadful duo did a thrill killing on an innocent couple and behaved worse than animals to their victims. BJ Sifrit was an ex-Navy Seal. He married Erika on a dare, a needy, obsessive young woman terrified of abandonment but with a criminal streak he soon elicited.

Erika began to have flashbacks of the cruelties done to Geney Crutchley and Joshua Ford about a month after her incarceration. These types of emotions need an outlet. Amanda may soon write more stuff that is another veiled reference to the crime.

Posted by Hopeful on 11/07/11 at 05:47 PM | #

@ martin.

Deanna Knox was stopped on the street outside the court house and interviewed quickly during the final week of the trial. 

She told the journalist that they were taking Amanda home in such an assured and confident way that I wondered how she could be so sure.

Posted by thundering on 11/07/11 at 06:02 PM | #

http://www.tgcom.mediaset.it/cronaca/articoli/1027061/parlano-la-mamma-e-la-sorella-di-meredith
non-faremo-appello-contro-la-sentenza.shtml

Posted by Miriam on 11/07/11 at 07:30 PM | #

What happened to “just want to spemd time with my family”

http://www.tgcom.mediaset.it/cronaca/articoli/1027036/amanda-nuova-love-story-con-un-suo-ex.shtml

Posted by Miriam on 11/07/11 at 07:33 PM | #

the headlines should have read
“HELL-MAN RESCUES DEVIL-MAN AND SHE-DEVIL”
  Makes the World Safe Once More for Phantasy

Posted by mimi on 11/07/11 at 08:47 PM | #

Good comments by Hopeful and Thundering.  Lovely videos.  This is my first post and I too have a great deal of criticism for Hellman and the appeals court and was shocked by the verdict. 

So much of what the PR machine printed was factually incorrect, and combine that with commentary and conjecture about how “Amanda might be autistic” and any other such EXCUSE they could think up and the whitewash was pretty complete. She is viewed as victim and I see this all to clearly in pro knox commments.  Everyone who failed to look outside the American media likely believes she’s innocent.  Kudos to Nancy Grace, but really there are so few who openly question this second verdict.

When I first found this case it was through the US media.  I was disgusted by the Italians and thought for sure their sex assault scenario involving Amanda was hogwash.

Then I found this blog.  I read the actual reality of the case, the facts, the evidence, the insanity….IT ALL POINTS TO AMANDA knowing more than she revealed and her being a liar.  People don’t lie about murder unless they are guilty in some way. 

I used to work for a criminal defense law office and I have extensive background into looking into crimes and crime solving, and if Amanda wasn’t involved I’d be very surprised.  Yet it was only because of curiosity that I came to that conclusion.  And it was the fact that everyone was raving about her innocence and yet she sat there and fingered an innocent man that made me do the “double take” and wonder if there was indeed more to it all.  BTW, many of the so called unbiased media stories on the Knox trial failed to ever mention Lumumba in their background of the case.  And the focus is always on Amanda, never Meredith or her family.

And so I’m suspicious of what went on behind the scenes of Hellman’s court, which surely saw all the evidence beyond the measly DNA in despute, and I’m anxiously awaiting what I predict will be quite an interesting exposure of Hellman’s inadquacies. The truth will come out, quesitons will come forth and this shameful mishandling of justice will again be news.  I predict more information will come forth as well that will be damning to the defense, probably out of the mouths of RS AND AK themselves. 

Just the other day Sollicito said “it’s over” for him and KNox, and she is already dating elsewhere.  I wonder, will he let her go or will the tension build and boil over.  These kids are out and about and socializing, and you know even those who think they are innocent are asking questions behind closed doors.  Sociopaths do well when they are not under heavy scrutiny like this.  Instead of laying low and smart, she is going out dressed as a cat burgler on Halloween and flaunting.  A sign that she thinks she’s even beyond the need of the PR at this point!

If I were AManda’s mother I would hire PR for her for LIFE!

Posted by JenE on 11/08/11 at 12:32 AM | #

Peter, “Left-wing pro-justice party?  That is a contradiction in terms.  Generally conservatives are considered “law and order.”  I know Berlusconi is a scamp, but there is no reason to believe the ex-communists and their allies would be better on this particular issue.  Did not Lenin say that courts were but a tool to be used in furthering the revolutionary struggle?

Posted by Gonzaga on 11/08/11 at 12:40 AM | #

Hi Gonzaga. I can imagine that phrase causing a double take! Even in the case of Lenin. The peculiar history of the Italian justice system (which was drafted to guard against more right-wing fascism and is hence extremely liberal) is a little different from everywhere else.

It has been the the right-wing parties and especially Berlusconi’s which have worked for years to roll back what is set out in the constitution. In part to help their more nefarious colleagues and in part to help organized crime. Search for any post here on Berlusconi and that is probably what it will be about.

His party right now is running campaigns to ease up on segments of the law that would give him strife in his three pending suits in Milan and give his party strife in the Olympic and earthquake relief scandals which the PERUGIA prosecutors have been handed to investigate. The right-wing MP Rocco Girlanda has a bill that would virtually decimate the annual wiretap budget of the police and was attempting to get the Perugia police and prosecutors investigated.

The more leftish opposition fight this in parliament and play on the population’s unease with growing crime. The left-wing President of the Republic of Italy has the role of defending the constitution and he often acts to ensure justice. In theory if Cassation confirms the AK and RS verdicts he could be petitioned to reverse that.

One of the oddities of this whole case is that Lady Doug Preston and the others so frantic to cut Mignini down play strongly into the hands both of a corrupt political party and a probable satanic sect in Florence.

Are they tools? You decide.

Posted by Peter Quennell on 11/08/11 at 01:36 AM | #

Hi JenE. An interesting post and one point you make there is profoundly important. Sociopaths are often better off inside.

Prisons have many sociopaths who act out their sentences as jailhouse lawyers and of course everyone around them is also proclaiming their innocence. Mental help is available and in prison murderers rarely break.

But on the outside they have to be watching every word and wondering who is staring at their back and trying not to blow it in a public argument. If they cannot sleep at night they are going to want sleeping pills and that is likely to leak out.

OJ Simpson is only one of many freed sociopaths who went downhill and some of them killed again. In OJ Simpson’s case it was his obsessive avoidance of the Goldman civil judgment that landed him in Lovelock Prison.

Posted by Peter Quennell on 11/08/11 at 02:07 AM | #

Not only is Amanda dating, she is apparently living with her first boyfriend in an apartment in Seattle, according to the article above.  I think it is rather sad and humorous that Raphael seemed to have felt such joy about seeing her again and I believe mentioned looking into her eyes etc.  Seems like quite a puppy love on his part which kind of supports the idea of him being led along in the situation, especially with his statement that he went along with her version of what happened that night, and didn’t know why she lied about certain things.  It will be interesting to see if he says anything further about the situation now that he has definitely been cast aside.  However I can’t feel sorry for him if I think that he could have been involved in the murder.  If only we could have the answer as to what really happened that night and why.  After reading OJ’s story, I realized how fast something like that could happen.  I hope there will be a civil trial if the Supreme Court appeal fails but I don’t know if the Kerchers have the strength to face that.  It has taken such a toll on the parents.

Posted by believing on 11/08/11 at 04:45 AM | #

During the RS interview on Italian TV mention was made of his father Doctor Francesco Sollicito. Raffaelle turned his head and said he is just here. His dad was just off camera. I bet he is.

I believe that the father knows his son was involved up to his neck in the murder but would never do this on his own. The father understands his son is a weak character a follower not a leader. Before meeting AK he was absorbed in his own world of hardcore porn drugs and fantasy.

He was even looking at the porn on the Catholic University computer and his Professors found out about it. After that they were keeping a close eye on him. They would have been alarmed to see what he was viewing on their computer.

We will wait and see the behaviour of both AK and RS in future but meantime Dr Sollecito is not letting his son out of his sight.

Posted by mason2 on 11/08/11 at 10:01 AM | #

Thanks mason2 and others for the latest Sollecito sightings and insights. A roundup post on his doings very soon.

Posted by Peter Quennell on 11/08/11 at 04:59 PM | #

Well I know the rumors about the civil suit against Amanda by the Kerchers is false, but Lumumba is suing her and I am willing to bet he will win.  It’s “followup” like that which will not only haunt Amanda, but make it much more likely she will slip up. 

Surely her intimacy with her new (old) boyfriend and all the other hoopla will die down and normalcy, the kind sociopaths detest, will settle in deeply, calcifying her.  She won’t be in prison but emotionally I believe she will be for a long time. Less than 2 months and she is moved in with her old boyfriend?  Very telling.  Let’s see what happens as she looks for more excitement and attention. 

Another telling point is when Amanda’s father actually admitted he has never discussed the events of the night of the murder with is daughter.  He has never heard the details of HER story.  VERY VERY damning and all this time I have highly suspected that bother Amanda’s parents actually know she is guilty to some extent, but perhaps they rationalize it away and even don’t want to know.  Clealy Kurt Knox is confident enough to even admit on TV Amanda never gave him a clear story.  Wouldn’t you think friends and family would have questions for her after she got home?  Again, even those who think she is innocent will want to hear her story (and surely the version has been updated more than 3 times so she must have a set story for all her kin back home by now?)

When I found out Sollicito lost his virginity to her it actually put a lot of this case together for me, as I am quite certain by his tone and words that despite his better judgement he feels great resentment towards Amanda.  If he was there that night was not the ringleader IMO.  I’m sure his father is keeping a close eye on him, this is the man who recently insisted his son would not be with Amanda and he is being proven correct.

If the prosecutions appeal reaches the point I think it will and the whole farce that was Hellman’s court gets exposed, how much you wanna bed Sollicito will come to his senses and probably spill more beans, esp. if it will help his case?

Posted by JenE on 11/08/11 at 11:42 PM | #

RS’s father certainly seemed to keep tabs on him, calling several times a day just before the murder.  Is that normal behavior in Italy for a father to call a 23 year old son so often?  It seems like he was worried he was in trouble or doing something to hurt himself.  Maybe they were just close, I don’t know.  It would be considered excessive in America, at least when I was 23, to get three and four calls and text messages in a day.  As far as Amanda moving in with her boyfriend after two months, this is a previous boyfriend and not a new acquaintance.  It is not abnormal for girls of her age to live in an apartment or with a boyfriend rather than at home.  I didn’t want to live at home at her age either.  So I’m not sure it is as significant as others above think. Most likely they corresponded the whole time she was in jail and he obviously believes in her innocence.  It may or may not be true that she wants to have a child.  Agree that it would possibly make it much harder to be extradited back to Italy, although that seems a remote possibility at this point.  I also think AK’s parents just did not want to know what really happened and stuck firmly to the story of her being at RS’s apartment all night.  They didn’t want to hear anything else.  That seemed to come through on the overheard conversations at the jail i.e. from AK saying “I was there, I"m not going to lie about it” to her mother, because why would she even worry about saying she was at RS’s apartment?  The lie would have to be about being at her own apartment that night.

Posted by believing on 11/09/11 at 03:19 AM | #

Raffaele’s relationship with his dad is definitely weird. Doctors usually are pretty busy with their work and don’t try to micromanage their adult children’s lives. Maybe because his mom passed away? It would be interesting to know if Papa Doc was just as involved with Vanessa.

I don’t think we can read too much into the prison conversations, because they knew they were being recorded—and especially in Knox’s case because the recordings were translated from English to Italian and back into English again.

Posted by brmull on 11/09/11 at 08:20 AM | #

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