Friday, January 16, 2015

The Sollecito Trial For “Honor Bound” #2: False Accusations From The First Few Pages

Posted by Our Main Posters

Suggested cover for a followup book due to multiple attempted malicious framings in first books

Examples: 20 False Claims In Seven Pages

We count several hundred malicious claims throughout that can easily be proved wrong. These twenty examples all appear in the book’s preface, which is only seven pages long.

Such claims continue throughout the book at approximately the same rate. Many sharp eyes here set about identifying them and are credited in the TJMK Liewatch page for Sollecito which will be switched on again when the secrecy requirement described in Part #12 below is relaxed by the court next week.

1. That Italian justice authorities took the easy way out

This is the story of two ordinary people who stumbled upon an extraordinary circumstance, the brutal murder of a British student in Italy. Neither Amanda Knox nor I had anything to do with the crime, but we came perilously close to spending the rest of our lives in prison because the authorities found it easier, and more convenient, to take advantage of our youth and inexperience than to mount a proper investigation. It’s that simple. And that absurd.

No advantage was taken of them. The two stood themselves out very sharply from all the others of similar age, and of similar inexperience (whatever that means). They did and said dozens of things in the early days that set them sharply apart.

They were questioned quite fairly, the Italian media was not especially hard, Dr Mignini never ever leaked, and they had lawyers and family handy at every turn after they were arrested. They each gave the authorities less than zero help - they tried to lead them off on wild goose chases, for example the false claim AK made against Patrick and dozens of other false claims, and apparently tried to finger yet another north African, Hicham Khiri, in a conversation they clearly knew was being recorded.

A “proper” investigation was indeed done. Simply read through all the posts on the trial here in the first half of 2009, and the prosecutor’s excellent summations, and you will see what a smooth comprehensive job was done. And the Supreme Court concluded that THREE had to have been involved, from the recreation of the attack and all the wounds on Meredith’s body. Subsequent to Patrick, AK and RS and their lawyers never came within light-years of throwing real suspicion on anyone else.

2. That the preventive custody was very harsh

On November 1, 2007, Amanda and I were carefree students at the beginning of a cross-cultural love affair in a beautiful Umbrian hill town. Within days, we were thrown into solitary confinement in a filthy prison, without access to lawyers or loved ones, accused of acts so heinous and disturbing we may never be able to banish them from our thoughts, or our nightmares.

Raffaele was sent to preventative prison on Tuesday November 6. Capanne Prison was almost brand-new then, and far from crowded. Cells contain TVs and private bathrooms.

All questioning had been stopped early on 6 November until Sollecito could have a lawyer present. He himself wrote to his father in his “prison diary” on November 7: “I may see you tomorrow, at least that is what I was told by Tiziano [Tiziano Tedeschi, his lawyer at the time], who I saw today and who defended me before the judge.”

Mr Tedeschi made no complaint about any delay in the first meeting with his new client. In Italy, a judge must determine within 48 hours whether to hold or release detained suspects. Judge Matteini did so meticulously with Tedeschi present and refused Sollecito’s release.

3. That the prosecution and Italian media demonized the pair

In the newspapers and on the nightly news, we were turned into monsters, grotesque distortions of our true selves. It did not matter how thin the evidence was, or how quickly it became apparent that the culprit was someone else entirely. Our guilt was presumed, and everything the prosecution did and fed to the media stemmed from that false premise.

In the real world, the prosecution fed nothing at all secretly to the media and publicly very little, none of it self-servingly biased. Italian reporting was sporadic and very mild compared to anything one can see said daily about possible perps in the US and UK newspapers and on US TV. Besides, any coverage, which was in part deliberate in the situation as dozens of students were fleeing Perugia, had no influence on anything, neither on the investigation nor the trial.

The Italian system is set up so media can have less influence than almost any other media on any other justice system in the world. The Micheli and Massei sentencing reports show the judges were not unduly influenced even by the lawyers right in front of them, let alone by mild media reports 1 or 2 years before that.

4. That four years were wasted showing where the prosecution went wrong.

By the time we had dismantled the case and demonstrated its breathtaking absurdity [in the bent and annulled Hellmann appeal] we had spent four of what should have been the best years of our lives behind bars.

“We” meaning the defense lawyers did very little in the bent and annulled Hellmann appeal that they hadn’t flailed uselessly against in the trial. Except of course shopping for an inexperienced and pliable business judge, and for DNA consultants who they could then spoon-feed.

The list of lies by omission is extremely long. Much of the hard evidence they simply kept well away from, both in the trial and annulled appeal. Such as the extensive evidence in the corridor and bathroom and Filomena’s room, which were all considered parts of the crime scene.

On the other hand, RS’s claim could well apply to what Dr Galati and Cassation did for the Hellman sentencing report. Dismantled the appeal verdict, and demonstrated its breathtaking absurdity.

5. That Knox was made a target because timid Italy was scared of her.

Amanda and I certainly made our share of mistakes. At the beginning we were too trusting, spoke too frivolously and too soon, and remained oblivious to the danger we were courting even after the judicial noose began to tighten. Amanda behaved in ways that were culturally baffling to many Italians and attracted a torrent of gossip and criticism.

An inaccurate and xenophobic remark originated by the American Nina Burleigh, who was having severe culture shock of her own and surrounded only by other foreigners with similar mindsets.

What EXACTLY was so baffling about Knox to the very hip Italians? That Knox was pushy, obnoxious, humorless, rather lazy, rather grubby, and not especially funny or pretty or bright? That she slept with a drug wholesaler up to the day of her arrest and cost him a stint in prison? That she put off Patrick, Meredith, her other flatmates, the boys downstairs, the customers in the bar, and just about everybody else except for the distasteful druggie loner Sollecito?

Read this post by the Italian-American Nicki in Milan. To quote from it “As many of us were expecting, Amanda’s testimony has backfired. She came across not as confident but arrogant, not as sweet but testy, not as true but a fake who has memorized a script, an actress who is playing a part but not well enough to fool the public….. Amanda Knox is not on trial because she is American and therefore too “emancipated”....Italians don’t much like Amanda primarily because they perceive her as a manipulative liar, who is suspected of having committed a heinous crime for which there is a whole stack of evidence.”

6. That Knox and Meredith were really great, great friends.

We were young and naive, unthinking and a little reckless. Of that much we were guilty. But what we did not do””and could not have done, as the evidence clearly showed””was murder Meredith Kercher.

Meredith was Amanda’s friend, a fellow English speaker in the house they shared with two Italian women just outside Perugia’s ancient city walls. She was twenty-one years old, intelligent, and beautiful. She and Amanda knew each other for a little over three weeks, long enough to feel their way into their new surroundings and appreciate each other’s interests and temperaments. I never heard about a single tense moment between them.

Plenty of other people did know of tensions. Meredith’s family and friends all knew Meredith was finding the noisy dirty lazy loud unfocused Knox and her one-night-stands hard to take. Her other flatmates found her hard to take. Her employer Patrick found her hard to take. His customers in the bar found her hard to take. The Lifetime movie got this strident angle of Knox pretty straight.

Remember, Meredith had enrolled for a full academic load at the main university. Knox in sharp contrast took only one undemanding language course - which anyone could walk into - requiring maybe 10 hours of study a week. They increasingly did less together. In fact after several weeks, nobody was lining up to have anything to do with Amanda Knox.

Seemingly unable to reverse herself, Knox was headed to being among the least popular of students (or part-time students) in Perugia. It should be recalled that the callous remarks by Amanda Knox about the death of her so-called friend Meredith included “Shit happens”, “She fucking bled to death”, and “‘I want to get on with the rest of my life”.

7. That an intruder knew about the rent money and so murder ensued.

Meredith, of course, suffered infinitely worse luck than we did: she came home, alone, on an ordinary Thursday night and had her throat slit by an intruder hoping to steal the household rent money.

There is zero evidence that this was the case. Knox herself ended up with a similar amount of cash that she has never been able to explain. There is zero possibility that Guede would know that any money was lying around - or not lying around, as it was concealed in Meredith’s drawer.

And take a look at the many images of the brightly lit house at night around 8:00 pm. There are several dozen other houses behind it in the dark which any smart burglar would have chosen first and entered hours later. In 2008 two real break-ins occurred at the house - both were in the dark behind the house, which is by far the easiest place to break in.

So much for the spurious lone-wolf theory, which Judge Micheli first ruled out even before trial.

8. That the media got hysterical and portrayed heartless killers.

But the roles could easily have been reversed. If Meredith’s Italian boyfriend had not gone away for the weekend and if Amanda had not started sleeping over at my house, she””not Meredith””might have been the one found in a pool of blood on her bedroom floor. That reality was quickly lost amid the hysteria of the media coverage. But it continued to hover over both of us””Amanda especially””as we sank into the legal quagmire and struggled in vain to overcome the public image of us as heartless killers.

There was zero media hysteria. This silly claim was addressed above. Watch the Porta a Porta YouTubes and dozens of other Italian reports and try to find ONE that is not fair and cautious and mature.

How precisely did the two struggle in vain to overcome their public image? By coming up repeatedly with stories which didnt even tally with others of their own, let alone with one another’s? They never between them made even one helpful statement which actually helped the police. And even their respective parents strongly suspected or knew of their guilt and were all caught incriminatingly on tape.

9. That Rudy Guede did it alone; ignore vast evidence that proves not.

This should not have been a complicated case. The intruder was quickly identified as Rudy Guede, an African immigrant living in Perugia with a history of break-ins and petty crimes. His DNA was found all over Meredith’s room, and footprints made in her blood were found to match his shoes. Everything at the crime scene pointed to a lone assailant, and a single weapon. Guede repeatedly broke into houses by throwing a rock through a window, as happened here, and he had been caught by the authorities in the past with a knife similar to the one that inflicted Meredith’s fatal wounds.

This is laughable. The room itself could not be checked for DNA as the choice was to fingerprint-check it instead. Sollecito’s footprint on the bathroom mat is a smoking gun all by itself. Crack national investigators demonstrated in numerous ways that the attack involved multiple assailants and this was endorsed by the Supreme Court.

Sollecito’s own lawyers never forcefully argued this. They produced two non-credible witnesses in the appeal trial (Alessi and Aviello) to actually prove that Guede had some other accomplices or that several others did it. Amanda Knox if anything diverted attention AWAY from Guede as he did in turn from her. He wasn’t quickly identified precisely because Knox had extremely credibly again and again on 5-6 Nov fingered Patrick.

There is no proof Guede intruded anywhere. The trial court concluded Knox invited him in. Guede had zero proven history of break-ins or petty crimes or drug-dealing, and late in 2008 at his trial Judge Micheli became angry at such claims. Guede had no prior criminal record at all. He had only been back in Perugia for a few weeks, after an extended stay up north. His DNA was not found “all over” Meredith’s room. A major surprise, in fact, was how few traces of him were found.

The recreation of the crime scene and the autopsy both pointed AWAY FROM a lone assailant, not toward. From Meredith’s wounds, it was quite evident that two and perhaps three knives had been used, and not a single weapon. What lone intruder carries or uses two or three knives? And footprints in blood outside the door matched the feet of both RS and AK. This is why the Supreme Court confirmed Guede’s guilt only “in concorso” (with others).

10. That the cops could have caught Guede fast, despite Knox’s frame

Guede did not call the police, as Amanda and I did, or volunteer information, or agree to hours of questioning whenever asked. Rather, he fled to Germany as soon as the investigation began and stayed there until his arrest two and a half weeks later.

Guede’s apprehension and eventual conviction on murder charges should have been the end of the story. But by the time Guede was identified, the police and the public prosecutor’s office had convinced themselves that the murder was, incredibly, the result of a sexual orgy gone wrong, in which Amanda and I had played leading roles. Their speculations ignited a media firestorm, inspiring sensationalist headlines across the world about the evil lurking behind our seemingly innocent faces.

The authorities had no shred of evidence to substantiate this story line, only erroneous suppositions and wild imaginings. We had an alibi for the most likely time of death, and none of the initial forensic evidence tied us to the scene of the crime. Nothing in our backgrounds gave any hint of a propensity for violence or criminality. We were both accomplished, hardworking students known to our friends and families for our gentleness and even tempers.

Four more untrue claims. All three were convicted of a murder with a sex-crime element, and nobody was wrongly “convinced”. Which alibi is Sollecito talking about now? He himself admits in chapter 1 (Love and Death) that they had no “real alibi”. They still have no alibis at all for the second half of the evening, neither of them, when Meredith’s murder indisputably occurred.

Extensive forensic evidence within days tied them both to the scene. Not a single element of it has been discredited in the eyes of the Massei trial and Nencini appeal court. Not even one. Nothing was proven falsified, no item at all.

Neither of their backgrounds was squeaky clean. Both had long been into illegal drugs, the loner Sollecito had to be watched by his father and teachers, the increasingly disliked Knox had a history of doing and saying crass off-putting things. Both were lagging behind their brighter peers in their studies and Knox was in reality taking a year off.

11. That the prosecution fed the media a huge number of false claims.

Yet the authorities stuck to their guns. They fed the media a steady diet of sensationalist stories of how Amanda, the promiscuous American she-devil, and I, her sex-and-drug-addled Italian helpmeet, had tried without success to drag Meredith into our depravity and punished her by plunging an outsize kitchen knife into her neck.

Complete fiction. Again, in the real world, as the media reporters all confirm, the prosecution fed nothing at all secretly to the media, and publicly very little, none of it self-servingly biased. Italian reporting was sporadic and very mild compared to anything one can see daily on possible perps in the US and UK newspapers and on US TV crime shows. There is zero sign this mild coverage mattered to the courts. As the media reporters all confirm, they were fed next to nothing by the police or prosecution on the case,

But whereas Mr Mignini famously never leaks, the defenses are widely claimed to have leaked throughout like sieves. So did Sollecito’s own family - they leaked an evidence video to Telenorba TV, for which they were considered for trial. Even we at TJMK and PMF received several offers of juicy leaks. Here is one example of where the Knox forces leaked - wrongly in fact - and then nastily slimed the prosecution and defenseless prison staff.

12. That the authorities had lots and lots and lots of scenarios.

It might have been funny if the consequences had not been so devastating. Listening to the tortured language of the prosecution””“one can hypothesize that . . . ,” “it is possible that . . . ,” “one can imagine that . . . ,” “this scenario is not incompatible with . . .”””it became clear that the authorities, like the media, were treating our case with the bizarre levity of an after-dinner game of Clue, or an Agatha Christie mystery. Everyone, even the judges in their black robes, had theories they were itching to air.

Have Sollecito and Gumbel ever before been in any other court in Italy or the UK or the US? Every judge and/or jury seeks to zero in on a viable scenario on lines not unlike this. That is the whole POINT of having courts - to weight the probabilities in what happened in the crime. The only difference in Italy is that the judges have to think their verdict through for weeks, and then write it all out, and then see it scrutinized by a higher court. Hardly a requirement to be sneered at.

Gumbel and Sollecito should have studied how US and UK juries arrive at their own scenarios. Very few US and UK lawyers think they do a better job. Ask those who watched the OJ Simpson and Casey Anthony trials and bitterly criticised the outcomes of those. And Italy has a vastly lower rate of false imprisonment than the US does, less than 1/6 of the US rate.

13. That Italy is a medieval country with a primitive justice system.

It could have been Colonel Mustard in the drawing room with the revolver; instead it was Amanda and Raffaele in the bedroom with the kitchen knife. How was it conceivable that a democratic country known for its style and beauty and effortless charm””the Italy of the Renaissance and la dolce vita””could allow two young people to be catapulted to international notoriety and convicted of a horrific crime on the basis of nothing at all?

This is not remotely what happened. There was very far from nothing at all. Convictions in the US and UK regularly result based on evidence 1/10 or 1/100 of that here - sometimes from one single evidence point. Any one or several of maybe 100 evidence points here could have convicted them in a US or UK court.

Italy gives defendants every possible break, and the justice system has become seriously loaded against victims and their families. Read here and here.

14. That the prosecutors office and media were in a grim embrace.

The answer has something to do with the grim embrace that developed between the prosecutor’s office and the sensationalist media. Like addicts constantly looking for the next fix, each fed the other’s insatiable appetite for titillation and attention. The casual cruelty of “Foxy Knoxy” and her Italian lover became too good a story line to abandon, even when it became apparent it was overheated and unsustainable. Our suffering was the price to be paid for the world’s continuing entertainment.

WHAT grim embrace? WHAT addicts? WHAT fix? WHAT insatiable appetite? WHAT titillation and attention? This is clearly defamatory if it can’t be proven, and we can turn up no evidence that any of it is true. It has to be one of the most foolish lies in the entire book, it is so easy to disprove. These who are being accused of crimes here are career police and prosecutors secure in their jobs, and perhaps some in the media, and none have the slightest gain to make from convictions arrived at through a hoax.

15. That in the justice system speculation and hearsay run rampant

The meandering complexities of the Italian legal system, where speculation and hearsay are allowed to run rampant and time invariably slows to a maddening trickle, did little to help our cause.

Total mischaracterization. First note that by comparison with any country in the world THERE IS NOT MUCH CRIME IN ITALY. There is some minor corruption and still some minor mafia action, but thefts and burglaries and assaults are few and murders even fewer. The main crime if you can call it such is citizens not lining up to pay taxes. Italy’s murder rate is 1/6 that of the United States and its prison system size is 1/30 that of the United States, so where IS all this crime about which the claimed speculation and hearsay are running rampant?

The legal process would have been fully over by the end of 2009 if (1) there was not the entitlement to two automatic appeals; in UK and US terms there was very little to appeal about; and (2) the Hellmann appeal court had not been fixed to produce a corrupt outcome, as the displaced judge Sergio Matteini Chiari and Cassation and the Council of Magistrates have all made plain.

And compared to American police and prosecutors, their Italian counterparts are famously taciturn under their unusually firm rules. There is media interest, for sure, as there should be when there are crimes, but that also is comparatively restrained. Watch the various Porta a Porta shows on YouTube and you will see how sedate crime discussion tends to be.

The Constitution and the judicial code set out to achieve the exact opposite of speculation and hearsay affecting justice, and they do so. Creating this restraint is a primary reason for the judges’ sentencing reports, and for all the magistrates’ checks of investigations along the way.

This whole series of dishonest claims about the the Italian system in the preface of the book and a later chapter have clearly not been read through or okayed by even one Italian lawyer. They would all know it is wrong.

16. That in Italy proof beyond a reasonable doubt scarcely exists

For reasons deeply embedded in the country’s history, the concept of proof beyond a reasonable doubt scarcely exists in Italy, and the very notion of undisputed fact is viewed with suspicion, if not outright aversion.

So Gumbel and Sollecito are historians and legal experts now? It would be nice, wouldn’t it, if either were able to explain the remark. This may be an ignorant swipe at the Napoleonic Code on which the law of a lot of continental Europe is based. Ignored is that Italy carried out its own reforms to the Code in 1990 and more subsequently. Much of that reform, it should be pointed out, was procedural or structural rather than substantive law.

There are two things wrong with “..the concept of reasonable doubt scarcely exists in Italy.”

Until the 1990 Reforms the relationship between criminal and civil proceedings in Italy were governed by the principles of unity of jurisdiction and the prevailing status of criminal proceedings. Hence, if the facts were the same then criminal proceedings (to punish the guilty) and civil proceedings (to render liable the guilty for damages) were heard at the same time and still sometimes are, as in the Meredith Kercher case.

What has changed (relevant to the above quote) is that civil cases can be and are more likely to be heard independently from the related criminal cases and, where not, the standard of proof in civil cases (the preponderance of evidence or, as we usually refer to it, the balance of probabilities) is to be applied to the civil case, and the civil case only, rather than be confused with or overriden by the criminal standard of proof (beyond reasonable doubt).

Not an easy task, admittedly, to apply different standards to different tasks, based on the same facts, in the same proceedings, but Italian judges are trained to do this because that is their system. No judge would EVER confuse “beyond reasonable doubt” with “the balance of probabilities” when the issue at stake is depriving an individual of his freedom.

17. That the Italian judiciary has vast, unfettered powers

Few in Italian society wield as much unfettered power as the robed members of the judiciary, whose independence makes them answerable to nobody but themselves.

Radically the opposite of the truth. The paranoid claim reads like it came from ex PM Berlusconi fearful of his own conviction or one of his parliamentary lackeys such as Girlanda.

The checks and balances on judges in the Italian system are enormous, perhaps the toughest checks and balances in the world. Read here and here about them.

All of the best judges in the world are independent and they all follow a demanding career path, not elected (as ex-Judge Heavey was) under zero criteria, or appointed under the political sway of politicians. We wonder if Gumbel and Sollecito have ever heard of the US Supreme Court? Do those judges answer to anybody? No? How unfettered.

18. That the courts are the most reviled institution in Italy.

Many Italians retain a healthy skepticism about the reliability of their procedures and rulings. The courts””tainted by politics, clubbishness, pomposity, and excruciating delays””are the most reviled institution in the country.

As our Sollecito Book pages make clear again and again and again, the Italian system is remarkably NOT tainted by politics, as even the most surperficial watcher of the trials of ex Prime Minister Sylvio Berlusconi would know.

And on the issue of popularity we have previously posted this and this and also this.

Our Italian poster Machiavelli (Yummi), who posted our deep analysis of the appeal to the Supreme Court by Dr Galati, has provided these hard facts:

For comparison, in 2011 the percentage of Italians who declared they trust the justice system “a lot” or “enough” was 53.3%. By comparison, the percentage of Italians who declared they trust the government “a lot” or “enough” were 14.7%, and those who trust the parliament were only 15%.

In 2012, the percentage of Italians who trust the parliament is now only 9.5%, and those who trust the Mario Monti administration are only 21.1%.

Over the eight years from 2004 to 2012 the percentage of Italians who trust the justice system was always bigger than those who trust parliament or government by at least ten points, and in some years we can see a spread of 20, 30, even 39 percentage points achieved by the judiciary over the parliament and government.

However, some cases of corruption (such as our Hellmann-Zanetti case, but also several others indicated by the Rapporto Italia 2012) do hamper trust.

The most trusted institutions in Italy above all are the Carabinieri (74% of Italians trust them) and the Polizia di Stato (71%).

Which means the most trusted institutions are precisely those law enforcement instruments which are deployed to enforce the orders of prosecutors.

19. That prosecutors can spin their cases into any shape they please.

Because the Italian legal system is almost completely blind to precedent and relies on a tangle of impenetrable codes and procedures, prosecutors and judges have almost boundless freedom to spin their cases into any shape they please and create legal justifications on the fly. Often, they are more interested in constructing compelling narratives than in building up the evidence piece by piece, a task considered too prosaic and painstaking to be really interesting.

Whoever wrote this either wasnt an Italian or a lawyer, and either way didnt have much of a clue. The entire Italian system under the post WWII constitution was designed to PREVENT what Sollecito & Gumbel claim it allows here.

There are checks and balances and reviews every step of the way. Magistrates (initially Matteini here) determine what a prosecutor may do in developing and presenting a case. Parties may appeal to the Supreme Court AT ANY TIME as Knox’s lawyers did over her second written confession - which she herself had demanded to make in front of Dr Mignini after he finished warning her of her rights.

Hard for Sollecito & Gumbel to believe, perhaps, but the defense is actually present in the same courtroom. They can raise points of order at any time. So can the defendants themselves, at any time, something maybe unique in the world.

And judges actually have minds of their own. And then there are the unique written sentencing reports, and the two automatic appeals if any parties want to pursue them.

Sollecito & Gumbel should have read the 2012 Galati appeal more closely. The Prosecution’s Appeal To The Supreme Court is available in English here. Precedent has a section to itself - “The non-observance of the principles of law dictated by the Cassation Court in the matter of circumstantial cases (Article 606(b)) in relation to Article 192 paragraph 2 Criminal Procedure Code.”

Well, that’s precedent, via the Court of Cassation no less! How surprising from Gumbel/Sollecito that they should make that claim about ignoring precedent when in fact there it is, going right to the heart of the flawed Hellmann/Zanetti judgement on circumstantial evidence! What else is a Code but in effect a codification, a gathering together, a rationalisation, of best law - and precedent?

There is an absurd irony here, were they aware of it. Perhaps they are. Surely it is Hellmann and Zanetti who have displayed “a boundless freedom” in spinning the case “into any shape they please”, and who have “created legal justifications on the fly”? As for prosecutors doing this, at least Dr Mignini followed the evidence, and American readers may recall the infamous Jim Garrison, the DA hero of Oliver Stone’s movie “JFK” but who in reality, unlike Dr Mignini, was a total and utter crackpot.

And what issue exploded the Porta a Porta TV show in Italy in September 2012? It was Sollecito’s false claim that the prosecution had secretly tried to offer him a deal if he would roll over on Knox. NOBODY including his own father and his own lawyers confirmed him. Evidence against both was overwhelming. Nobody needed such a deal, and Italian prosecutors are highly rules-bound against ever offering such deals.

Sollecito was in effect accusing Dr Mignini of a felony with this much-repeated false claim in his book. (In her book Knox also accused Dr Mignini of a felony.)

20. That the prosecutors and judges in Italy are far too close.

Prosecutors and judges are not independent of each other, as they are in Britain or the United States, but belong to the same professional body of magistrates. So a certain coziness between them is inevitable, especially in smaller jurisdictions like Perugia.

Yes, prosecutors and judges in Italy belong to the same professional body of magistrates. But then so does the defense lawyer Ms Bongiorno. The claim that there is no independence between prosecutors and judges in Italy, in fact a coziness between them, is a bit rich.

Consider, say, the UK. It is true cases are prosecuted by the Crown Prosecution Service, a government body, but in serious cases the CPS will employ barristers from the Inns of Court. There is scarcely a judge in the UK, even up to the highest level, who was not and who is not still a member of one of the Inns of Court from whence barristers, for the prosecution or for the defence, ply their trade.

You can’t walk past an Inn without seeing the names of judges on the roll call on the plaques outside. A judge is still a barrister, just fulfilling a different function, although, of course, now paid by the State. The old school boy tie? Corruption? No, the fulfilling of different roles by members of the same body is called professionalism.

Judges and lawyers all belong to the American Bar Association in the US and attend the same conferences. No sign that this lack of “independence” ever affects trials. This claimed excess of coziness is often ranted about online by the Knoxophile David Anderson who lives near Perugia. Nobody who pays him any attention can get where he derives this from. Maybe he heard it from Hellman?

Perugia prosecutors and magistrates are all known to do a fine job, and the national Olympics & earthquake relief cases involving powerful Rome politicians were assigned for competent handling to where? To Perugia… Defense lawyer Ghirga and Prosecutor Mignini have the reputation of being good friends. And Mignini and Massei would both draw their salaries from the State. But so what? Do not judges and DAs in the the USA do likewise? Are Gumbel and Sollecito impugning the professionalism of the counterparts of Mignini and Massei all over the world? It sure reads like it.

Posted by Our Main Posters on 01/16/15 at 08:44 PM in Defendants in court, Raff Sollecito, The legal followups, Sollecito followup, Hoaxes against Italy, 1 Ital justice hoax, 2 Italian mileu hoax, 9 Mignini v Knox hoax, Hoaxes Sollecito etc, Hoaxers from 2007, Raff Sollecito PR, More hoaxers, Raff Sollecito #2

Comments

I have read a lot of ‘‘For Dummies’’ books, and most have a ‘Parts of 10’ section, or sections in the back.

So, ‘‘Parts of 10: Must Have Elements for a Successful Frame Job’‘

1. A boss, who sends innocuous enough text messages that you can twist and distort. Helps if he is black.

2. A guy who is attracted to you, one who preferably who has been rumoured to do previous break ins. Also helps if he is black.

3. A virgin, loner boyfriend who collects knives, so you can use his knife/knives, and have suspicion directed at him. Helps if he is black, but ‘not American’ is good enough.

4. A coke dealer who deals drugs for sex on the side, who doesn’t mind having his number end up in police hands.

5. Random people in the neighbourhood that you can write lists of and makes maps to find. Helps if some of them are black.

6. Understanding flatmates in your hometown, who won’t report you for practicing your break in/burglary techniques.

7. A guilt-ridden dad, who blames himself for your weirdness, and who will take matters into his own hands. Same with Mom.

8. A good PR guy, who can turn a sex-crazed druggie killer into an ‘Innocent Abroad’.

9. A supply of loser wannabees who will pursue your cause for their own selfish ends.

10. Limp, impotent, and weak-minded media types who will report what they are told, and who will not ask tough or probing questions.

Okay, that is 10, but also ... proper tools: large rock, knives, extra mop, extra sets of clothes, extra tennis shoes, socks to rummage through purses, enough bleach, enough time to finish a cleanup,

Not needed: cell phones, pipes, or computers that work.

Posted by Chimera on 01/17/15 at 03:47 AM | #

7. Meredith, of course, suffered infinitely worse luck than we did: she came home, alone, on an ordinary Thursday night and had her throat slit by an intruder hoping to steal the household rent money.

To me an innocent person wouldn’t say this, because the wouldn’t need to. An innocent person might say ‘what on earth really happened in that house I don’t know’. Or something like that.
But Sollecito’s words are deliberately trying to give a different scenario. And the bit about the ‘rent money’; I mean he really is confident of his knowledge!

Posted by DavidB on 01/17/15 at 12:58 PM | #

Hi Chimera:

Thanks for the incisive 10 Points. And they should amuse our friends in Italy! There have been a number of satires of RS and AK there.

Nobody repeat nobody has any time for Sollecito as an Italian who used national betrayal in his whiny defense, and thy are amazed that some gush over him here.

Read the 160 5-star reviews of what is literally a huge fraud of a book:

http://www.amazon.com/Honor-Bound-Journey-Hell-Amanda-ebook/product-reviews/B007MB5UYQ/ref=cm_cr_dp_qt_hist_five?ie=UTF8&filterBy=addFiveStar&showViewpoints=0

And AK shagging her drug dealer just doesnt come across as classy. Even if she’d soon be broke and forced back to Seattle.

Posted by Peter Quennell on 01/17/15 at 04:19 PM | #

Thanks a lot DavidB. Later, will add that. Needs to be there.

Posted by Peter Quennell on 01/17/15 at 04:22 PM | #

.... continued from last post ....

Parts of 10: Very Useful Elements for a Successful Frame Job

1. Italians, or nationals of some other country, who speak something other than English. Anything lost in translation means you’re a victim, right?

2. Kindly police officers, who take your witness sessions off camera, and offer you tea. Likewise, a Public Minister (or Mayor), who is off duty.

3. Prison officials who don’t report their daily activities to the media, or who allow you books, TV, rock concerts, a hairdresser, or to make a music video.

4. Roommates who either are lawyers, or who work for lawyers, Then, you can claim with some plausibility that the first thing they did was see a lawyer.

5. An American lawyer, who can explain your story, and while there is no evidence against you, and what there is is unreliable. Additionally, helps if he explains your appeal acquittal being annulled is just some ‘‘fine tuning’‘.

6. Friends of your victim, especially if they are telling the police stories about how you bring home strange men, and were having troubles with said victim.

7. Strong filters on social media, so your rape stories, or photos holding a meat cleaver are not public.

8. An oddball friend, who will tell the world you are not a monster. Note: Coach her to not include the part of you possibly being a total master manipulator.

9. A good book agent who can sell your blood money books, preferably one who doesn’t know the difference between ‘‘awaiting a new trial’’ and ‘‘guilty, pending further appeals’‘.

10. A Ph.D of some sort, who can explain your Susan Smith type false ‘‘confession’’ implicating another person.

Right ... limp, impotent, and weak willed media types

Coming soon: Parts of 10: Things to Avoid Doing for a Successful Frame Job

Enjoy!

Posted by Chimera on 01/18/15 at 07:05 AM | #

.... continued from last post ....

Parts of 10: Things to Avoid Doing For a Successful Frame Job

1. When deciding on a supposed ‘‘entry point’’ for your ‘‘robbery’‘, AVOID choosing a location that is too visible, such as the front of the house.

2. When ransacking the house to stage a burglary, AVOID doing things out of order. Remember, glass is broken first, then items are randomly thrown around.

3. Remember to watch for potentially incriminating clues. AVOID leaving your blood and footprints in the house. Remember, those pesky police tend to define crime scenes as entire buildings, and don’t always believe that murder scenes are just menstrual issues.

4. Remember, that while selectively cleaning evidence is critical, there is such a thing as being too thorough. AVOID removing all traces of yourself from your bedroom. That causes suspicions.

5. While leaving traces of your ‘patsy’ is critical, not all evidence is good evidence. AVOID this trap. While leaving poop behind is proof he was there, police tend to wonder why you didn’t just flush, if it had been there for a day.

6. While conducting murder investigations, police have this odd habit of asking everyone where they were. AVOID giving multiple, conflicting, and contradictory alibis. You want this detail worked out in advance.

7. During their bumblings, police have another odd habit (maybe they are quirky), of taking strange behaviour into account. AVOID acting as if you don’t care, revealing person details only the killer(s) would know, or engaging in exhibitionist sexual behaviour in the immediate aftermath. There will be time for ooh-la-la later.

8. If you are going to frame someone, it is very powerful to claim that you were a witness to it. AVOID doing this however, as police tend to ask why you did not report it sooner.

9. Yes, knives are really cool, and make cool trophies after just turning someone into a corpse. However, AVOID doing this, even if you bleach it, as strangely, DNA tends to remain. Just get a new knife, Dad can afford it. Same with the bloody sneakers.

10. While testifying can be a great way to show off your language skills, AVOID having your true nature come out. Telling people you just want to get on with your life undermines your claim that the victim was a close friend.

Posted by Chimera on 01/18/15 at 08:02 AM | #

thanks Chimera, that was fun.

On false claim (16) reasonable doubt, I made this point in the past but repetita juvant.

The principle of “in dubio pro reo” has existed for hundreds of years in what today we call Italy and in general in ol’ Europe.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_dubio_pro_reo

So whoever makes this point to object to the conviction of Knox and Sollecito is ignorant or trying to mislead the public (more likely).

There is even much more.

In the Italian criminal trial the principle is concrete and a real burden for judges as there are multiple checks on the application of “beyond every reasonable doubt”, presumption of innocence and the use of appropriate (not illogical) arguments and evidence to convict or acquit.

The checks are direct as all verdicts must include a written justification (article 111 of the Italian Constitution “... Tutti i provvedimenti giurisdizionali devono essere motivati…”).

This principle is instead quite abstract in the US criminal trial. Empty words fill the mouths of propaganda experts but the obvious reality is nobody ever checks on what basis a jury convicts or acquits and no record exists explaining the reasons for the decision.

The principle is just an instruction to the jury but there is never any evidence the instruction is followed or even understood [understanding of the principle is not so obvious, the MK case and many others show daily how little people understand around the law].

In which of the two systems is the defensive guarantee provided by this principle stronger? The answer is obvious.

We could go on ...

In which system are 2 appeals provided automatically as Courts/Juries are not considered infallible?

Which of the 2 systems discriminate against poor defendants as they have no money to pay aggressive lawyers or post bail?

Etc.

Posted by Popper on 01/18/15 at 12:11 PM | #

Much appreciated Popper. To include in the Master Version of our disputes with the book, on a separate page soon.

Posted by Peter Quennell on 01/18/15 at 04:15 PM | #

@ Popper & Pete, re Reasonable Doubt:

Those deniers are trying to mislead the public.

Your Point is so crucial that it is central to an upcoming Post I’m composing for submission.

Posted by Cardiol MD on 01/18/15 at 04:59 PM | #

Lovely. The thing the FOA can’t stand of course is having the entire evidence listed chronologically. This shoots all their rebuttals in the foot since they only have the ability to focus on one aspect at a time in the hope that everything else will just disappear. People who believe a single aspect at a time while ignoring everything else must be slow, and really in denial. For example the invention of “Franny the Nanny” in the Casey Anthony trial was believed by some as being true. The fact that there was a TV show staring Fran Dresher in the title roll of the same name was missed by just about everyone, particularly those who wanted to believe in innocent even though they were in the minority. People will believe anything if it’s packaged properly (Money back guarantee, buy one get one free etc;) that is why anything here is of such importance because it dismisses the view that anything Italian is a set up and a conspiracy. For example, Karen Pruit is of the opinion that since Knox is “In the System” it’s all lies and a gigantic
Machiavellian witch hunt just set up to entrap innocent American girls, and since Knox was the only American Girl in Parugia who was having sex she was a prime target. If it wasn’t so tragic it would be laughable.

Posted by Grahame Rhodes on 01/18/15 at 05:26 PM | #

Grahame,I think you meant to say Zanny the Nanny , who is Zainada Gonzalez the poor woman who had to go through hell after Casey Anthony accused her of kidnapping her child, but any way you look at Anthony and Knox they are both despicable scumbags

Posted by forres on 01/18/15 at 06:54 PM | #

Hi forres. i stand corrected. Thank you

Posted by Grahame Rhodes on 01/18/15 at 10:36 PM | #

Sorry for all the postings, but am in a writing mood. As for all the ‘framing’ stuff, and the notion that it is ‘quirkiness’, here is how I distinguish things.

Proof of Guilt:
-Falsely accusing an innocent person (ie, Casey Anthony or Susan Smith)
-Creating lists of ‘suspects’ right before giving these statement ‘gifts’
-Repeating false accusation, while throwing suspicion onto boyfriend
-Letting innocent person sit in jail, even after talking to your Mum
-False alibis
-Lying about when you woke up
-Lying about when you called the police
-Lying about the door always being locked
-Knowing that nothing had been taken
-Sending ‘alibi’ email for no reason
-Admitting you gave someone a false alibi
-Revealing details not made public
-Staging a break in. While not directly incriminating you, it causes the police to focus on residents who lived there
-Turning off phones (if this is a first)
-Buying bleach at dawn (if this is a first)
-Walking home past a broken window, then showering in a bloody bathroom
-Leaving the home, without taking anything for your ‘Gubbio trip’
-Telling a judge you ‘‘wish never to see Amanda again. Above all, it is her fault we are here’‘

Proof of Callousness:
-Showing affection at police station or outside crime scene
-Not coming to the police station right away because you are ‘‘eating dinner’‘
-Lacking any fear or sadness at the murder of your ‘‘friend’‘
-Not interested in hanging around police station to find out what happened to your ‘‘friend’‘
-Shopping for sexy lingerie after the murder of your ‘friend’
-Comments like ‘‘shit happens’‘, or ‘‘I just want to get on with my life’‘
-Skipping your ‘‘friend’s’’ memorial
-Refusing to acknowledge that your ‘‘friend’’ doesn’t find you to be a good person to live with.

Inexplicable ‘‘Lawyer Logic’‘:
-Refusing to attend the testing of certain evidence, then later claiming it was contaminated
-Claiming your client is best served by severing his appeal from the co-accused, who happens to be his alibi
-Asking to sever a trial, as co-accused who don’t know each other, are trying to frame each other
-Claiming the evidence is strong against one defendant, but contaminated against the others.

If it were just the ‘Callousness’ topic, I might be able to accept AK and RS are just cold but innocent. But combined with the ‘Guilt’ topic, no, there is no other explanation. The lawerly logic, further confirms this.

Of course, this post doesn’t even address actual physical evidence ....

Posted by Chimera on 01/18/15 at 11:15 PM | #

Commenting is not available in this channel entry.

Where next:

Click here to return to The Top Of The Front Page

Or to next entry The Sollecito Trial For “Honor Bound” #3: Targeted Claims On Which Sollecito & Gumbel May Fold

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