The Trials of Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito: Part 28

[Bill Williams]

You're right. There is no point. It's just nonsense.

"Begging the question" is a form of circular reasoning that has always been the backbone of the on-line guilter PR-campaign.

Rather than coming right out with their assumed conclusion, they used to construct both short and crisp word salads like this one, or more convoluted ones like Machiavelli used to toss.

The point is to chuck into the post sinister-sounding factoids to fool unsuspecting readers. Instead of responding to posts like LondonJohn's which flesh out the incongruities on which the post is based.....

..... the guilter PR-machine would just wait a month or two, and simply repost it - as if someone like LondonJohn hadn't long since skewered the reasoning.

Word salad. Begging the question. Whack-a-mole. Key ways to keep the guilter PR-campaign going after all these years.

 

[TruthCalls]

...

With those stark choices, what would any morally or psychologically dysfunctional prosecutor do?

Exactly!

 

[TruthCalls]

Sophie Purton had her phone tapped and was not allowed to leave Italy.

Should she have been placed under arrest and cautioned that she was a formal suspect?

Of course not.

The question is whether Purton was ever considered a suspect. As was pointed out, it appears there was a standard process of spreading a wide 'phone tap' net over anyone who might be involved. However, as you read through the General Investigative Activity reports it becomes clear Purton's phone tap was the ONLY thing the police did specific to Purton. There are no transcriptions of any of her calls. None of her emails were collected. None of her school work was collected. No private conversations were recorded.

The analysis of these reports CLEARLY shows that all of the investigative activity was focused on Amanda and Raffaele, as well as Raffaele's family. There was NO focus on anyone else. Ergo, Amanda and Raffaele were the primary suspects. No one else got anything more than a cursory glance. To not acknowledge this very obvious conclusion is, as Stacy stated earlier, intellectual dishonesty.

 

[Bill Williams]

"Begging the question" is a form of circular reasoning that has always been the backbone of the on-line guilter PR-campaign.

Rather than coming right out with their assumed conclusion, they used to construct both short and crisp word salads like this one, or more convoluted ones like Machiavelli used to toss.

The point is to chuck into the post sinister-sounding factoids to fool unsuspecting readers. Instead of responding to posts like LondonJohn's which flesh out the incongruities on which the post is based.....

..... the guilter PR-machine would just wait a month or two, and simply repost it - as if someone like LondonJohn hadn't long since skewered the reasoning.

Word salad. Begging the question. Whack-a-mole. Key ways to keep the guilter PR-campaign going after all these years.

For the sake of transparency, I did find one Italian lawyer with impeccable legal credentials and qualification who sincerely believed in both Sollicito's and Knox's guilt.

He was tracked down by a Ph.D. researcher from Columbia University who had done an award winning paper on how most of the "official judgments" in this case had gone so wrong. In her further work, she'd gone to Italy four times to try to track down people from all sides of the debate. She found one who was a guilter, and who had impeccable credentials.

He met with her over coffee. As she writes it, he was of the view (oft parroted by guilters) that there simply could not have been such a volume of circumstantial evidence without them being guilty of something.

In reading it, it reminded me of Peter Quennell's Summer 2011 piece on TJMK that despite the DNA evidence falling apart, there was "all the other evidence". Dumpkoffs like myself had picked up on that and had gone on a search for all that "other" stuff.

As the Ph.D. researcher concluded, even this acknowledged Italian legal expert had not been immune from it all, albeit that he was seemingly quite alone in his assessment in the Italian legal community. Most, if not all others simply accepted the 2015 Supreme Court exonerations and got on with life.

"All the other evidence," turns out to be a conglomeration of all those other word salads. They periodically get repeated when their turn on the merry-go-round comes around. None of it, though, defeats the final conclusion of the Marasca-Bruno report from September 2015 which said that in the final analysis, one decisive element still was unchallenged, no matter how many word salads you could construct.....

Any further and more meaningful value would be, in fact, resisted by the fact - which is decisive - that no trace leading to her was found at the scene of the crime or on the victim’s body, so that - if all the above is accepted - her contact with the victim’s blood would have occurred after the crime and in another part of the house.

"If all the above is accepted." So that's even before considering that most, if not all, of "all the other evidence" is mostly invented, word salads, or actually putting one's thumb on the scale to get the desired result.

 

[TruthCalls]

For the sake of transparency, I did find one Italian lawyer with impeccable legal credentials and qualification who sincerely believed in both Sollicito's and Knox's guilt.

He was tracked down by a Ph.D. researcher from Columbia University who had done an award winning paper on how most of the "official judgments" in this case had gone so wrong. In her further work, she'd gone to Italy four times to try to track down people from all sides of the debate. She found one who was a guilter, and who had impeccable credentials.

He met with her over coffee. As she writes it, he was of the view (oft parroted by guilters) that there simply could not have been such a volume of circumstantial evidence without them being guilty of something.

In reading it, it reminded me of Peter Quennell's Summer 2011 piece on TJMK that despite the DNA evidence falling apart, there was "all the other evidence". Dumpkoffs like myself had picked up on that and had gone on a search for all that "other" stuff.

As the Ph.D. researcher concluded, even this acknowledged Italian legal expert had not been immune from it all, albeit that he was seemingly quite alone in his assessment in the Italian legal community. Most, if not all others simply accepted the 2015 Supreme Court exonerations and got on with life.

"All the other evidence," turns out to be a conglomeration of all those other word salads. They periodically get repeated when their turn on the merry-go-round comes around. None of it, though, defeats the final conclusion of the Marasca-Bruno report from September 2015 which said that in the final analysis, one decisive element still was unchallenged, no matter how many word salads you could construct.....

​

"If all the above is accepted." So that's even before considering that most, if not all, of "all the other evidence" is mostly invented, word salads, or actually putting one's thumb on the scale to get the desired result.

I'm a little confused by this. Was it YOU who found this Italian Lawyer or the Ph.D. Researcher?

You then say the Italian Lawyer (IL) was tracked down by the Ph.D. Researcher (PR) who had done an award winning paper. Was the paper based on overall case research, what she learned from the IL, or both?

The PR then traveled to Italy and found a pro-guilt with impeccable credentials, but I assume this was not the IL? Do we know who this person was? Did the PR ever produce a write-up regarding her exchange with this pro-guilt she found? ...or what the IL had to say, for that matter?

Do you know if the PR ever reviewed "all other evidence" with the IL to get his perspective on each item of 'evidence'? That's the part I find most interesting. I've found most pro-guilt are so deeply impressed with the lengthy list of 'evidence' that they tend to ignore the fact that each item in that list can generally be proven false or have a purely innocent interpretation. It would therefore be interesting to hear how this IL would try to validate that list.

 

[TomG]

For the sake of transparency, I did find one Italian lawyer with impeccable legal credentials and qualification who sincerely believed in both Sollicito's and Knox's guilt.

He was tracked down by a Ph.D. researcher from Columbia University who had done an award winning paper on how most of the "official judgments" in this case had gone so wrong. In her further work, she'd gone to Italy four times to try to track down people from all sides of the debate. She found one who was a guilter, and who had impeccable credentials.

He met with her over coffee. As she writes it, he was of the view (oft parroted by guilters) that there simply could not have been such a volume of circumstantial evidence without them being guilty of something.

In reading it, it reminded me of Peter Quennell's Summer 2011 piece on TJMK that despite the DNA evidence falling apart, there was "all the other evidence". Dumpkoffs like myself had picked up on that and had gone on a search for all that "other" stuff.

As the Ph.D. researcher concluded, even this acknowledged Italian legal expert had not been immune from it all, albeit that he was seemingly quite alone in his assessment in the Italian legal community. Most, if not all others simply accepted the 2015 Supreme Court exonerations and got on with life.

"All the other evidence," turns out to be a conglomeration of all those other word salads. They periodically get repeated when their turn on the merry-go-round comes around. None of it, though, defeats the final conclusion of the Marasca-Bruno report from September 2015 which said that in the final analysis, one decisive element still was unchallenged, no matter how many word salads you could construct.....

​

"If all the above is accepted." So that's even before considering that most, if not all, of "all the other evidence" is mostly invented, word salads, or actually putting one's thumb on the scale to get the desired result.

I've encountered the same "s**tl***s of evidence" argument from guilters on various comments sections and debates. The simple solution is to ask for a narrative of the crime beginning with Raffaele playing the Naruto file on his computer at 9.26. I've done this many times to absolutely zero response. The bottom line is that the pro-guilt argument with it's "s**tl***s of evidence" still can't come up with a sustainable theory of the crime. What we get instead are petty little hit-and-run comments of little substance.

Hoots

 

[Bill Williams]

I'm a little confused by this. Was it YOU who found this Italian Lawyer or the Ph.D. Researcher?

You then say the Italian Lawyer (IL) was tracked down by the Ph.D. Researcher (PR) who had done an award winning paper. Was the paper based on overall case research, what she learned from the IL, or both?

The PR then traveled to Italy and found a pro-guilt with impeccable credentials, but I assume this was not the IL? Do we know who this person was? Did the PR ever produce a write-up regarding her exchange with this pro-guilt she found? ...or what the IL had to say, for that matter?

Do you know if the PR ever reviewed "all other evidence" with the IL to get his perspective on each item of 'evidence'? That's the part I find most interesting. I've found most pro-guilt are so deeply impressed with the lengthy list of 'evidence' that they tend to ignore the fact that each item in that list can generally be proven false or have a purely innocent interpretation. It would therefore be interesting to hear how this IL would try to validate that list.

I'll post the link when I get home.

As long as you remember that the title is meant tongue-in-cheek, it's titled something akin to "what not to do if you're charged with murder in Italy."

The researcher sought out and had coffee with the Italian lawyer, who has been cited here before. People like Methos or LondonJohn will remember his name, although it escapes me at the moment.

Her paper was based on overall case research, put the piece I'll link to was done following that. The lawyer she interviewed in Italy, although an unassailable expert, simply got this one wrong - like Alan Dershowitz in the USA.

Me, I'd been clearing out a HD and ran across it again.

 

[TruthCalls]

I'll post the link when I get home.

As long as you remember that the title is meant tongue-in-cheek, it's titled something akin to "what not to do if you're charged with murder in Italy."

The researcher sought out and had coffee with the Italian lawyer, who has been cited here before. People like Methos or LondonJohn will remember his name, although it escapes me at the moment.

Her paper was based on overall case research, put the piece I'll link to was done following that. The lawyer she interviewed in Italy, although an unassailable expert, simply got this one wrong - like Alan Dershowitz in the USA.

Me, I'd been clearing out a HD and ran across it again.

Thanks Bill

 

[Stacyhs]

>snip<

I've found most pro-guilt are so deeply impressed with the lengthy list of 'evidence' that they tend to ignore the fact that each item in that list can generally be proven false or have a purely innocent interpretation. It would therefore be interesting to hear how this IL would try to validate that list.

That.^ No other possible explanation for this "other evidence" is considered. Any discrepancy, any error in memory, etc. is presented as a 'lie'. Any action is given a nefarious explanation. For example:

1. Knox saying Meredith "always locked her bedroom door" is presented as a deliberate lie and couldn't possibly be Raff mistranslating what Knox said despite the fact he spoke very poor English at the time and the scene was chaotic. Filomena's statement that Meredith NEVER locked her door is accepted as fact. But how would Filomena know when, or if, Meredith locked her door unless she checked it every time MK left the house? I doubt MK announced to everyone "I've locked my door" when she left or wanted privacy (as when having Silenzi in her room).

2. Raff saying "nothing was taken" when he reported the break-in is presented as evidence that he knew it was fake. The fact that valuables in plain sight had not been taken so as to suggest nothing was missing is ignored.

3. The pair turning off their phones is 'evidence' that they were at the cottage despite a rational and logical explanation of not wanting to be disturbed during an unexpected night off. The fact this was not their 'usual habit' is somehow suspicious even though they'd only known each other less than a week and the circumstance of Knox suddenly having off a night she usually worked had never occurred before. Raff didn't normally turn off his phone because he hadn't been in the same situation before. By all accounts, he had a very limited sex life (One previous sexual experience, IIRC).

4. Raff couldn't possibly have been confused about the night Amanda went out when he said she may have left the night MK was killed during his interrogation. Of course, his description of that night is corroborated by witnesses for her whereabouts the night before the murder.

On the other hand, the guilters believe every witness that supported guilt. Witnesses like Curatolo, Quintavalle, Kokomani, and Capezalli are believed without question despite strong evidence that they weren't credible.

 

[Bill Williams]

Thanks Bill

Martha Grace Duncan wrote the piece for the Harvard Journal of Law and Gender in 2017. The Italian law expert she visited in Florence (?) was Steffano Maffei, who holds a Ph.D in law from Oxford.

I think that's enough to Google it. For some reason I cannot copy and paste a link from here!

 

[Vixen]

Did the police and Mignini ever say that they suspected Purton as they admitted they suspected Amanda as early as Nov. 2? Mignini has admitted he thought it was an "inside job" immediately and began to suspect Amanda when he saw her acting "inappropriately" with Raffaele (when he comforted her outside) and when she 'broke down' when taken back to the cottage.

Purton was never a suspect. Your inability to admit that Knox and Sollecito were more than "witnesses" by Nov. 5 is intellectual dishonesty.

Detectives vigorously investigated amongst others Filomena, Sophie and 'Shaky'.

Detectives can't do their job properly if they are barred from investigating anyone.

You belief detectives decided to victimise Knox for no reason at all is totally absurd. Police have better things to do with their time than frame an innocent person for the murder of Meredith Kercher.

Final judgments state very clearly Knox was present at her murder, washed off Mez' blood from her person and covered up for Guede.

Wake up, smell the coffee.

 

[Vixen]

All this is of course completely correct.

But you can also add: did the police ever tell Purton that they knew she wasn't telling them the truth and that she had better now tell them the truth otherwise she faced decades in prison?

Because as much as there's very strong evidence that the police/PM considered Knox a suspect well before the evening of 5th November (per your points), there's virtually incontrovertible evidence from that 5/6 Nov interrogation that the police HAD to have believed Knox to be a suspect of a serious criminal offence - whether protecting the perpetrator, or lying to the police, or direct involvement in the murder itself - at some point prior to her initial verbal "confession/accusation". And after all, as far as law and ethics are concerned, it's relatively irrelevant as to at which precise point the police/PM considered Knox a criminal suspect. The important matter is that the evidence from that final police interview of Knox shows that it must have been at some point prior to her first verbal "buckling". Whether it was minutes before that, or hours before that, or days before that, is of less importance.

I'm going out on a limb here, and suggesting that the police conducting witness interviews with Purton never did shout at her that they knew she wasn't telling them the truth, or threaten her with lengthy incarceration, or cuff her on the back of her head, or make her "buckle"......

There is nothing wrong with police saying to someone, 'you are aware you could go to prison if you run over somebody and you were found to have been playing with your mobile phone?'

Knox' flippant attitude, laughing and joking, turning cartwheels and making out with Raff, rightly called for a reprimand as to the seriousness of the murder investigation.

 

[Vixen]

In addition, Purton never stated that she had been coerced by the police into making a statement, nor was she arrested, prosecuted, and convicted for making a statement in an interrogation without a defense lawyer or with the suggestive misconduct of an interpreter, a police agent who as acting in concert with the police interrogators to obtain a coerced false statement. Purton never alleged she had been subjected to any coercive treatment or other mistreatment by the police that would have credibly constituted inhuman or degrading treatment.

Thus, Italy could not be said to have violated Purton's Convention rights under Articles 6.1 with 6.3c or Articles 6.1 with 6.3e. Since Purton made no claim to the authorities of mistreatment, Italy could not be considered to have violated either limb of Convention Article 3 in her case.

In comparison, the ECHR Chamber judgment found that Italy had violated Knox's Convention rights as follows:

Violation of Articles 6.1 with 6.3c (unfair trial resulting in conviction based on a statement made under questioning without a defense lawyer)

Violation of Articles 6.1 with 6.3e (unfair trial resulting in conviction based on the failure to provide a fair interpreter during questioning)

Violation of Article 3 in its procedural limb (failure of the authorities to conduct an effective and independent investigation of a credible claim of inhuman or degrading treatment during questioning).

We are now awaiting a decision from the Grand Chamber Panel on Italy's request for referral of the case to the Grand Chamber. If the Grand Chamber reviews the case, according to current ECHR case-law, all of the violations found by the Chamber would still hold.

Sophie Purton understood that whilst it was unpleasant to be under investigation and being asked to attend the questura, having her phone tapped and questioned about it and her whereabouts and not being able to leave Italy as all the other Brits ('the British birds', as Grinder called them) had done.

She fully understood the police were only doing their job and she was happy to be thus inconvenienced for the sake of her dear friend, Mez.

You never hear Sophie, Filomena or Shaky complaining.

 

[Bill Williams]

Final judgments state very clearly Knox was present at her murder, washed off Mez' blood from her person and covered up for Guede.

Wake up, smell the coffee.

And around and around we go, where it stops nobody knows.

This has been covered ad nauseam. No one other than 2015 Supreme Court deniers say what you say. I've just read all about Steffano Maffei, an Oxford Ph.D. practicing law in Florence.

As late as 2017 he opined that he thought the pair was guilty. He cited "all the other evidence", and said nothing about what you continue to cite.

BTW - an exhaustive search among Italian lawyers reveals Maffei as the only one expressing a guilter point of view.

 

[Stacyhs]

Detectives vigorously investigated amongst others Filomena, Sophie and 'Shaky'.

Detectives can't do their job properly if they are barred from investigating anyone.

You belief detectives decided to victimise Knox for no reason at all is totally absurd. Police have better things to do with their time than frame an innocent person for the murder of Meredith Kercher.

Final judgments state very clearly Knox was present at her murder, washed off Mez' blood from her person and covered up for Guede.

Wake up, smell the coffee.

Exactly HOW did the detectives 'vigorously investigate' Filomena, Sophie, and Shaky? Does your definition of 'vigorously' include verifying their alibis the night of the murder thus eliminating them as suspects? Wow. That's some vigorous investigation!

No, there were reasons the police and Mignini focused on Amanda which they have made quite clear. Follain explained them in his book: Amanda and Raff were kissing 'inappropriately' and 'smothering each other with kisses' (disproved by the actual video) and who (to Napoleoni)'seemed completely indifferent to Meredith's death' (not according to others there who said Knox cried). Napoleoni 'couldn’t help thinking that she (Knox) was hiding something from her' because her 'story didn't make sense'. I mean, who would go into a house with an open door (even though it had a broken lock and wouldn't stay shut) or would shower in a bathroom with a small amount of blood on the faucet and sink that indicated someone may have cut themselves and a previous look around the house had revealed nothing else suspicious)? According to Follain, Mignini immediately deduced that ''There’s a traitor in this house, someone who participated in the crime or helped to cover it up or who did both,’ and that 'only a woman would cover the body'. Laura was in Rome and had been the night of the murder so that eliminated her immediately. Romanelli had spent the night with her boyfriend and was also quickly eliminated. Who did that leave? Take a guess.

So, yes, there were reasons...but they were lousy ones based on false assumptions and inferences.

 

[Stacyhs]

Sophie Purton understood that whilst it was unpleasant to be under investigation and being asked to attend the questura, having her phone tapped and questioned about it and her whereabouts and not being able to leave Italy as all the other Brits ('the British birds', as Grinder called them) had done.

She fully understood the police were only doing their job and she was happy to be thus inconvenienced for the sake of her dear friend, Mez.

You never hear Sophie, Filomena or Shaky complaining.

LOL! What did they have to complain about? How many hours were they interrogated? Were any of them accused of lying? Were any of their characters assassinated by the media? Were any of them accused of murder? Were they arrested and imprisoned? Were they tried for murder? Were they treated as anything other than witnesses? NO. Purton's parents flew to Perugia immediately and were with her until she left Italy just after Knox's arrest.

But thank you for letting us know what Purton 'fully understood' and that she was 'happy to be thus inconvenienced'. I see your psychic abilities to know what others think and feel are coming in handy again.

Stop just making up crap and presenting it as fact.

 

[Stacyhs]

There is nothing wrong with police saying to someone, 'you are aware you could go to prison if you run over somebody and you were found to have been playing with your mobile phone?'

But that's not what happened, is it? The police did not say "You are aware that you could to to prison if you were found to have murdered someone?

Knox' flippant attitude, laughing and joking, turning cartwheels and making out with Raff, rightly called for a reprimand as to the seriousness of the murder investigation.

What has that to do with LondonJohn's post? Hint: absolutely nothing.

 

[Methos]

Martha Grace Duncan wrote the piece for the Harvard Journal of Law and Gender in 2017. The Italian law expert she visited in Florence (?) was Steffano Maffei, who holds a Ph.D in law from Oxford.

I think that's enough to Google it. For some reason I cannot copy and paste a link from here!

Thankfully TJMK has it archived :
WHAT NOT TO DO WHEN YOUR ROOMMATE IS MURDERED IN ITALY

It's interesting that Stefano Maffei also has been Andrea Vogt's "expert"...

"Computer and crucifix: Amanda Knox's guilt will be judged in a system that is a mix of old and new" (Nov 29th, 2009)

The debate continues over Knox's guilt (Dec 14th, 2009)

"There were 19 judges who looked at the facts and evidence over the course of two years, faced with decisions on pre-trial detention, review of such detention, committal to trial, judgment on criminal responsibility. They all agreed, at all times, that the evidence was overwhelming."

*Yawn*

ETA: Isn't it interesting that both, Vogt and Maffei, have purged their internet pages from everything related to the case? In fact both of them have set up new - Knox free - pages, I wonder why?

 

[Bill Williams]

N

Thankfully TJMK has it archived :
WHAT NOT TO DO WHEN YOUR ROOMMATE IS MURDERED IN ITALY

It's interesting that Steffano Maffei also has been Andrea Vogt's "expert"...
"Computer and crucifix: Amanda Knox's guilt will be judged in a system that is a mix of old and new" (Nov 29th, 2009)

The debate continues over Knox's guilt (Dec 14th, 2009)

*Yawn*

Like I always say, some people use The Library of Congress, the Library at Alexandria, or the Oracle of Delphi.....

..... we mostly use Methos.

Maybe Maffei's Oxford Ph.D. counts as Quennell's 100s of lawyers.

 

[Vixen]

And around and around we go, where it stops nobody knows.

This has been covered ad nauseam. No one other than 2015 Supreme Court deniers say what you say. I've just read all about Steffano Maffei, an Oxford Ph.D. practicing law in Florence.

As late as 2017 he opined that he thought the pair was guilty. He cited "all the other evidence", and said nothing about what you continue to cite.

BTW - an exhaustive search among Italian lawyers reveals Maffei as the only one expressing a guilter point of view.

First duty is to a court. If you are a lawyer you don't mouth off about the courts you are subservient to.