Amanda Knoxx retrial

I find the whole situation somewhat bizarre that it will ultimately come down to political horse reading to decide if she serves her sentence or not.

Half expecting her to do her time in the US as I cannot imagine they will release her to Italy.
 
I find the whole situation somewhat bizarre that it will ultimately come down to political horse reading to decide if she serves her sentence or not.

Half expecting her to do her time in the US as I cannot imagine they will release her to Italy.

Again, the very situation of her being away in america lets Italy save a little face by retrying her, finding her guilty and not playing the "we can't ask for extradition America are big and bad and strong and we can't win so we won't try" angle. It lets them be right about their theory of her being the murderer, but not have to fight the world on public opinion again.

The US will never jail her, the only absurd thing is they may jail their own to make this point, from a single piece of evidence. It's said on the video of this bra clasp with his DNA on it(his dna is no where else), this bra clasp was highlighted straight away, and is basically white, 46 days later, after they investigators forgot to collect it, it was found, almost black from dirt, under a pile of rags 4ft from where it originally was. This painfully tainted item had one spec of his DNA which absolutely by any sane person can't be said to have certainly be there to start with, and if it was isn't proof of guilt to start with.

That is their basically entire case against him, their "proof" he was there that night in that room, put someone in jail for 25 years.... for tainted evidence. That is how not at all corrupt the system is right there.

Apparently the knife in his appartment with a single tiny spec of her DNA... cleaned completely to remove blood... but with one piece of DNA, was also transported in a shoe box, and handled by investigators without gloves...... it also doesn't match the bloody imprint of the knife on the bed(someone clearly put the bloody knife down and left the knife's shape outlined) and doesn't match the wounds by eye, the Italian prosecution refused to let an independent expert compare the knife to the wounds.

As I keep saying, if she did it is irrelevant at this point, and him, by any reasonable law system there is absolutely not even remotely close to no doubt. If she was completely guilty, she would never be found guilty in the US or UK or most civilised court rooms. The evidence is clearly tainted, insanely marginal but most importantly the prosecutors case/interpretation of events is basically impossible.

The only way they could possibly have done what the Italian team say, is if they pre-planned it, wore forensic investigation style suits to prevent any DNA being dropped anywhere. But the Italians insist it wasn't pre-planned, and base their case on exceptionally marginal dna evidence from tainted items which absolutely don't explain their story.
 
The multiple attacker hypothesis also rests on that knife being incompatible with some of the wounds on Meredith. Hence two knives - or just perhaps a different knife entirely that they never found?

I was already aware of most of the evidence summarised on the murderofMeredithkercher.com website. Like when I first became aware of the evidence, I found myself saying "so?" or "and?". The trouble is, this was a criminal trial and the conviction criteria is "beyond reasonable doubt". There is nothing to suggest that Knox and Sollecito murdered Meredith Kercher beyond reasonable doubt. There's plenty that raises further questions and I do think there may have been some backside covering on their part.

Unfortunately, I agree with Fox that a fair trial is probably no longer possible. Just read the contents from the Judge in the latest trial, on the lay members coming in each day, talking about what they'd seen of the case in the media. One, the Judge shouldn't be discussing it in public until the final appeal is over. Two, the lay members discussing Media coverage just illustrates how difficult it is for anyone familiar with the media coverage to approach it with an open mind.
 
Amanda Knox is one hot tomale...that she can look pretty good during the trial and under that amount of stress just illustrates that.

Oh, and going on the available evidence, despite the Italian shenanigans, she sounds innocent to me, a bit weird, but innocent all the same.

I'd agree with this view. :)

The trial just reeks of Italian Police Incompetence, just retrialing them until they are found guilty.

I hear the US have said they are not going to extradite Knox, is this still the case?

I still feel sorry for Meredith's parents though. Whether they think Knox (and the bloke) is innocent or not, it must be a very difficult time as if they believe the convicted are actually innocent, the real killer is still at large.
 
The real killer is in prison. Does anybody actually doubt that Rudy Guede did it (with or without accomplices)? The really scary thing is he'll be eligible for parole in 2016.
 
On Sky News last week they interviewed Meredith Kercher's sister and brother and the reporter who did the interview said afterwards he got the impression that they didn't think Knox was guilty. Obviously that's his view on what they said to him, and he spoke to them more than I saw in the interview, but from what I did see they were being very careful over their words and I did wonder what they were really thinking about Knox.
 
It's said on the video of this bra clasp with his DNA on it(his dna is no where else), this bra clasp was highlighted straight away, and is basically white, 46 days later, after they investigators forgot to collect it, it was found, almost black from dirt, under a pile of rags 4ft from where it originally was. This painfully tainted item had one spec of his DNA which absolutely by any sane person can't be said to have certainly be there to start with, and if it was isn't proof of guilt to start with.

I don't think its as simple as that - the contamination argument has already since been rejected by the supreme court as it doesn't hold water... the delay isn't massively relevant,DNA has been collected in cases after much longer delays, it doesn't just magically appear. The Bra Clasp wasn't 'almost black with dirt' either.

As I keep saying, if she did it is irrelevant at this point, and him, by any reasonable law system there is absolutely not even remotely close to no doubt. If she was completely guilty, she would never be found guilty in the US or UK or most civilised court rooms.

Well Dershowiitz (a Harvard law professor) disagrees with you there (not that there isn't some doubt here - that certainly seems to be the case) but that she wouldn't be convicted... and has put forward that there are thousands of people in the US convicted on less evidence, that she'd need a very good lawyer to get away from a conviction in the US too.
 
The multiple attacker hypothesis also rests on that knife being incompatible with some of the wounds on Meredith. Hence two knives - or just perhaps a different knife entirely that they never found?

It doesn't rest on that at all, its covered quite well on that site you've mentioned:

http://themurderofmeredithkercher.com/Multiple_Attackers

I do agree that the investigation hasn't been great and the Italian authorities haven't done themselves many favours at all... though there is a lot of evidence regarding Knoxx and Sollecito having some involvement in this, there are been a lot of myths and misinformation perpetuated in the media coverage (supposed 14 hour 'interrogations' etc..) and those two have repeatedly told lies, made up stories... There is no 'smoking gun' or clear narrative of what might have happened and we might never know. There is plenty of room for reasonable doubt to kick in regarding various aspects of the case. IMO Knoxx and Sollecito probably were involved in some capacity.
 
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Dowie, in your opinion do you think there is enough evidence to convict Knox or Sollecito of murder, beyond reasonable doubt?

Sure, I think something doesn't add up beyond your average weed induced haze. Guede, Knox and Sollecito have all changed stories enough that investigators wouldn't believe them if they all suddenly told the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Once I thought a formal, detailed confession from Guede was the only way the truth was ever going to come out. To be honest, I don't think that will happen and I'm not sure it would help if it did.
 
There's still half a chance Knoxx will get extradited back to Italy to severe the rest of prison sentence, I thought the rules on double jeopardy would make that a near impossibility but the whole process is set in for 4 stages with the last stage being in this case an appeal by Knoxx.

Even though Italy and the US have a formal treaty for extraditing people I can't see the US extraditing one of their own.

She was doing yoga. Probably to relax. After being questioned for hours without a lawyer. And are you serious: her guilt rests on the fact that she didn't behave the way you expect her to behave? You realise that you know **** all about how people under stress behave, right? That stressed people do all sorts of odd things? This isn't news: it's been known since people started studying people under stress. Anyone who has ever been through a stressful event will remember at least one thing they they did which they later recall and wonder: "WTF did I do that for?" So yes, her behaviour is entirely consistent with an innocent person's.

Sorry I didn't recall ever saying she was guilty based on he behavior i just said I found it odd/strange that you act like nothing had happened and she on the face of it wasn't able to gasp the gravity of the situation. In the fact the only time I saw her show any emotion was when she was sent down in the original trial, she is one cool customer under pressure I'll give the that.
 
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Dowie, in your opinion do you think there is enough evidence to convict Knox or Sollecito of murder, beyond reasonable doubt?

I'm not sure to be honest... the whole thing is very dubious, someone likely did try to (badly) clean up part of the crime scene, no blood in the hall but victim's blood still present in places in the bathroom, footprint in the victim's blood belonging to Sollecito found on the bathmat but no similar footprints on the tiles. Guede's shoe prints lead directly from Kercher's room to the front door yet her room door was locked, someone had taken the time to remove her bra, move the body etc..

There is evidence linking them to the crime which can't be easily explained, their behaviour afterwards is very very dubious. It seems fairly likely they were involved in some capacity but as far as beyond reasonable doubt is concerned... I'm really not sure - will wait and see if anything is sucessfully disputed by the defence team.

Once I thought a formal, detailed confession from Guede was the only way the truth was ever going to come out. To be honest, I don't think that will happen and I'm not sure it would help if it did.

I think his defence team really doesn't want him talking in court, he's not the brightest of people.
 
I don't think its as simple as that - the contamination argument has already since been rejected by the supreme court as it doesn't hold water... the delay isn't massively relevant,DNA has been collected in cases after much longer delays, it doesn't just magically appear. The Bra Clasp wasn't 'almost black with dirt' either.

Dna actually can just appear, particularly when the same video's showing the clip show forensic investigators touching things without gloves, improperly handling evidence.

The point is over 46 days how many people walked around that apartment, and how many times, how many people may have trodden on or kicked that bra clasp around, then it was found under a pile of clothes or rags. The apparently tiny sample of dna could indeed have been tracked into that room by incompetent idiots, over 46 days of being trampling there is no way to say where the DNA came from, or even if it was found on the clasp and not contaminated at the lab which is also possible.

Again it's not really saying it definitely isn't his DNA and it definitely wasn't there, it's a case of after such horrendous mishandling being very much able to say it wasn't definitely there originally.

The more you read up on it the more ridiculous it gets frankly.

One of the reasons they were found not guilty is because the judge ordering re-examination of the evidence, particularly on the knife and the bra clasp basically show an idiot forensic investigator using equipment not recommended, for unqualified tests, and bypassed parameter's on the machine to get the results they wanted.

The experts appointed by the judge basically said the lead forensic investigator on the case who later admitted that basically there was no evidence on the knife. The knife which was taken from his home to be tested based on..... looking clean, they didn't test or check the other knives. There was no control done in a lab that had been testing huge amount of the victims dna. The police presented it as the murder weapon and explained the lack of blood as... the pair cleaned it, with bleach..... leaving both of their dna on it and the victims non blood dna evidence.......... Yup, they poured bleach all over the blood but again carefully avoided the victim and knox's dna.

If, and I mean if Knox was a world famous forensic investigator with the whole kit, and pre-meditated it, then maybe she could have cleaned up with such precision in the bedroom, but that doesn't explain missing one spec of dna(later seemingly proven not to be hers) on the knife.

Anyway when the evidence was re-examined, the low dna count method they used to test destroyed the minute amount of DNA if it was the victims or not. The method used to test is poor, and it wasn't to detect blood evidence, it could only be certain types from that kind of sample. The knife was re-examined and no trace of blood was found on it at all. There is no evidence that makes it the murder weapon, it doesn't match most of the wounds, there was no blood on it, it wouldn't have DNA on it if it were cleaned, if not it would have blood on it. The judge appointed pair conclude it wasn't the murder weapon and that it's extremely likely the sample was cross contamination.

The DNA clasp, more detail, firstly the video shows forensic investigators touching it and other things without changing gloves, second, the DNA IS NOT a direct match for Sollecito, some strands matched, not all it was merely in a class of dna types that COULD be his, the prosecution failed to explain that to the jury in the first trial. The sample contained the dna of several other people also. It was metal, stored in water(????) and rusted so couldn't be re-examined. The video showed dozens of problems with the collection of the evidence, not changing gloves when poking around the room then touching the clasp, the 46 day delay in collecting it, that it was moved around the room and was found under a pile of stuff.

Neither pieces of DNA are remotely reliable, the overwhelming likely hood is if his dna was on it or the victims on the blade, it was contaminated. Neither samples were proof it was those peoples DNA in question, both pieces of evidence were improperly collected, handled, tested and stored........

But again it's the lack of evidence that is even more compelling. They stabbed her and took the knife home, cleaned all the blood but neither of their dna off the knife? They picked the knife at random, they left no trace of her blood on their clothes, their rooms, no footprints, no finger prints, not a single skin cell.

There has been less coverage of the latest trial because 99% of people know what it is, BS, the uk/us isn't that interested in it. I'm going to presume they managed to re-enter the basically insane, bogus, guesswork dna evidence.
 
If I had to construct a hypothesis of Knox and Sollecito's involvement, I'd say Knox at least cleaned up the corridor.

If innocent of murder, she realised that the clean up would look incriminating (particularly in the absence of a suspect) and lied . Or she had some involvement, she's done a pretty good job of keeping her DNA out of it while leaving Guede's all over everything.
 
It depends what 'involvement' is. Knox's DNA was not in Meredith's room. It seems that the hallway was cleaned. Perhaps Knox's involvement was limited to the hallway? However, I can't see that you'd prove it.

I think, it's just as likely that Knox returns to the flat, doesn't turn on the lights. Perhaps she treads in some of the still wet bloody footprints that Guede made, not realising that it's not just that the floor's a bit damp. At some point she sleeps, takes a shower (not necessarily in that order). At some point Sollecito joins her. They realise with the lights on that the hall is a mess and needs a clean. By which point Knox and Sollecito have both trodden in blood (which, will stay liquid for quite a few hours). Hours later the blood is mostly dried and brown (Guede's footprints needed to be identified with luminol remember). No alarm bells are ringing...

Note, the above paragraph was just entirely made up by me, and as far as I can tell is about as plausible as anything the prosecution came up with.

It just riles me that there are two people convicted on the basis of evidence that can easily be explained away, at least with respect to the two accused.

I used to deliver leaflets on some pretty rough estates. Your first thought on seeing a mostly dried pool of blood isn't "someone must have died" it's "someone's made a mess".
 
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