Amanda Knox, Political Prisoner

[SoDesuKa]

There was no real case against Amanda Knox. The prosecutor rounded up every anti-American stereotype he could think of, then threw them at her. Thus, she's in prison because she's an American. Somebody other than Senator Cantwell ought to be addressing this.

There was no motive, and no evidence placing her at the crime scene when the murder took place. Instead, the prosecutor invented some lurid fantasy of sex play gone wrong. There's no basis for any of this.

I don't know whether Perugia's chocolate makers have enough influence over American publishers to keep the anti-American aspect of this story under wraps. But anti-Americanism is clearly an aspect of this story. Amanda Knox could have been any of us. She was convicted because she's an American, and small town Europeans will believe almost anything negative about Americans.

[atreides1]

1. I don't know

Under US law she probably wouldn't have been charged! But she wasn't tried under US law.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

2. This movement makes the Free Mumia people look credible.

[maxsolomon]

3. Do Tell

1. What is the motive?
2. How many sane, female US college students on their overseas semester have murdered their roommates while trying to rape them?
3. How many sane female college students in the history of sane female college students on the entire planet have murdered their roommates trying to rape them?

The murder was transparently a failed rape attempt, and Amanda's coerced "lies" don't change the facts. May saner minds prevail in the Appeals process.

[pnwmom]

5. And her coerced confession wasn't allowed in the Courtroom, either.

Unfortunately, the jury wasn't sequestered so they were all tainted by media coverage over the year long trial.

[Silent3]

205. How many sane, female US college students on their overseas semester...

...have had their roommates found knifed to death in the apartment they share?

I don't have a strong feeling about this case one way or the other personally, but your probability-based argument is flawed. The circumstances of the death of the roommate greatly increase the odds of Knox's guilt far above the generalized odds of others who fit Knox's general demographics having committed such a crime.

[southernyankeebelle]

208. Very good point. This whole thing is terrible. What about the victim?

[JI7]

12. yup

[alcibiades_mystery]

29. +1

:rofl:

[BurtWorm]

94. I think you probably don't know what you're talking about.

You're probably unaware of the corruption--and insane paranoid conspiracy theorizing--of this prosecutor's office. This is not the first case these prosecutors have hallucinated their way through. Look up the Monster of Florence case. Same group of nuts fucking with justice.

PS: This isn't political injustice. This is tabloid injustice--what would happen if Nancy Grace had the power here these loons have there.

[seeinfweggos]

139. *with purchase of any mumia of equal or greater value

[devilgrrl]

221. I think she's guiltier than Mumia!

The little freak. Jesus! You can see right through her.

[lapfog_1]

4. I don't know if she did it or not, or goaded her companions into doing it

or even if she had nothing to do with it.

But she was convicted because she was involved with the men that DID do it (or took part in it).

Had she been tried here, she probably would have gone free.

[pnwmom]

7. She wasn't involved with the killer. And the boyfriend did NOT do it either.

He's a medical student who's just as much of a victim in this as Amanda.

There was only one killer, and she wasn't involved with him. Someone else in the apartment building was friends with him, and she'd had occasion to meet him there at parties attended by lots of people. That's not being "involved" with him.

Her real boyfriend wasn't involved any more than she was. The knife in his apartment didn't match the knife that made the cuts in the victim's neck, and didn't match the size or shape of the knife outlined in blood on the victim's sheets. And it had no blood on it that could be detected, even with luminol. There were a few cells on the tip that could have been the victims -- or could have been a lot of people's, because it only had a few allele's worth of DNA. Any process that eliminated all blood would have eliminated these cells, too, so these few cells were probably the result of contamination in the lab.

As far as the bra clasp is concerned, the BF's DNA was found on it -- and so was the DNA of three other unidentified persons. There was no DNA from the BF anywhere else on the woman's bra, or anywhere else in her room. And the bra clasp was only discovered after it had been kicked around the room on the floor for 46 days. There are photos of the police bagging evidence while wearing unchanged gloves, so the whole process was hopelessly contaminated. Again the BF's DNA and that of the three other persons can only be logically explained as the result of contamination, probably in the lab.

Except for the bra clasp, there wasn't one bit of DNA or other physical evidence from Amanda or her BF in Meredith's room -- even though they supposedly committed a drug induced murder of rage and rape in there. How could that be? IT COULDN'T! There was no way Amanda and the BF could somehow remove all their own DNA, fingerprints and footprints from that bloody room and leave only the third person's trail. That would be impossible!

There was all kinds of evidence in the room linking the third guy to the murder (the one with the friends who lived downstairs). He admitted having sex with Meredith, he had a criminal record, and he left his DNA, fingerprints, and footprints at the crime scene. And he broke a window from the outside to get in.

The only reason Amanda and the BF were indicted is because the prosecutor announced his suspects before the DNA of the third person was identified. Once it was, he just changed his theory of the case to add the third one in, rather than dropping the charges against Amanda and the BF. That's why so many say -- correctly -- that this is all about face saving, from the prosecutor's point of view.

[TorchTheWitch]

110. she admitted to knowing Guede

She would have to since there were phone calls between her and Guede after she turned her phone back on just after midnight the night of the murder. She also implicated her boss and Sollecito at different times and never implicated Guede.

You defend the collection and handling of the physical evidence concerning Guede but condemn it concerning Knox and Sollecito when all of it came from the same scene by the same police and handled the same way.

You've been all over the threads on this case making all manner of exuses about it not one of which is ever backed up by a single source, and when confronted with any conflicting info particularly when backed by a source or many sources you never even attempt to refute it or just give some absurd remark that has nothing to do with anything. But it would look pretty foolish to use Friends of Amanda as your source for info, now wouldn't it?

[FunkyLeprechaun]

217. Raffaelle is not a medical student

I am in the UK and I am siding with the Italian courts on this. I think all of them did it and they killed her under the influence of drugs.

She kept changing her story and framed a bar owner (who is now suing her for defamation).

I find it strange that people here are defending her.

[Joe Chi Minh]

44. If you're in a car with a man who, unbeknownst to you, leaves you for a while to rob a bank

and or to kill someone, in the US, the innocent passenger is implicated totally with the perp and dealt by the law in just the same way; found just as guilty. There were no innocent parties in that business but the poor victim.

[sinkingfeeling]

6. Come on, her only alibi was that of the other charged killer and was so confused by the drugs that

they couldn't even keep it straight. Her entire defense was based on DNA evidence contamination. And she initially lied about a pub owner being with the roommate.

[pnwmom]

9. Please read my post 7, above.

And explain to me how the two drug-enraged killers somehow managed to remove all of their DNA, footprints, and fingerprints (except for on the bra clasp) in the room full of blood, while leaving only the 3rd person's trail (and DNA in and on the victim) to be found by the police?

And tell me why the police haven't gone after the identities of the three other persons with DNA on the bra clasp (no, I'll tell you -- because it was obviously contamination).

Amanda didn't initially lie about the pub owner; initially she said nothing about him. But, in the course of more than 50 hours of questioning, the police insisted that she was lying, that she hadn't been in the BF's apartment during the murder, that they had PROOF that she'd been in her apartment. Finally, exhausted and no longer trusting her own memory, and asked by the police whether the pub owner had been there, she said that maybe she had seen him, like in a dream. A few hours later she retracted that statement and returned to her original statement that she had been at the BF's and didn't know anything about the pub owner.

The higher level court EXCLUDED the dream-statement from the evidence because of the way it was obtained, but that didn't keep it out of the media, and it didn't keep people like you and probably members of the jury from being influenced by it.

[JI7]

14. yes, she decided to blame him after she was caught having lied about where she was

others said they saw her at the home and she decided to blame an innocent black man.

[pnwmom]

19. No, she told the truth about where she was. There were no witnesses then

who put her at the murder scene -- that was a lie by the police. And the police were the ones who first brought up the pub owner to HER. She didn't decide to blame an innocent black man -- she broke down after being harangued by the police; and a few hours later, she withdrew the statement -- much to the chagrin of the police, who thought they'd gotten their black guy.

[sabrina 1]

56. She wrote a long document without the police being anywhere

near her the following the day, accusing that innocent man of committing the crime. She contradicted herself as to where she was that night. She said she was at the house and heard everything. That written 'eyewitness' report was not coerced in any way and she had plenty of time to think about it before she wrote it. No one asked her to write it, it was her choice. She is being sued by the victim for ruining his business, which she did.

She was also charged with falsely accusing someone of a major crime, and the extra year she got, was for that. Her verbal accusation was not admitted in court as she made it without an attorney present. But her voluntary written accusation was a different story.

She changed her story so often as to where she was that night, it's hard to remember what her final destination was. And she and her boyfriend contradicted each other too as to where they were.

She also ended up accusing her boyfriend of the murder in her 'prison diaries', making the claim that she fell asleep and he probably sneaked out, killed her roommate and then returned with the knife (which had her dna on it along with the victim's blood) and while she was sleeping, held her hand and put her fingerprints on it.

Please, this woman is not credible at all. I do feel sorry for her in a way though, as she seems to be a very disturbed individual.

Meantime, a beautiful young woman, her name is Meredith, is dead and her family will have to live with the nightmare memories of how she died forever. I notice that the defenders of this woman, Amanda, never, ever mention the victim at all.

[K8-EEE]

58. The perp is a pretty young girl and I really think that's why

People are "convinced" that she didn't do it even though her story is very dubious.

No guy (or ugly woman for that matter) with her ever-changing stories would inspire this kind of "sureness" about their innocence.

[sabrina 1]

63. Maybe you're right. I guess I didn't think of her as being

out of the ordinary, but then I'm not a guy lol! It could also be that her family has hired a PR team to keep as much of the real evidence against her away from the US media and looks like our crack reporters here, just read the memos they are given by the PR people. It didn't take long to find the facts though which I did after seeing the media coverage here and feeling like something was missing from the coverage. It's a habit now, to double check everything I see on the MSM.

She lied so much that any law enforcement agent who DIDN'T arrest her would have been guilty of a crime themselves. I don't know what role she played in the actual murder, but I do believe she participated in it. And it may be that they were all high or whatever, but it was gruesome, cruel and brutal killing of a very lovely girl. I feel so sad for her family. It is a real tragedy.

[SoDesuKa]

67. Dubious Story

Even if aspects of Knox's "story" are - in your words - dubious, it doesn't mean that she committed a murder. She may have simply used bad judgement in her account of what she knew. You are assuming that homicide suspects ought to act a certain way, and if their behavior differs markedly from your expectation, that shows their guilt. This is the kind of reasoning behind the Salem witch trials. Women accused of witchcraft often behaved at odds with preconceived notions of how they should have acted. In the minds of their tormentors, it proved their guilt.


Incidentally, there is a witchcraft angle to the Knox story. One theory is that Knox and Sollecito were members of some sect that practices human sacrifice. The theory would be harmless and irrelevant except that the person advancing it is a good friend of the prosecutor. That may be the reason for the theory that the crime was a sex party gone wrong.

[beac]

150. So, how do you explain

the FACT, proven in court by Knox's own mother's testimony, that Knox claimed that she had called the cops when she had not. She told both her mother AND her roommate that she had already called the cops, but the FACT is she NEVER called them and her boyfriend only did AFTER officers, from a different branch, unexpectedly showed up at her flat b/c the victim's cell phones had been found in a nearby garden. WHY claim she had called the cops when she hadn't? Why make a call to report a 'break-in' when policemen had already been at the house for 20 minutes?

People are making much of her fingerprints not being in Kercher's room, but her fingerprints weren't ANYWHERE in the whole apartment-- including her OWN ROOM, except for on one glass in the kitchen cupboard. WHO else would have been motivated to erase all traces of her presence there?

Her claim that she took a shower in a bathroom filled with bloody smears and streaks (one ten inches long!) but wasn't concerned b/c she just assumed someone "was having their period" just isn't the slightest bit credible.

These are just a few of the things that have not been discussed in the US media that throw cold water on the idea she was "railroaded."

Her family hired a high-priced PR firm and they have certainly gotten their money's worth, but it doesn't make their daughter any less guilty.

Since you seem to have loaded up on '48 Hours' and Seattle-based press coverage, why not visit these sites and see why many of us have no problem understanding why she was convicted:

http://truejustice.org/ee/index.php
http://www.perugiamurderfile.org/

[BurtWorm]

97. If you know anything about the prosecutors, you'll doubt every case they make

Especially because they love conspiracy theories. They love the Satanic cult angle. They are power-crazy lunatics.

[CTyankee]

180. Do we have any other evidence of Amanda being "disturbed"?

I mean, was anything discovered about her mental/emotional state such as: history of torturing animals, history of acting out in school, what anti-psychosis drugs she may be or was taking. In short, is there ANY evidence that this young woman would all of a sudden turn into a vicious killer? Is there any evidence to support the supposition that the drugs/alcohol she was consuming could have made an otherwise sane young woman go suddenly insane?

I am talking about hard evidence that even SUGGESTS, much less proves, her capability to commit such a hideous crime?

[beac]

186. "He was such a nice man." "She was a quiet churchgoer." "They were a nice young couple."

History is FULL of people whom "no one would have ever expected" to be murderers.

[CTyankee]

195. True, there ARE some compulsive psychopathic killers.

Amanda's young age works against that profile, tho. Perhaps the closest to it would be the Columbine shooters but they, too, had a different profile, since gun violence in high schools/colleges were almost exclusively committed by white male adolescents. It doesn't seem to fit Amanda Knox. If she IS really a psychopathic killer then was there any evidence to suggest that revealed at her trial? Was psychological testing even done on her pre-trial?

[beac]

199. There was a psych evaluation by an 'expert witness' called by the defense.

He interviewed her in the Spring of 2008, long after the murder. I don't believe there was any other psychological testing done at the time of the murder or after.

The defense expert was put on the stand to support the theory that Knox's ever-changing stories about where she was and what she did were the result of stress.

Knox's defenders like to claim she was interrogated for 14 hours, but the fact is that she was on the phone with her roommate at 10:45pm, turning cartwheels at 11pm and a suspect by 1:45am (at which time her 'witness' interview was halted b/c she was now a suspect and had no lawyer.)

Since she started lying LONG before she was ever questioned (lied about calling the police, to her mother and roommate on the phone the day of the murder AND in an email sent out to friends/family two days later), I don't find the 'stress' defense credible. Her lies were proven in court by both her mother's and roommate's testimony AND phone records.

Good break-down of the lies about calling the police here: http://www.truejustice.org/ee/index.php?/tjmk/comments/why_defendants_mostly_dont_testify_those_devils_that_lurk_in_the_details/


It would be interesting to see how a psychiatrist without an agenda would evaluate her, but at this point I doubt either side would allow that.

[CTyankee]

200. Being caught in this blizzard of inconsistencies, Amanda seems to be

floundering. That COULD mean she was guilty and trying desperately to cover up or it could mean that she was very poorly representing herself in the courtroom. I wonder what her lawyer was advising her. I can see it both ways: guilty and covering up and not guilty but a lousy way of trying to keep herself from LOOKING guilty.

You can pick one and justify your own verdict, I can see that!

[beac]

201. For me, it's the lying on the day of the murder & in email, for no good reason I can think of, that

settles it.

All the lying later can be interpreted in differing ways depending on one's opinion of Knox, but I can't see any innocent reason she would repeatedly lie about having called the police. The fact that the postal police showed up without a call must have been a shock to Knox and Sollecito.

[CTyankee]

202. Could you clarify that for me? My eyes began to glaze over with all of the

barrage of calls, emails, and details in the link you gave me...it's all getting to be a blur (I am right in the middle of an art history exegesis on Piero della Francesco and my head is spinning!). Just a summary if you could (sorry I am so lame).

[beac]

204. I'll be happy to try and summarize it. You're not 'lame', just buried under the

mountain of information that exists about this case (most of which hasn't been covered in the US press, hence the ease with with some people have over-simplified the case against Knox.)

The 'short and dirty' of it, as it were, is that she called both her roommate and mother to report that something was amiss in the cottage and, during the course of those calls, claimed she had already called the police about it. She did the same in an email to family/friends. The fact is that she herself never made a call to the police and Sollecito only called about 25 minutes after the police had arrived at the flat and were already investigating the 'break-in' he was calling to 'report.'

Here's a blurb that covers some of this pre-interrogation lying:

At 12.34pm Amanda and Filomena again spoke on their phones. Filomena said, “We spoke to each other for the third time and she told me that the window in my room was broken and that my room was in a mess. At this point I asked her to call the police and she told me that she already had.”

The prosecution introduced records to show that Knox and Sollecito didn’t actually call the police until 12.51pm.

In her email to friends in Seattle on 4 November, Amanda Knox says she called Meredith’s phones after speaking to Filomena. Knox’s mobile phone records prove that this was untrue.

In the email, Amanda also claims that she called Filomena back three quarters of an hour later – after Raffaele finished calling the police at 12:55pm. But cellphone records show that Knox never ever called Filomena back at all.

Sollecito and Knox both claimed they had called the police before the postal police had turned up at the cottage and were waiting for them. Sollecito later admitted that this was not true, and that he had lied because he had believed Amanda Knox’s version of what had happened.

He said he went outside “to see if I could climb up to Meredith’s window” but could not. “I tried to force the door but couldn’t, and at that point I decided to call my sister for advice because she is a Carabinieri officer. She told me to dial 112 (the Italian emergency number) but at that moment the postal police arrived.

He added: “In my former statement I told you a load of rubbish because I believed Amanda’s version of what happened and did not think about the inconsistencies.” (The Times, 7 November, 2007).

The CCTV cameras in the car park record the arrival of the postal police at 12.25pm which corroborates Sollecito’s admission that he had spoken rubbish.

http://www.truejustice.org/ee/index.php?/tjmk/C197/

(And, yes I realize I may have re-buried you in this blurb. Oy.)

Another pre-interogation lie that I neglected to mention before is her claim that when she called both of Kercher's phones they “just kept ringing, no answer” when phone records revealed the calls lasted only 3 and 4 seconds each. When you are allegedly worried to death about someone, would you only give them 3 or 4 seconds to answer the call you were making to establish that they were alright? More importantly, who would describe a 3-4 second call as one that “just kept ringing, no answer”? (reference to this in court testimony in same link above.)

[CTyankee]

210. OK, thanks. That helps.

I appreciate your taking the time to do this...

[CTyankee]

212. OK, so WHO called the police? I mean, originally...nt

[beac]

213. The police showed up b/c they were investigating two phones that had been found in a local garden

earlier that morning (the garden of a house quite near Sollecito & Guede's repective apartments-- S&G lived about 100 meters apart.)

The person that found the phones called the police to report them and by noon, the police had traced one of the phones to the cottage (it was being used by Meredith, but was on-loan from her Italian roommate, Filomena.) The police thought they were there to return lost or stolen property. They were in for a shock too!

OK, I think that's it for me as far as grisly murder tonight. Off to pour myself a nice big bicchiere del vino!

(Of course, feel free to continue our dialog, if you like -- I just need to take a piccola pausa. :) )

Buona notte!

[beac]

206. Oh, and your art history topic blends right in too.

Did you get to see his 'Polyptych of Perugia' (aka 'Polyptych of St. Anthony) in the Galleria Nazionale when you were there?




Much nicer to think of Perugia as a city of art than a city of murder, non e vero?

[CTyankee]

211. Daverro! Si, l'ho visto e grazie molto !

Mi piace la predella sotto la pittura...

[CTyankee]

218. The tondo on the right is, I believe, St. Agatha with her breasts on a plate,

one of those grotesque religious themes you see so often in Italian Renaissance art. An amusing story: I was going through a little church in some Sicilian town. Our Italian art lecturer, who told us that since the old priest there could not speak English, proceeded to describe a panel depicting St. Agatha "with her tits on a plate," as she put it in her less than perfect English. With that the old priest, who had been slightly dozing in his chair, opened his eyes suddenly, sat up and asked the lecturer what she had said. The lecturer kept a straight face and said "Non posso."

[beac]

151. Actually, she NEVER withdrew her accusation of him and he was only freed after

another person came forward two weeks later (he was in another country) and gave Lumumba an airtight alibi.

Knox NEVER retracted her WRITTEN accusation that she made VOLUNTARILY as 'a gift' to the police on the day AFTER she originally made it orally.

http://www.truejustice.org/ee/index.php?/tjmk/comments/the_summations_patrick_lumumbas_lawyer_describes/

[maxsolomon]

"the drugs"?

she was high THE NIGHT BEFORE. and it was just THC, not PCP. jesus christos get real.

confessions or accusations made under duress aren't physical evidence. they are evidence of police misconduct.

[TorchTheWitch]

8. oh bullshit

I'm really getting tired of this nonsense.

[pnwmom]

10. This case reminds me of the Duke case, so I guess I'm not surprised at your response.

Another case of a rogue prosecutor influencing the media and people all too willing to go along with it.

[TorchTheWitch]

17. sorry, but I look at evidence

Both Knox and Sollecito lied, lied some more, and lied to cover up previous lies then in typical fashion of guilty people turned on each other. In any case I look at everything available. I think the prosecutor's sex game theory is idiodic and he's wackadoodle but that doesn't change all the lying those two did that they got caught out in nor the evidence that puts them at the scene they both sworn at first they were no where near at the time.

I also find it interesting that Knox in particular never points the finger at the guy whose DNA was in and on Meredith though she knew him and knew he was there. I don't personally believe that it was Knox who plunged the knife through Meredith's neck but she was there, she was in some way involved and she most certainly was involved in covering it up not just for herself but the two other guys.

I don't care about her nickname or how many guys she was screwing, and I don't even care about the knife. She was there. She was involved. She tried to cover up that she was there and involved. Guilty.

[pnwmom]

21. Yeah, you're so good at looking at the evidence. n/t

[TorchTheWitch]

30. a shit load better than you n/t

[sendero]

121. Your so good...

.... at ignoring everything that doesn't suit you. I not only think she is guilty, I think she would have easily been convicted in America based on the same evidence, most of which you are clearly not familiar with.

THE FACT THAT THE PROSECUTOR IS A WACK JOB IS NOT AN INDICATION OF HER INNOCENCE.

Innocent people don't lie over and over and over again, period.

[LisaL]

116. It doesn't resemble the Duke case whatsoever.

The accused there had consistent accounts of what they were doing.
Unlike the woman who accused them.

[demoleft]

47. agreed. n/t

[sabrina 1]

60. You and everyone else ~

I really feel for the family of the victim who have been so dignified throughout all of this, never saying anything that might influence the trial. And if anyone had the right to be angry, they surely did. They will not see their daughter again. Yet, they have acted with such restraint, even after seeing the behavior, the disrespect to their daughter's memory by some of these rabid defenders of the indefensible.

[Romulox]

11. It's worth noting that "motive" is not an element of any crime

(at least under the common law system, which I fully understand is not the system in place in Italy.)

Still, I see this mistake made so frequently, I wonder if some TV show is disseminating it--again, prosecutors (under our common law system) have no obligation to prove motive. Motive is most frequently a key element of police investigations, but not necessarily prosecution, where a related (but distinct!) concept "intent" must generally be proven.

[pnwmom]

13. No, but they have a requirement to prove the case, and this one had a big enough

hole to fly a 767 through.

Supposedly Amanda and her BF, along with the third convicted person, killed Meredith in a fit of drug induced rage. Then how did Amanda and her BF, in this druggy state, manage to eliminate every trace of their own fingerprints, footprints, and DNA from the blood covered room, while leaving only that belonging to the third person?

Please don't tell me about the bra clasp, picked up by the police after 46 days of being kicked around on the floor. It had the DNA of three other unidentified persons on it as well as the BF's, and the police isn't going after any of those people because the clasp was obviously contaminated in the lab.

[katmondoo]

15. Stay away from drugs or stay home

Americans always seem so arrogant in another country. They are away from home, away from parents and start to feel they can do whatever they wish. Amanda may or may not be guilty but she walked a thin line, did things she may not have done had she been home. Just how I feel, no evidence to say I am right or wrong.

[pnwmom]

24. It's nice to think Amanda wouldn't be in this trouble if she hadn't been a bad girl,

but it's just not true.

The police just looked for the nearest person to accuse -- and there she was. Her smoking some hash had little to do with it. The vibrator and condoms in her bathroom were enough to condemn her.

Do you think only nuns should go to Italy?

[tonysam]

16. Some people around here don't have all of the facts and apparently

swallow Rupert Murdoch's tabloid horse manure.

I came across a couple of blogs in support of Knox which have all kinds of good information on the case:

Perugia Shock

The Ridiculous Case Against Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito

The second blog has a lot of video reports from various sources.

[TorchTheWitch]

31. blogs in support of Knox

is supposed to be a wellspring of truthful unbiased info?
:rofl:

[JI7]

18. how about the Italian who was convicted in the case ? are italians anti italian ? do they also hate

black people since another one convicted was black ?

[tonysam]

20. Let's quit with this nonsense. The REAL reason both were arrested, tried, and convicted

was to cover police misconduct. That is pretty clear once Guede was found.

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to know Amanda and Raffaele are innocent. I want BOTH of them out of prison as soon as possible.

There is nobody reputable who thinks they did it. Only the corrupt Italian officials and the European tabloids.

[JI7]

22. so why are her supporters trying to make it into some anti american thing

if you think her boyfriend who is also Italian is innocent.

[TorchTheWitch]

109. then why aren't you defending Guede?

If you're going to insist there was all this police misconduct and contamination of physical evidence how is it that Guede is not also determined by you to be just as much the innocent little lamb you believe Knox and Sollecito to be? How do you defend the conduct of the police and collection and handling of the physical evidence of Guede while condeming it when it concerns Knox and Sollecito?

Good luck with that.

[pnwmom]

23. He was probably convicted because he'd hung out with the "American slut."

So he was hurt by anti-Americanism as well.

[JI7]

25. so why no sympathy for him ? why demand only Knox be freed ?

is it anti italian on the part of those demanding for Knox to be released ?

[pnwmom]

26. Who said only Knox should be freed? Not me. I'm sure in Italy his family

is working just as hard to free him as hers is to free her. But their cases go along together -- when one is freed, the other will be, too.

[alcibiades_mystery]

27. She was convicted because she murdered her roommate

This thread is an insult to actual political prisoners the world over.

[TorchTheWitch]

35. yes indeed

Amazing how of all 4 people arrested and interrogated she is apparently the only one interrogated harshly and even tortured. The people that believe that nonsense have never questioned why that would be.

Had this happened in the US she would have likely been found guilty and likely gotten a harsher sentence.

[alcibiades_mystery]

41. With a 26 year sentence in Italy, she will likely be out by the time she's 35

I admire the more rational sentencing regime in Europe.

I have yet to see even one of the pro-Knox posters explain why Meredith Kercher's family would very openly consider Ms. Knox guilty if all the evidence so "obviously" was insufficient. Presumably, they would have an incentive to see the actual murderer and only the actual murderer punished, and any supposed "anti-Americanism" would be less of a factor, given their English background. And yet, they seem utterly convinced - not one of them speaking anything but favorably of the verdict. They are also, in any case, the only group in this entire affair to have conducted themselves with any dignity. They are also - outside Mr. Lumumba - the only wronged party in the entire mess.

[TorchTheWitch]

137. I've yet to see a single pro-Knox poster explain ANYTHING

Particularly the very vocal ones who don't know jack-shit about the case and get all their info from Friends of Amanda or their own butt. And they sure have a stunning array of excuses that are so absurd they're laughable.

What I don't get is why the rabid defense of the indefensible? For what reason would anyone want to defend her without even looking at the evidence? That seems to happen a lot here with various cases where people just see a few anecdotes about a particular case and are absolutely certain of guilt or innocence without bothering to look into any of the facts of the case at all.

[sabrina 1]

57. Agreed, it is a disgrace the way this trial has been mis-represented

in this country. These supporters of this woman have done not only her, but America which is just beginning to recover from what Bush did to it internationally, but the US an immense amount of harm. I was shocked when I started reading about their antics. If I were any politician in this country, I would stay far away from the mob that has formed in support of this woman. They are pretty scary to be honest.

[SoDesuKa]

62. Actual Political Prisoners

Amanda Knox was convicted because of anti-American stereotyping. There may be some truth in the things Europeans believe about Americans - that we are out of control and indifferent to other people's lives - but that doesn't mean that Knox is guilty. Knox is an American, and Europeans believe some far-fetched things about Americans, but that's as far as it goes.

Knox is not the less of a political prisoner because prosecutors deny the political motivation in the way the case was presented. Mignini built Knox up to be an insatiable she-wolf, constantly seeking greater kicks to maintain her debauched life style. Curiously, another DU poster cited Knox's alleged debauchery as evidence of her guilt.

What small minds these Europeans have. If you expect justice outside the United States, stay out of Italy. Italian jurors are easily swayed by fanciful arguments, the more preposterous the better.

[alcibiades_mystery]

82. That's absolute nonsense

You've been conned by a very slick public relations campaign. Ms. Knox is guilty as all get-out. Her family should be happy that Europe has sensible sentencing guidelines and Ms. Knox will be out by the time she's 35, quite likely.

[Violet_Crumble]

83. 'What small minds these Europeans have. ' - Way to go with the nasty stereotyping!!

'If you expect justice outside the United States, stay out of Italy.'


Being in the position of not being an American or a European, I think there's far more in the way of justice from most European countries than I would from the US, where I'd only be confident of things going well for me if I was incredibly wealthy, and where I'd also have to worry about the death penalty....

[JuniperLea]

95. Oh the irony...

Of accusing Europeans of stereotyping Americans as you stereotype Europeans!

I know plenty of Europeans and none of them feel that way about Americans... you must have been reading those bought and paid for news stories fed to American journalists... and sadder still, you believed them.

[WilmywoodNCparalegal]

98. yeah, right, we're just a bunch of imbeciles

as opposed to juries in the U.S.

yeah, right :sarcasm:


Disclaimer: I am an Italian citizen and legal permanent resident of the U.S.

[SoDesuKa]

101. Junk Justice

I apologize for implying that all Italian justice is junk justice, but this case certainly was. The prosecutor made no attempt to preserve the jury's impartiality; in fact he went out of his way to prejudice them against the defendants. That's junk justice no matter where it happens.

This conviction is nothing to brag about, and I hope that's not what you are doing. Is trial-by-tabloid common in Italy? It happens here too, but we don't brag about it.

[devilgrrl]

28. I couldn't give a rat's ass about this case.

:boring:

She should thank her lucky stars that this didn't happen to her in North Korea or something.

[WI_DEM]

32. Maybe she did do it and maybe she didn't. I know there are lots of

things she said in the days afterward that are questionable including accusing somebody else of doing it.

[TorchTheWitch]

36. and then she pointed the finger at Sollecito when that didn't work out for her

and after he turned on her.

[grassfed]

33. guilty

http://missrepresented.net/blog/

[juno jones]

34. What do these two lurid cases have in common between them?

Besides graphic crimes tinged with twisted puerinency- oh, and a couple of americans in Italy?

How about the rantings of a religious 'psychic' who sees the devil behind everything? And the same proscecutor as well.


Masonic theory that put Knox in the dock

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/masonic-theory-that-put-knox-in-the-dock-981759.html

The last place you would look for such sources, however, is in a conspiracy theorist’s blog. Yet that is where the theory of the sacrificial rite finds its fullest expression. In a blog posted last August, Gabriella Carlizzi, a prolific Roman blogger, claimed that Meredith’s murder had been ordered by the dark masters of an esoteric Masonic sect, the Order of the Red Rose, to which she thinks both Meredith and Amanda may have belonged.

“This is just my personal opinion,” she begins modestly, “and it may have no value to the investigators, but my research in America and England has reinforced my idea that this case must be interpreted from an esoteric point of view.”

Meredith and Amanda went to two universities, Leeds and Seattle, which “have become recruitment bases for Masonic orders, both deviant and non-deviant, and of Esoteric Schools,” she claims. These Schools brainwash their initiates into believing that it is right to offer “even the sacrifice of their own lives in a secret ritual, sacrifices often made voluntarily”.

...

The similarities between the “human sacrifice” blog and Mr Mignini’s account might be considered a coincidence, except for the fact that Ms Carlizzi and the prosecutor know each other well. Ms Carlizzi has been giving unsolicited advice to criminal investigations up and down Italy for many years. The wealthy Roman wife of an architect, and a devout Christian, she was for years the disciple of a charismatic priest called Padre Gabriele. Gabriele died in 1984, and she claims has been sending her messages from the other side. “It’s he who lights me up with intuitions,” she explained to Corriere della Sera. “Then I investigate, I dig. And when I have concrete elements I go to the judges.”

No crime is too ghastly or notorious for her. Single-handedly, for example, she has succeeded in re-opening the Monster of Florence investigation, which lay dormant for years.

The Monster of Florence

http://www.prestonchild.com/solonovels/preston/monsterofflorence/

Amazon Best of the Month, June 2008: When author Douglas Preston moved his family to Florence he never expected he would soon become obsessed and entwined in a horrific crime story whose true-life details rivaled the plots of his own bestselling thrillers. While researching his next book, Preston met Mario Spezi, an Italian journalist who told him about the Monster of Florence, Italy's answer to Jack the Ripper, a terror who stalked lovers' lanes in the Italian countryside. The killer would strike at the most intimate time, leaving mutilated corpses in his bloody wake over a period from 1968 to 1985. One of these crimes had taken place in an olive grove on the property of Preston's new home. That was enough for him to join "Monsterologist" Spezi on a quest to name the killer, or killers, and bring closure to these unsolved crimes. Local theories and accusations flourished: the killer was a cuckolded husband; a local aristocrat; a physician or butcher, someone well-versed with knives; a satanic cult. Thomas Harris even dipped into "Monster" lore for some of Hannibal Lecter's more Grand Guignol moments in Hannibal. Add to this a paranoid police force more concerned with saving face and naming a suspect (any suspect) than with assessing the often conflicting evidence on hand, and an unbelievable twist that finds both authors charged with obstructing justice, with Spezi jailed on suspicion of being the Monster himself. The Monster of Florence is split into two sections: the first half is Spezi's story, with the latter bringing in Preston's updated involvement on the case. Together these two parts create a dark and fascinating descent into a landscape of horror that deserves to be shelved between In Cold Blood and Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. --Brad Thomas Parsons

Today interview with Douglas Preston.

http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/26184891/vp/34105647#34105647

His interview begins about 7:29.

This case is probably not as open and shut as some would like to believe.

[grassfed]

37. Italy is not third world

The country is far more sophisticated and modern, at all income levels, than most of the US even in Italy's outlying regions from which I just returned.

http://missrepresented.net/blog

[juno jones]

93. Well they still seem to suffer from a tabloid press.

Not that we don't. Thanks, Murdoch.

And these two, prosecutor and spiritual warrior have established a pattern of such things.


And what I find chilling is that it could easily happen here in the right circumstances. So no, I don't find the Italians less sophisticated at all. That would be foolish. After all Europe is where the history comes from (according to Eddie Izzard :) )

PS: The whole thing stinks. I think Knox's probably involved in this murder and the prosecution is crooked as well. The weird occult thing bugs me tho. Especially the involvement of this particular woman. She holds some pretty retrograde religious beliefs much on the same lines as Sarah Palin's prayer warrior bunch. Italian officials are using her opinions to build their cases. Thats what bugs me about it.

[dflprincess]

51. And isn't the prosecutor under indictment or being investigated for misconduct?

I thought I heard that on "48 Hours" the other night and that he could be facing jail time himself.

He seems to be obsessed with finding "satanic ritual" as a motive for crimes.

[juno jones]

92. Yep.

I started poking into this a little last night. I hadn't paid attention to this trial before, it just seemed like a 'missing white girl' item, but I happened to hear about the 'occult angle' and, having read 'Monster of Florence' last summer, something sort of tripped in my head regarding the similarities. I go poking around at some other sites and whattya know, here's all these not-so-weird coinkydinks that aren't being discussed.

For example here's a bit of background I stumbled upon.

Luther Blissett.

Luther Blissett is not a real person. Luther Blissett is a mostly European anonymus collective. In the late 90's they played an eleborate prank in central Italy.
(From a wiki article: )

Luther Blissett's most complex prank was played by dozens of people in Latium, central Italy, in 1997. It lasted a year, involving black masses, satanism, Christian witch-hunters in the backwoods of Viterbo and so on. The local and national media bought everything with no fact-checking at all, politicians jumped on the bandwagon of moral panic, there was even video footage of a (rather clumsy) satanic ritual abuse being broadcast on national TV, until Luther Blissett claimed responsibility for the whole racket and produced a huge mass of evidence. Blissett activists called this "homoepathic counter-information": by injecting a calculated dose of falsehood in the media, they meant to show the unprofessionality of most reporters and the groundlessness of moral panic. The hoax was praised and analyzed by scholars and media experts, and became a case study in several academic texts<13>.

There's a lot there. I'm doing some more research on this and am thinking of posting an article for sh*ts and g*ggles. Knox seems to be a little weird herself, and who knows maybe it was a fair cop, but certain Italians seem to be riding social sentiment and a lazy tabloid media for attention, money and power. They certainly are displaying a very particular MO and a fondness for repeating it with americans who speak little Italian.

[beac]

148. No, he isn't. The charges were regarding some procedural issues and were THROWN OUT.

The person who accused him has appealed the decision and that is the ONLY reason there is still any court case pending at all.

The '48 Hours' piece was RIDDLED with inaccuracies and pro-Knox bias.

Please visit these sites to learn more about the case:

http://www.perugiamurderfile.org/

http://truejustice.org

The thing that makes me convinced of their guilt above all else is the FACT, proven in court by Knox's own mother's testimony, that Knox claimed that she had called the cops when she had not. She told both her mother AND her roommate that she had already called the cops, but the FACT is she NEVER called them and her boyfriend only did AFTER officers, from a different branch, unexpectedly showed up at her flat b/c the victim's cell phones had been found in a nearby garden. WHY claim she had called the cops when she hadn't? Why make a call to report a 'break-in' when policemen had already been at the house for 20 minutes?

People are making much of her fingerprints not being in Kercher's room, but her fingerprints weren't ANYWHERE in the whole apartment-- including her OWN ROOM, except for on one glass in the kitchen cupboard. WHO else would have been motivated to erase all traces of her presence there?

Her claim that she took a shower in a bathroom filled with bloody smears and streaks (one ten inches long!) but wasn't concerned b/c she just assumed someone "was having their period" just isn't the slightest bit credible.

These are just a few of the things that have not been discussed in the US media that throw cold water on the idea she was "railroaded."

Her family hired a high-priced PR firm and they have certainly gotten their money's worth, but it doesn't make their daughter any less guilty.

[beac]

149. You should read this article about the 'Monster of Florence'

angle and perhaps take a second look at Preston and Spezzi (who is himself under indictment, FYI):

http://truejustice.org/ee/index.php?/tjmk/comments/hopes_of_pr_campaign_dashed_that_prosecutor_mignini_would_soon_leave_the_ca/

Actually, there seem to be no parallels whatsoever between the Florence and Perugia cases. For example Amanda Knox was interrogated only for two rather short periods - and Mr Mignini was not even present at the first of them.

And Mr Mignini was quite tangential to the Monster of Florence case. He was actually investigating a drowning to the west of Perugia. And when Preston and his partner interfered in Mr Mignini’s case in a particularly harebrained manner, a sharp response was inevitable.

http://truejustice.org/ee/index.php?/tjmk/comments/prosecutor_mignini_offers_some_helpful_advice_to_a_factually_challenged_rep/

[Thickasabrick]

38. What about the bleach and cleaning supplies? She told police she

was at her boyfriends sleeping when eyewitnesses put her at at market at 7:45 buying cleaning supplies. The crime scene was cleaned up somewhat prior to the police arriving.

She may not have done it - I don't know. But her story still has numerous inconsistencies...she's changed it 6 times.

The victim's family after hearing the evidence feel that she was rightfully convicted...who am I to argue with them?

[Liquorice]

40. The crime scene was not cleaned up. The man who raped and murdered

Meredith, Rudy Guede, had his DNA all over the place. There was no clean-up whatsoever.

[sabrina 1]

66. His DNA was not 'allover the place'. It was found in specific

places, the bathroom an in four places in the bedroom where Meredith's body was moved AFTER she was killed. That is the reason why Amanda Knox's DNA was found mixed with Meridith's blood, elsewhere, a bloody footprint in the hall eg (and it was cleaned up). These are the little details left out by Amanda's supporters. They scream about her DNA not being in the bedroom, therefore she could not be guilty. It was established pretty conclusively by pretty solid evidence, that the victim was NOT killed in the bedroom. This is why people have to look for themselves whenever our MSM reports on anything, which I thought we all knew by now.


Both Amand and her boyfriend were outside the house the following morning with a bucket and mop btw, surprised by the arrival of the police who they had NOT CALLED, despite Amanda telling her mother someone had been in the house, that that there was blood in the bathroom, and that her roommate's door was locked. Her mother TOLD her to call the police. She lied to her mother saying she had called them.

Her cell phone records show that too was a lie, does this woman EVER tell the truth, and she only called them AFTER they arrrived unexpectedly, to return Meredith's cell phones, which had been thrown away, presumably by the killer(s).

Both her and her boyfriend's cell phones were turned off at exactly the same time the night of the murder and turned on the following morning at exactly the same time. His computer was not used on the night of the murder, despite both Amanda and him, claiming to have been watching movies on it, or downloading cartoons etc. They forgot obviously that these things are easily checked out.

There is a ton of evidence against them. It is a wasted effort to try to pretend there is not. And while the prosecutor appears to be a problem himself, and imo, should probably have been removed from the case, nothing he said was needed to convict them. They themselves provided all that was needed for a conviction.

[TorchTheWitch]

42. It was Sollecito who bought the bleach

at 8:30am and again bought bleach at the same place 45 minutes later at a shop near his house when he told police he didn't wake up until 10am or 11am. Amanda may have been with him at the time of the two purchases... that I don't know.

She implicated her boss and when that didn't work implicated Sollecito when he turned on her implicating her. Interestingly, neither one of them ever implicate Rudy who's DNA and prints were in Meredith's room and on and in Meredith. That makes sense for Sollecito since he always maintained he was at his own house all night until he woke at 10am or 11am (which is proven to be false). Knox, however, does admit in some of her many stories that she was there but never implicates Rudy though she did admit she knew him (although she would have to admit to knowing him with the phone calls the police knew occurred between Rudy and her).

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article2894139.ece
Police said that further evidence against Mr Sollecito had come to light in the form of receipts from a shop near his flat for bleach, bought on the morning after the murder and allegedly used to clean an 8in kitchen knife and Mr Sollecito’s Nike trainers. The first receipt was timed at 8.30am on November 2, and the second 45 minutes later, suggesting that the first container of bleach had not been sufficient. The bleach was also used to clean up the flat itself.

Tests have shown Ms Kercher’s DNA on the tip of the knife and Ms Knox’s DNA close to the handle. Police suspect that Mr Sollecito and Ms Knox attempted to clean the knife, failing to realise that they would still leave identifiable DNA traces.

The till receipts call into question Mr Sollecito’s account of events on November 2, since he had testified that he did not get up until 10am, when he was woken by Ms Knox.

[Thickasabrick]

46. Thanks - I was going from something else I read and it's interesting

how stories change as they are told repeatedly. Somewhere I have read that people identified her at a market and perhaps she may have been with him.

Either way - the inconsistencies are what hurt her.

[TorchTheWitch]

103. Exactly - it's her own attempts at covering up that sink her

There weren't just inconsistancies in her many stories, her many stories changed wildly from not being there at all the entire night to being there with her boss who killed Meredith to claiming to not know where she was or who she was with and implicating her ex-boyfriend... all of which are attempts to explain her previous lies and the evidence against her as it came up.

She may have been with Sollecito when he went twice to buy bleach and it's likely that she was... she didn't seem to go anywhere without him from the night of the murder until she was arrested four days after the body was found. There was another story of her being seen shopping for lingerie with Sollecito the day after the body was found and laughing and joking with him... hardly behavior of one whose house had supposedly been broken into and her roommate and friend found in it brutally murdered. Her own friends remarked on her odd behavior.

Had this incident happened in the US there's no doubt in my mind at all that she would have been found guilty and gotten a harsher sentence. And the tabloid foder would have been just as looney.

[walldude]

39. You state all this like it's fact..

yet I have read that her DNA was on the murder weapon along with the blood of the victim, and that she admitted that she was there. If that is true it sounds like guilt to me. It may not be true but the statement that there is no evidence against her seems like you are ignoring certain aspects of this.

[SoDesuKa]

80. Sounds Like Guilt

You have a fairly low standard for guilt in a murder case. The DNA found on what was offered as the murder weapon was inconclusive - it didn't rule her out but there wasn't enough to say that this small sample came from her and from nobody else. In most circumstances, this is called "reaching."

Knox was convicted because jurors believed Mignini's smutty fantasy about her drug use and her lovers. Since she was a bad girl, and there was an unsolved murder, why then, she must have been the one that did it! This is not good reasoning, in my opinion. It's way too convenient, and depends on heroic leaps of logic.

[TorchTheWitch]

104. you're assuming that

It's more likely the jury discounted the smutty fantasy Mignini's theory was based on and went with the evidence. Without the alleged murder weapon at all there still a piss load of other evidence along with her own mountain of lies that is plenty enough to convict by any jury's standard.

[Joe Chi Minh]

43. The circumstantial evidence alone could scarcely be more compelling. "'Lurid fantasy"? Knox and

Sollecito were debauched drug-addicts - prime suspects for such a crime. Living so closely, it was almost "en famille" - another preponderant feature of murders. Many of the worst, most insane crimes are committed under the influence of drugs. Why did they lie and change their stories? What did they have to hide?

As for the questions raised concerning the forensic evidence, how often is there no basis for any such questions to be raised? Who does it all point to, if not to them? If it was cherry-picked, then why did they not point to evidence that would exculpate them?

Doing cartwheels in the police station, kissing and cuddling with Sollecito outside the building, while Meredith's bloodied corpse was still in the building, as witnessed by a neighbour, and the rest of Knox's grossly inappropriate demeanour, are not, as one sick journalist averred, merely gauche. It wasn't eating with your elbows on the table.

On the contrary, it suggested a lack of empthy so absolute that, in other circumstances, it would have been comical. It all suggests a serious, untreatable, psychological disorder. I'm sure most people would have been unable to suppress a little laugh of incredulity when they read about the cartwheels, it was so preposterously "off the scale". To do it in ANY circumstances!

This all reminds me of the Beverley Allit case. I thought only we Brits were sick enough and arrogant enough to defend the indefensible, as if we felt a weird, vicarious sense of entitlement, which because she was British, demanded that the moral order be suspended, so that the incriminating evidence against her, should be set aside, she should be deemed innocent and released.

Anti-Americanism would have had nothing to do with it. The world hates your State Department, CIA and military-industrial complex, but certainly not your people. How many Italian families have relatives in the US? A fair few, I would think. Europeans actually like most American people, whom they can distinguish quite clearly from their leaders.

[JPZenger]

45. NPR Analyst: Wouldn't Have Been Convicted in US

Silvia Purgoli (sp?) of NPR said that under the US legal standards, she would not have been convicted based upon proof beyond a reasonable doubt. She said it was all circumstantial evidence.

The defendent and her boyfried supposedly dug themselves into a hole with lies and stories that changed several times. I haven't studied the facts, but I wonder whether the defendent was trying to cover up for her boyfriend.

It is so rare for a young woman to be involved in a rape and murder with 2 other guys. I can't remember another case like this.

[sabrina 1]

68. Nonsense, with the evidence found against her

had it been here, the prosecutor would have asked for the death penalty. Clearly another US 'journalist' who hasn't bothered with the facts. Notice how little the victim is mentioned here in the coverage of this story. But had it happened here it would be the VICTIM who would be the focus of the media attention and Amanda would be condemned far more quickly here by Nancy Grace, just for her bizarre behavior after the crime, than she was in Italy. She should be glad it happened in Italy, they do not have the death penalty there.

This woman reminds me a lot of the woman who is on trial for killing her baby daughter, Casey I think was her name. The same, cold, uncaring attitude towards the victim. The same intense selfishness.

Amanda Knox showed so little empathy for the victim that one of the other roommates at the house was shocked when, right after the murder when they were all devastated by the tragedy, Amanda called her up and asked if they could still share the house. As if any of them would want to even go there again at that time.

Then there was the behavior of her family when they were in Italy. Her two sisters posing outside the house where the murder took place for a magazine article, as if it was a tourist attraction. That upset many people including the family of the victim naturally.

Interesting too that none of the other roommates had any problems with the police, none of them lied about where they were. I think there were seven others sharing the house, two other women and four men. All were able to account for their whereabouts on the night of the murder, all except Amanda and her boyfriend.

[Joe Chi Minh]

87. There was a woman who lived opposite, who heard Meredith's absolutely

horrifying, unearthly death-cry. It was so hair-raising that it didn't even seem human. And the woman can no longer sleep at night, as the sound of it haunts her, night and day.

[Joe Chi Minh]

86. Circumstantial evidence can be overwhelming. How about the lad who

was recorded on the phone telling his fancy woman they wouldn't have to wait much longer. That was one of the most, if not THE most damning evidence against him.

But there again, there was that weird and chilling character flaw. As you watched his nibs lolling in his seat, like the Sheik of Araby, next to his defence attorney, he looked for all the world as if he'd just emerged from a particularly thrilling and satisfying session in his harem. His quite senior looking brief looked positively nervous, in comparison. LARRY KING looked more nervous than his nibs! And he'd done more than a thousand show on air. The next day, when he appeared in court, he'd obviously been told to wise up. HOW to wise up.

[LisaL]

115. Oh give me a break.

"Reasonable doubt" isn't a concept written in stone.
There are plenty of people in US convicted on questionable/disputed/less than a 100 % convincing evidence.

[slampoet]

153. You admit you haven't studied the facts...so all the rest is you saying what people TOLD you to say.

[KT2000]

49. Good comment

I tried to put that together - her lack of empathy and inappropriate behavior indicating something seriously wrong with her- but it didn't come out as well as your statements.

[snagglepuss]

53. Well said.

:applause:

[SoDesuKa]

54. Debauched Drug Addicts

I'm not buying your Manson Family argument. Your accusation that Knox and Sollecito were debauched drug addicts suggests that you are reading things into their personalities. Your further comments about Knox's grossly inappropriate behavior is even more judgmental. Sounds like you think that Knox and Sollecito are the sort of people we were warned about as children.

I also am suspicious of the police statement that Knox did "cartwheels" at the police station. It's very self-serving of them to say that, because it suggests derangement. It's curious that this derangement is not reflected in her courtroom demeanor despite her awful experience. She seems calm and focused.

Anti-Americanism is a subtle but real aspect of the case. You would not expect the jurors to openly acknowledge it, would you? However, they were certainly exposed to local tabloids which represented Knox as oversexed and out of control. That's a familiar theme among America-bashers throughout the world, and it's the foundation of the prosecution case.

• Americans are hedonistic, reckless, out of control.
• Amanda Knox is an American.
• Amanda Knox is hedonistic, reckless, and out of control.
• Amanda Knox is guilty of murder.

Amanda Knox is in prison because of anti-American stereotypes. That makes her a political prisoner.

[sabrina 1]

69. There were witnesses to her doing cartwheels

in the police station. She did splits and cartwheels before she was questioned by the police. Please get at least SOME of your facts straight.

As for them being on drugs, blame Amanda for that, both she and her boyfriend admitted to being very high on drugs that night. In Italy btw, they could get a reduction in their sentencing if they committed the crime on drugs because they would be considered not as responsible as someone who was not on drugs. It helps if you know a little about the case and the culture, and the laws of a country you are trashing for no particular reason.

Are you at all familiar with Europe? From your post you seem to be very ignorant of the culture of Europeans. America is puritanical in its attitude towards sex compared to most Europeans, did you know that?

In Europe, a promiscuous sex life would hardly cause anyone to bat an eye so it's doubtful that the tabloid reporting of her sex life had any effect on the jury. A prosecutor trying to make it an issue, doesn't mean it WAS an issue.

As for the rest of your post, it really isn't worthy of comment. She was convicted because she was guilty and she got off lightly considering the depravity and brutality of the crime.

You are repeating the paid for talking points from the PR firm her family hired to try to distract from the facts. They thought that claiming Anti-Americanism would be a real winner. Maybe with Freepers. I'm afraid they underestimated the intelligence of the American people, and whatever they are being paid, they are not worth it.

And please, don't make a fool of yourself by comparing this woman to a political prisoner. That is an insult to those who have been imprisoned for political purposes. She is a convicted criminal, probably a very disturbed individual and I hope she gets some help while she is there. Italy has a very compassionate, compared to ours, approach to rehabilitating people. That's the best that can be hoped for for her at this point.

[K8-EEE]

71. Agreed Sabrina, "Political Prisoner" oh come ON....

That's bullshit, there's no political motivation involved on any side. I guess the guy is trying to say there's anti-American prejudice involved but I think if the English girl was in her shoes or an Italian girl for that matter with the same circumstances, they would get the same sentence.

[Joe Chi Minh]

89. You know and I know and everyone else knows that you are talking tripe.

Your response is too simplistic and creatively imaginative to warrant responses, but I'll point out certain things, nevertheless.

What about Sollecito? Are the Italians anti-Italian, too?

And yes, I judge her character on the evidence of her behaviour. And I call it as it appears. She and Sollecito were debauched, drug-addled (drugs are prone to make people reckless), and cold-blooded. You can have your own opinion, but not your own facts.

'Sounds like you think that Knox and Sollecito are the sort of people we were warned about as children.' I don't now about that, because drug-taking was very rare indeed, but re the debauchery yes. It was nothing like as bad in our day, but when my sister went to her Art college, on one or two occasions, because of a heavy smog and the consequent absence of buses, my sister hitch-hiked to the college. But not without my mother taking down the car's plate number. The psychos are bit more ingenious these day, and would probably carry false number-plates.

I had a mate in Australia who was physically fearless. Later in life, as a government lawyer, he prevented a Korean ship from leaving the port he exercised authority over, until the owner paid the crew, and was warned he would have a price put on his head by the owner. As a young speedway rider, when leaving the track for home, he found a group of scowling larrikins round his motorike, went back to the pits, and re-emerged with a motorbike chain in his mit. He said you may get me, but one of you will die first. They shambled off. The only time I ever heard him express fear, however, remotely, was when he told me that in his professional travels he had occasion to call at a house out in the wilds, where there were a lot of young people high on drugs having a party. He told me he didn't waste any time getting away. I guessed that he meant that they could act in a deranged way, but, in my naivety, it would never have occurred to me.

In the end, spiritual judgment is not ours to pronounce, although in extreme cases such as this, we don't have to close our minds to obvious truths. However, even when discussing legal cases, inevitably the moral dimension cannot but obtrude, and indeed underpin our assessments. Judge not that ye be not judged is not a command to abdicate our intelligence.

I'd be very surprised if future students in lodgings don't move out very quickly if they find their neighbours are debauched-seeming drug-addicts.

[SoDesuKa]

100. Reefer Madness

Oh, go on. You are carrying on about reefer madness as though smoking marijuana leads directly to debauchery. This is only one of the aspects of the trial that makes me believe that the prosecution was politically motivated. This wasn't about a homicide, it was about Perugia's drug problem.

I don't believe there's an association between pot-smoking and whatever it is you are calling debauchery. By your own words, you've indicated you have an agenda quite apart from the merits of the case against these defendants.

[Joe Chi Minh]

128. Well, these young people certanly didn't invent sex, but to have sex

with a stranger on a train seems to me a bit more than casual sex with friends and acquaintances, which is pretty normal today.

You think that kind of casual sex with strangers is OK? Sex doesn't fall within the purview of morality at all?

Love your infantile illustrations, by the way. But I'd humiliate myself like you are doing, if I were family or a paid PR man. Are you either?

But you didn't answer my question: are the Italians anti-Italian? Do Italians really have it in for Italians? Does it play into that nice fantasy Italians have about all Italian females being sluts? Or is it just in the bedroom, but not the kitchen? I think we should be told.

[KT2000]

48. Don't know if she did it

but there is something odd and inappropriate about Knox's behavior. Doing cartwheels at the police station? Sitting on her boyfriend's lap at the police station? Behaving childishly (laughing and joking) towards her boyfriend in court at the beginning of the trial. Wearing t-shirts with messages on them in court. When she addressed the jury she spoke in almost impersonal terms.
Why was she so "confused" that she blamed another person, confessed, changed her stories a few times?

[liberal_at_heart]

50. I don't think any of us have enough information to judge whether she is guilty or not

We have a mob and tabloid mentality in this country. We watch Nancy Grace and get two or three tidbits of information from our media and make a snap judgment on whether someone is guilty or innocent. We don't know whether Amanda Know is guilty or innocent anymore than we know if Casey Anthony is guilty or not. But we sure like to play detective and throw down our gavel like we do know.

[burning rain]

52. Any of us?

I doubt many of us would turn fucking cartwheels at the police station after a roommate's murder and confess to having been there and heard the screams if we hadn't.

[SoDesuKa]

55. Cartwheels

There were no independent witnesses to these alleged "cartwheels." It's very self-serving of the police to make this accusation, because it suggests derangement. However, this implied derangement was not evident from Knox's courtroom demeanor, which was calm and focused.

The important thing for cops anywhere - not just in Italy - is to get somebody to stand trial for a sensational crime. This is epecially true in an area as dependent as Perugia is on money coming in from outsiders - tourists, visitors to the chocolate festival, and students. Because unsolved murders are bad for the town's economy, these jurors - who weren't vetted for bias - were anxious to believe Mignini's lurid theory of the murder.

[burning rain]

61. Why then do Knox's family accept that she did cartwheels & try to explain it?

.

[JI7]

64. with different explanations

one moment they claim she was doing yoga and next moment they claim the police forced her to do the cartwheels.

[burning rain]

72. It never looks good when people can't get their story straight.

The one thing that really sticks from that, is that they admit she did cartwheels.

[Matariki]

131. I heard them quoted as "that's just Amanda being Amanda"

[sabrina 1]

74. What utter nonsense. Are you aware that her parents

tried to explain why she did cartwheels before the police even questioned her? If the police were lying, why didn't they say so rather than try to explain it away?

And what police officers do you know who just want to convict anyone just to get a conviction? The garbage being posted in this thread is embarrassing. The facts are available for anyone who cares to look them up and as more and more people, like me, do that, these insane theories being put forth by her supporters are beginning to look extremely foolish and are only making her look more guilty.

Explain if you can, where she was the night of the murder. That would be far more interesting than these silly theories with no basis in fact that are being thrown around. Where was she that night?

[SoDesuKa]

76. Cartwheels Indicate Guilt

It's well known that cartwheels indicate guilt, that's why defense lawyers advise their clients against them. And whatever you do, don't do a cartwheel in front of the jury. They'll find you guilty, bigger 'n shit.

You are really investing a lot of energy in this cartwheels thing. I don't know what you're getting at with this. Did she do cartwheels? Didn't she? You're insisting, "She did! She did!"

Because there was so little actual evidence in the case, defenders of the verdict have to resort to ambiguous circumstances like Knox's demeanor. What kind of legal standard is that? You know she's guilty because she did cartwheels? You must be a psychic.

[JI7]

77. you are the one who claimed the cartwheel thing didn't happen and was made up to hurt

knox.

and responses were to point out that her own family is not denying the cartwheels happened.

[SoDesuKa]

78. Mignini's Smutty Fantasy

Knox was convicted on the basis of Mignini's smutty fantasy about her drugs and her lovers. There wasn't much else for the jury to go on - certainly not the DNA found on what was offered as the murder weapon.

Who knows what sorts of behavior are appropriate when your roommate has been murdered and you are the prime suspect? Under the circumstances, I might do backflips myself. But cartwheels or backflips don't have any weight establishing guilt or innocence in a murder case. The most you can say is that given the same conditions you probably wouldn't have done backflips. And if the prosecutor is anxious for a conviction, he'll get you on wringing your hands. Or pulling at your hair.

This notion that cops and prosecutors don't go after innocent people is naive. That's the basis of all the protections we have in America, which they apparently don't have in Italy.

[JI7]

79. yeah, but in this case you accused the cops of making up the cartwheels

and it was pointed out to you that her own parents aren't denying it. and yet they offer different explanations for it. one moment saying she was doing yoga and next moment claiming the cops forced her to do it.

[SoDesuKa]

81. Backflips

The point about backflips or cartwheels or hopping in place is that the cops used them to suggest derangement - which is one of the issues of the case. It's disingenuous to say that defenders of the verdict haven't drawn the same conclusion about the backflips, cartwheels or hopping in place.

Even if there's no argument about whether these physical exercises took place at all, there's certainly an argument about their significance. I return to my original statement that it's self-serving of the cops to imply that Knox is nuts. If that's your argument as well, make it explicitly. Don't introduce it in a sneaky way.

[Joe Chi Minh]

91. Perhaps someone (or non-one) can confirm what I believe I read

in a newspaper and struck me very forcibly, namely, that Knox's mother said that even if she were guilty, she would stand by her. Can anyone confirm it, or is it my misremembering?

[devilgrrl]

59. Wasn't Scott Peterson convicted based on currcumstantial evidence?

Wasn't he lambasted by the media before and during the trial as much as Miss Knox?

[SoDesuKa]

65. Gary Condit

If Gary Condit had faced a zealous, grasping prosecutor like Mignini, he would certainly have been convicted. The jurors would watch ponderous discussions of his guilt on television, and would read salacious accounts of the murder in the local newspaper. Even with the presumption of innocence we have in America, there was almost nobody willing to entertain the thought that Condit was innocent.

Amanda Knox had the further disadvantage of feeding into vulgar fantasies about American college girls. Italian jurors wanted to believe that Knox's debauched American lifestyle was a gateway drug to the thrill of committing sexy homicide.

[sabrina 1]

73. No he would not have. Despite the media conviction of Gary

Condit, most people, were they on a jury, would not have convicted him without evidence. You have a very condescending attitude towards the intelligence of other people. Maybe YOU would convict someone based on tabloid journalism, or on a prosecutor's view of their morality, but most people are smarter than that.

This woman was convicted on very solid evidence. Tell me, where was she on the night of the murder?

[SoDesuKa]

75. Solid Evidence

You're missing the point. There wasn't any solid evidence against Knox, just some lurid speculation by the prosecutor. Other than the vulgar suggestion that Knox is a druggie and a slut, there really wasn't a theory of the crime.

The "hard" evidence amounts to a smidgen of Knox's DNA on what was offered as the murder weapon. Since Knox was not allowed her own experts to dispute the evidentiary value of that DNA, the jury depended on the bad girl theory; i.e., that drugged-up sluts will do anything for a kick.

It's outrageous that the jury convicted Knox without evidence. The fact that they obligingly believed the prosecutor's smutty fantasy shows that small town Italy is as politically backward as small town America.

[Miss_Represented]

84. Is Amanda Knox a political prisoner?

SoDesuKa wrote: "You're missing the point. There wasn't any solid evidence against Knox, just some lurid speculation by the prosecutor. Other than the vulgar suggestion that Knox is a druggie and a slut, there really wasn't a theory of the crime."

I have been following the Meredith Kercher case now for nearly two years and blogging about the psychology underpinning the case for over a year. Though it's great to see intelligent debate going on it's also a real shame to see statements like this which sadly have been particularly viral over the last few days.

The reason why there was only "smidgen" of Knox's DNA on the murder weapon is not really the issue here and it never really has been (though the presence of Knox's DNA is crucial). The police officers who conducted the search of Raffaele Sollecito's apartment noticed how shiny the knife was compared to all the others and suspected it had been thoroughly bleached which was why it was seized in the first place. The really important issue is the fact that the DNA expert Patricia Stefanoni found Meredith Kercher's DNA on the tip of the knife. This DNA was found on a knife in a drawer, in an apartment that Meredith had never been to.

Similarly, when Raffaele was confronted with this evidence he tried to explain by saying he'd once pricked Meredith's hand with the knife whilst cooking. Telling indeed.

The idea that a 'smutty' fantasy was all it took to convict Knox is beyond ridiculous. There were over 10,000 pages of evidence, witnesses and experts on footprints, DNA, blood and fibers involved in this case. Let's not forget Amanda and Raffaele are still the only people in Perugia without an alibi for the night of the murder. They don't even agree with each other!

This case is not about politics it's about the brutal murder of Meredith Kercher, her family have endured the indignity of seeing her corpse broadcast on national TV, her name and reputation slurred in magazines and on TV shows, some have gone so far as to to say there was no evidence of sexual assault and even that any sexual contact that did occur may have been consensual. Meredith never consented to any of the despicable acts that were inflicted on her that night.

Make no mistake. Amanda Knox is guilty of this crime and calling Italian people 'backward' because you don't agree with their fair and honest judgement is ethnocentric and ignorant to say the least.

[grassfed]

88. Welcome Miss_Represented!

Glad to see you here. I may be confusing your blog with another site but I seem to remember a post about the bleach bought by Raffaele when he claimed to have been sleeping. Did you post something about this? I have been told that the two bleach receipts were never introduced as evidence. Is this true?

[Miss_Represented]

90. Bleach Receipts

Hi Grassroots,

Yes you are absolutely correct those receipts weren't presented in court. I've visited the store in question as I stayed not far from where Raffele lived on Via Guiseppe Garibaldi when I visited Perugia over the summer. The store in question is a tiny little shop and I'm not sure they would have given a receipt even if bleach was purchased that morning. Though the shop owner claims to have seen Amanda in the store on the morning of the 7th nobody ever testified to having seen any bleach purchased that day. I believe Raffaele's cleaning lady testified at some point to there having been a bottle of bleach under the kitchen sink that she'd never used.

Luminol showed up blood footprints on the floor and droplets in both Laura and Filomena's bedrooms so some clean up seemed evident. Plus bra strap imprints in the pooled blood around Meredith's body indicate she lead on her side for some time, though her body was later found on it's back nearer the bed. Blood evidence suggests someone removed Meredith's bra after death and also moved her body. Raffaele's DNA was found on Meredith's bra strap.

The evidence for a clean up is suggested in the staging of the crime scene, cleaned up footprints and the movement of Meredith's body. All we know for sure is that whoever moved Meredith, it wasn't Rudy. He was seen by a number of witnesses in the Domus nightclub when Meredith's body was being moved back at the cottage.

Hope this helps.

[grassfed]

99. thanks...

I'll be following your blog.

[SoDesuKa]

102. Fair and Honest Judgement

No, I don't think the outcome reflects the fair and honest judgement of the six jurors who, I think, were bullied by the prosecutor's appeal to tabloid vulgarity. No matter what else you may say about the evidence, that aspect of the case remains troubling. OK, we understand that Mignini might be motivated to win. But in this country at least, we're leery of situations in which the prosecution wins ugly. And that certainly describes the character assassination Mignini did on Knox, making her guilty even before any evidence was presented.

What was all this about reefer madness and out-of-control sex orgies? You're saying that the case against Knox was very scientific and high-minded, but it clearly wasn't that. Mignini took the jurors right down into the gutter, and the prosecution case never rose significantly above that. I call it a political trial because of the focus on Knox's morals - an aspect of the culture clash between Americans and Europeans.
Do you really believe this outlandish story that the murder happened because the three of them - Guede, Knox and Sollecito - were sitting around passing a joint? One says to the others, "Hey, let's off your roommate." And the other two nod and say, "Hey, groovy."

[beac]

175. Welcome to DU, MissR!

I recently found your blog and have enjoyed reading your take on the case.

As for the OP, he has drunk long and deeply from the FOA Kool-Aid and just stops replying when he can't refute facts made that point to Knox's guilt. He prefers to run about the thread asking who has and has not smoked marijuana. :eyes:

[TorchTheWitch]

106. oh bullshit

It is absurd of you to claim that all the evidence the jury was given is the prosecutor's silly bad girl motive theory and the knife. The trial ran for 11 months and included 130 witnesses with a mountain of evidence including phone calls and receipts, bloody footprints and hand and finger prints, hair analysis, DNA and blood analysis, etc., etc. and here you are claiming that not only did the entire jury sleep through all the months of this presentation of evidence the ONLY thing they took any notice of was the prosecutor's silly bad girl theory and any tabloid nonsense they may have read.

Stop making yourself look ridiculous.

[sabrina 1]

70. Yes, I mentioned that last night. Scott Peterson was convicted

on less evidence than Amanda Knox was and he got the death penalty. When the evidence is circumstantial and there is no confession there should be never be a death penalty. But the media circus around that case, had so many people calling for blood, it was disgusting.

In her case, there was blood/dna evidence, and far more lies early on, not to mention bizarre behavior that he did not exhibit at all airc. I am very glad there is no death penalty in Italy. There is always a slight chance that a person convicted on circumstantial evidence might not be guilty. Aside from which I'm against the DP anyhow.

I think if Scott Peterson had been in Italy and his wife had been British, the people who are claiming Anti-Americanism, would be doing the same thing. Or maybe it's just that Amanda Knox's family hired a PR firm and they are doing their job by getting people, most of whom haven't bothered to look at the evidence which is obvious from the commenters in these threads, to defend her using 'anti-Americanism' as a hook.

[LisaL]

114. Yes.

And he is sitting on death row.

[DanTex]

85. You know what would be great?

How about an honest discussion of the evidence on both sides. It seems that the people who follow this case are split into two camps, one camp is positive Knox is innocent, and the other is positive she is guilty. I really have trouble believing anyone who can really be 100% convinced by second- and third-hand evidence available on the internet.

Take for example, the knife which supposedly has the victim's DNA on the blade. If that's legitimate, it's pretty damning. Predictably, the prosecution says the DNA is solid, while the defense says there's not enough DNA and it could have been contaminated. So what to make of this? I'm no expert on DNA contamination. I would think, though, that this is a scientific matter, and there's an objective way to determine the validity of this piece of evidence.

And how about Amanda falsely accusing her boss when she was first questioned? There's no excuse for that. Of course, it doesn't automatically mean she's guilty, but it definitely qualifies as "strange" behavior.

In fact, based on what little I know about the case, my impression is that she is probably innocent. There doesn't seem to be any motive, and the whole sex-game theory seems weird and far-fetched. But part of that may be cultural bias on my part. For all the talk of her lifestyle, she seems like a regular college student to me, and my first inclination is to not believe she would do something like this. But, unlike the jurors who found her guilty, I have seen zero first-hand evidence, so what do I know.

Well, I do know that Italy isn't Iran or North Korea, and to say she's a political prisoner is a dishonor to actual political prisoners who are tortured and sit for years in solitary confinement without the hope of ever speaking to a lawyer or having a trial by jury.

Remember that her Italian boyfriend is also in prison. Apparently (and correct me if I'm wrong) he comes from a relatively prominent family, who hired a big-shot defense lawyer. I don't know much about the Italian legal system, but I would guess that, like anywhere else, you get the justice you pay for, which would imply that the boyfriend got pretty good justice.

[JuniperLea]

96. In order to do that properly...

You would need access to court records. What most people are quoting are news releases that were fed to the American press by the family representative.

[SoDesuKa]

105. Honest Discussion of the Evidence

The "honest discussion of the evidence" is what's supposed to happen at trial. We know that this is not what happened.

One of the defenses offered for the verdict is that Knox didn't act the way an innocent person would. But that assumes that an innocent person would not fear Italian justice and would not dispose of evidence that might incriminate them. Mignini's reputation is relevant here. He appears to be a guy who goes all out to win and doesn't care what he has to do to accomplish that. Even before the police had collected any evidence at all, Mignini had Knox convicted as a slut and a drug addict. Yes, he won the case, but he won ugly. Even his supporters acknowledge that.

In order for the Italian justice system to claim that they avoided appeals to bias they would have had to have sequestered the jury away from the tabloids. They didn't do that. Unsurprisingly, the things we're hearing about Knox sound like standard anti-American slurs - reckless, out-of-control, self-indulgent.

What makes Amanda Knox a political prisoner is that she's caught up in the culture clash between the United States and Europe. We Americans don't disapprove of her lifestyle, but it's obvious that ordinary Italians wanted very much to punish her. Incidentally, we saw just the opposite in the Sacco-Vanzetti trial. They were found guilty, essentially, of violating American customs. Imagine - advocating anarchy! That simply isn't done in America.

[TorchTheWitch]

107. not all of us who believe she's guilty believe she weilded the knife

I happen to believe she's guilty because she was involved willingly and that it was either Sollecito or Guede who weilded the knife that made the killing thrust. I also believe she was glad that Meredith was killed and willingly went to the house specifically to participate in harm being done to her.

[SoDesuKa]

112. Belief States

You believe in Knox's guilt because you want to believe she's guilty, and you're willing to overlook the implausibilities inherent in that view. Did she do this because she was smoking pot with Guede and Sollecito? That's the theory of the crime as presented to the jury. Is this plausible? If you've smoked marijuana, is that the effect it had on you?

There's something else going on, something political. You are offended by Amanda Knox, and you want to see her punished. The prosecution's ace of trump was to present Knox as a slut and a druggie, and let the tabloids take it from there. What a low road to take. Yeah, he won, but he tainted the Italian court system.

Even in America there are many people in prison who are factually innocent, despite the greater number of safeguards than there are in Italy. When American jurors want to punish a defendant, they do so even if they have to disregard the evidence. Webster Thayer, the judge who presided over the Sacco and Vanzetti case, openly expressed his contempt for the defendants, calling them "anarchist bastards."

[TorchTheWitch]

125. don't put words in my mouth

Especially words that apply to YOU. You're the one who believes she's innocent because you WANT to. You WANT to believe she's an innocent little lamb railroaded because of some undefinable dark political objective laughably on par with Sacco and Vanzetti. You're the one that continually brings up the same convenient nonsense her parents' PR team has like her smoking pot (big fucking deal), cartwheels, and all the other stupidity from tabloids. You're the one so enamored with tabloid silliness that you actually accused the entire jury of sleeping through 130 witnesses in an 11 month trial and convicting her for no other reason than the prosecutor said she was a bad girl with a stupid nickname. CLEARLY you are the one taking the side you do not because of any actual facts or evidence but because you WANT to because it appeals to you're personal desire to make a simple murder case into some political nightmare you can gasp over.

I believe she's guilty because of the overwhelming evidence against her the same as I do in every case I look into because I DON'T CARE if the accused is innocent or guilty because I DON'T HAVE any personal reasons to turn a simple murder case into some political grandstanding. I looked at the evidence on BOTH sides and concluded her many outrageous stories that are all over the fucking map that included implicating both her boss and her "boyfriend" at different times solely for her own benefit and her total lack of empathy for the victim and lack of caring that her roommate was brutally murdered in the house where she herself lived absolutely points to her guilt not to mention the witnesses, phone calls, etc... all things you obviously have not paid one single moment's attention to.

Sacco/Vanzetti and Dreyfus... for fucks sake!

[GoneOffShore]

108. Have you drunk the FOA Kool-Aid?

She was convicted. You may not like the verdict, but it would appear not to be biased.

[SoDesuKa]

111. Much Lower Burden of Proof in Political Trials

The burden of proof in political trials is much lower than in criminal trials, even when the political trials are fronted as criminal trials. There are many examples throughout history, such as, for example, the Sacco and Vanzetti trial. They were found guilty of murdering a paymaster but they were nowhere near the scene. Their actual "crime" was that they were Italian immigrants and members of an anarchist society. Thousands marched in protest when Sacco and Vanzetti were executed, and many years later, Governor Dukakis apologized for the injustice to them.

The Dreyfus affair was another politically motivated criminal trial which gave short shrift to the actual evidence against the defendant. Alfred Dreyfus, a French military officer and a Jew, was accused of spying for Germany and promptly convicted. It was subsequently learned that Dreyfus had not been the source of the leak, but the French military suppressed the evidence against the real spy. Unlike the Italian newspapers in the Knox case, however, French newspapers played an active role in uncovering the truth. Emile Zola's notable headline J'accuse! is still proudly cited as an example of press activism at its finest.

The politics underlying the Knox case probably have to do with gender issues like sexual propriety. The prosecution went full tilt at identifying Knox as a slut and a drug addict, without offering a connection between those behaviors and a propensity to commit murder. The threat to Italian values was assumed, just as Sacco and Vanzetti were assumed to threaten American society, and Dreyfus to threaten French society, specifically, its manhood.

Underlying political themes don't have to be discerned by the participants; i.e., history is made without the specific consciousness of its agents. See, for example, Christopher E. Forth's book, The Dreyfus Affair and the Crisis of French Manhood:

Forth first considers the broad gender issues that faced the French at the time of the Dreyfus trial. He examines contemporary newspaper accounts as critiques of the masculine credentials of Jewish men and shows how members of the Jewish press answered allegations of their own cowardice and effeminacy. By situating the figure of the "intellectual" within the gender anxieties of the time, he shows how Dreyfus's supporters defensively tried to affirm their masculinity by distancing themselves from "cowardly" Jews, "hysterical" crowds, and threatening women. This book pays special attention to how the Dreyfus Affair engaged with changing ideals of the male body. Taking as a metaphor the portly body of Dreyfus's most prominent defender, novelist Émile Zola, Forth explores how an emerging emphasis on diet and exercise allowed supporters to celebrate Zola's "heroic" weight loss. Finally, he examines the relation of the Dreyfus Affair to the "culture of force" that marked French society during the prewar years, thus accounting for the rise of the youthful athlete as a more compelling manly ideal than the bookish and sedentary intellectual.
http://people.ku.edu/~cforth/dreyfus%20affair/index.html

As a post script, Dreyfus was later exonerated and became a colonel in the French army. However, Sacco and Vanzetti had already been executed by the time the popular mind recognized the terrible unjustice done to them.

[Joe Chi Minh]

133. Have you made a single effort to explain their want of an alibi and conflicting stories?

Was buying two bottles of bleach quite a common practice of theirs? Is it common practice, generally? Why had the blade been bleached? Oh. I forgot! It was those bent police out to frame them. Sorry. To frame her.

If there's been any sign of political power-plays, it was by the Sollecito and Knox side. You need to address the extraordinarily compelling CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE, on top of the already cogent hard, forensic evidence. One item of the former could not be construed to indicate anything significant; but when there are so many, all pointing in the same direction, well, hey, guess what? It doesn't look so good. And even courts of law are occasionally wont to apply a certain degree of common sense.

And by the way, the claims that American courts would not accept this or that by way of evidence are risible, as well as being irrelevant. Is American justice the gold standard? That would surprise a few Americans - leaving aside the prison gulag, whose inmates number more than the prison population of the rest of the world. I believe some are even in there for smoking pot! Debauchery's OK, as long as it isn't predatory. Was there a victim here, by the way?

[GoneOffShore]

140. It wasn't a political trial.

It was a murder trial.

Stop trying to make Knox into a martyr. She's a convicted murderer.

[LisaL]

113. Your argument is nonsense, considering her ex-boyfriend

has also been convicted.
He isn't American.

[SoDesuKa]

117. Not a Player

The case was always about Knox, not about Sollecito. He's a bystander. She was always the target, not him.

I don't know exactly what the case is about, but it's about politics and the threat that Amanda Knox poses to Italian values. She wasn't convicted on the merits of the case, don't be ridiculous. There's no evidence placing her at the scene when the crime was committed, and the putative motive is a product of Mignini's fevered imagination. It's absurd.

These political cases are hardly ever about what they purport to be about. Why was Bruno Hauptmann convicted? He certainly wasn't guilty, but the judge, the jury and the prosecutor leaned over backwards to interpret the meagre "evidence" as convincing. We know that Sacco and Vanzetti didn't commit the murder for which they were executed, and we also know that Albert Dreyfus' real "crime" was that he a Jew and a captain in the French Army. Quel horreur!


Ken Saro-Wiwa, along with eight of his associates, was hanged for a murder he certainly didn't commit. It does happen, you know.

[WilmywoodNCparalegal]

118. WTF are you talking about 'italian values'?

Since I'm Italian and in your opinion I hold lesser intelligence than my American counterparts, prithee explain to my feeble mind what these "Italian values" you speak of are. I, as a lesser mentally-endowed Italian, would like to know.

I guess that since I am not as mentally alert as other ethnicities, I, like all other Italians, don't flinch when two microseconds of breast are flashed on live TV, nor when nudity is presented on TV, while any one can be sawed in half on primetime shows and no one bats an eye.

It's funny, I'd almost say that you think Italians are prude, while Americans are the liberated sort. Funny, I thought it was much the opposite, but then again I probably don't have the IQ to really understand.

Let me ask you, do you speak or read any Italian at all? Have you had a chance to read about this case from La Repubblica or Il Corriere Della Sera, both of which are highly esteemed Italian newspapers (NOT tabloids)? Or have you gotten your (mis)information from the likes of 48 Hours and Good Morning America interviews with the Knox family?

If Italian is not among your vast array of superior knowledge, have you perchance followed this case in the British press (again, NOT the tabloids)?

Are you aware, in your infinite wisdom and erudition, that there are several prosecutors involved in any criminal trial under the Italian justice system and that Mignini was not the sole prosecutor?

Are you also aware that Mr. Lumumba, an honest and hardworking immigrant, lost his reputation and his business due to your precious Amanda's lies? Surely, that doesn't speak of her guilt in any way, but it surely speaks of her character.

Funny how she didn't pick a Mr. Rossi or Mr. Bianchi to finger for the murder, but she picked an African man. Since I live close to South Carolina, this has an uncanny resemblance to 'sweet and innocent' Susan B. Smith, who also blamed a black man for the abduction of her two children who, as we now know, were murdered by her.

Then again, why am I rambling on? I am a less-than-intelligent Italian... Italy is, after all, a third world country without death penalty and with universal health care. What do I know anyway?

Let me go and practice my 'Italian values' around here...

:sarcasm:

[SoDesuKa]

119. National Values

National values, like personal values, are determined by choices. Here in America, we don't necessarily believe in equal justice under law. We say we do, but when you get down to particular cases, this commitment to equal justice is often lacking. I cited the Sacco and Vanzetti case as an example. These two Italian citizens were put to death for a murder they didn't commit, probably because no effort went into assuring them a fair trial.

I see the same lack of effort in assuring Amanda Knox a fair trial. The prosecutor immediately went negative, maligning Knox as a slut and a drug addict. The Italian tabloids joined in, giving the clear impression that there was no way Knox was going to catch any break at all. And she didn't. The prosecutor seemed to amend his theory of the crime with each new development in the case, but at no point did he afford her the presumption of innocence - she was always some kind of trailer trash. Similarly, the judge at the Sacco and Vanzetti trial behaved the same way, at one point calling them "anarchist bastards."

Historians don't just sit back and accept the interpretations of the persons involved in these defining moments. For instance, Professor Christopher Forth has written a revision of the Dreyfus Affair, in which he argues that French people at the time were redefining masculinity. You do not have to agree with him, but he is a scholar, and revising history is what scholars do. See "The Dreyfus Affair and the Crisis of French Manhood" at http://www.amazon.com/Dreyfus-Manhood-University-Historical-Political/dp/0801874335.

I don't know why it was necessary to convict Bruno Hauptmann on flimsy evidence for the kidnapping and murder of the Lindbergh baby. Scholars are still arguing about that. And I don't know the actual underlying reason that Amanda Knox was railroaded the way she was. Clearly, there's something about the case that's more important to Italians than having a credible system of justice. This nonsense about a pot party leading to a rape and murder is a ludicrous theory of the crime. As it turns out, there's very little other evidence against Knox. There's some DNA that could belong to her; and some behaviors after the crime that are said to indicate guilt. That's not a lot to base a 26 year prison sentence on.

What is really going on here? From this distance I can perceive that there's something that's making Italians totally lose it. I sincerely mean that. Why did the crowd applaud Mignini after the ugly way he chose to win the case? Obviously there's something political about the case, and at this distance I can only speculate what it might be. Does she threaten Italian social values in some way?

I'll candidly admit that whatever motivates Italians to applaud Mignini makes them look ugly. He looks like Roger Ailes, and his statements about Knox sound like the stuff we hear on right wing radio. Frankly, he's your guy. You keep him. He may be a troglodyte, but he's not ours; he's yours.

[Maine-ah]

120. While reading some of the posts in this thread all I can hear

is Marion from Indiana Jones yelling "You can't do this to me, I'm an American!"

[SoDesuKa]

122. Don't Go To Italy

They've got some wierd-ass justice system. You've probably got more rights in friggin' Burma.

[WilmywoodNCparalegal]

123. Actually, it's "Don't go to Italy and commit a crime"

lest you be punished...

SoDesuKa, you still haven't answered my questions about what you think 'italian values' are, nor whether you have read any foreign press in either Italy or the U.K. about this case, nor whether you can read any Italian press in Italian.

Until then, I am freely of my own volition thinking that (1) you are full of what we Italians call 'merda' and (2) you have only been fed very biased information.

[SoDesuKa]

124. Italian Values

As I explained in my earlier post, values are generally discerned through decisions rather than declarations of principle. In 1895, for example, it didn't make any difference what the French military justice system claimed for itself; when military courts were presented with the Dreyfus matter, they failed to preserve the rights of the accused. Professor Forth of the University of Kansas has offered an explanation. At the time, the French were in what he calls a "crisis of masculinity" which took precedence over the rights of Captain Dreyfus. See http://people.ku.edu/~cforth/

Because the Dreyfus Affair was over a hundred years ago, we have the benefit of a century of historical progress by which to judge what was really happening. We do not have the same perspective about our own times. However, sometimes we can make comments on the surface of things. Clearly, Italians are more concerned about something other than a fair trial for every defendant. I can only go by the absurdity of the guilty verdict handed down in the Knox case despite the paucity of hard evidence against her. I'm not going to speculate about what it is that has set the Italian court system off course, at least in this one instance.

Do you honestly think that the rape and murder evolved out of a pot party? It's absurd on the face of it. No prosecutor would present such a cockamamie theory to an American jury. But even worse, the Italian jury not only bought such a foolish argument, they found the defendant guilty. There's at least some element of naivete or willing suspension of disbelief here, and perhaps something else. Again, historians will have a better perspect to interpret what's going on in Italian courts, assuming that the Knox case is representative. At this time, however, your guess is certainly as good as mine.

[grassfed]

127. when were you last in Italy?

Under what circumstances?

[grassfed]

163. I thought so ...

[devilgrrl]

126. Your posts are so ridiculous that I hope Amanda Knox stays behind bars for the rest of time

And F*** your anti-Italian bullshit.

:nuke:

[JI7]

132. you accuse Knox of being a victim of anti americanism but your posts are full of bigotry of Italy

[Violet_Crumble]

134. I'd rather go to Italy again than ever visit the US...

The bigotry and ignorance in this thread from some Americans towards Italy and Italians is pathetic, and yr posts are leading the way in hatred and intolerance. Have you ever been to Italy? Have you got any clue at all about what the country and its legal system is like? Because from yr posts it's very clear that you don't at all. And that you know fuck-all about the situation in Burma, either...

[beac]

152. I too find it SHOCKING that a board allegedly made up of good Democrats

could produce such vile, xenophobic comments. And the ones lauding the US justice system as some kind of paragon on virtue just boggle the mind.

Regardless of one's view of her guilt (I think she's guilty), Knox is living INCREDIBLY humane conditions-- guitar lessons, singing lessons, writing desk/books provided, shower and kitchen in her cell, allowed to wear her own clothes, opportunities for cultural enrichment (starred in a movie, entered a writing contest) and, with good behavior, she could be out in as little as ten years. Here at home, she'd be facing the death penalty or life in an overcrowded hellhole.

I've lived in Italy, and I can tell you that there I have met some of the kindest, fairest, most generous and open-minded people I could ever hope to know. It makes me SICK to see how Knox's high-priced PR campaign has succeeded in smearing an entire nation.

[SoDesuKa]

156. High-Priced PR Campaign

It's not a smear of an entire nation, just a single wrongful conviction by a jury waylaid by a prosecutor's gutter tactics. Surely you're not implying that the Knox verdict is the best that be expected from the Italian courts. Incidentally, the Italian government has considerable resources of its own. It is not hopeless in the face of an attack by a Seattle public relations firm.

And here are some questions for you. What do you think of the prosecution's theory of the crime? Does debauchery lead to homicide, as Mignini implied? Have you ever smoked marijuana yourself?

[beac]

162. So, your comment down thread that

"I don't know exactly what the case is about, but it's about politics and the threat that Amanda Knox poses to Italian values" wasn't a smear? What about the other xenophobic comments in this thread-- "Amanda Knox is a political prisoner", "Italy is a Third World country", etc?

It's good of you to try and back away from your vile comments, but this thread is full of them.

And no, the Italian government isn't "helpless" but they also weren't lobbying the American press 24/7 with 'poor little Amanda' propaganda. Most Americans' view of the trial has been shaped by the one-sided coverage driven by Knox's supporters and PR firm.

As for Mignini's theory of the crime, perhaps you are not aware that in Italian courts the jurors can use the evidence presented to decide their own theory of the crime and convict on that, as long as there is sufficient evidence to support their theory.

Personally, I think Kercher caught them stealing her rent money and the situation spiraled out of control from there.

I also note that you chose to jump in on a post I made to another member instead of replying to my post to you pointing out just a few of the substantial reasons Knox was easily convicted:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=7173750&mesg_id=7201535

[beac]

174. Still banging away in this thread I see, but you haven't taken the time to respond to

my several examples that point to Knox's guilt. Why? Perhaps because there are no FOA talking-points on them???

[CTyankee]

181. I've been to Italy several times. I've been to Perugia, which I loved.

When I was there, I enjoyed the stranieri (mostly Brits) that I encountered there; it seemed like a nice college town, Italian style, plus it is beautiful and the food is magnificent, the people and the shops elegant and refined. I'm going to Italy (Tuscany) probably in April. I love going to Italy and Sicily. However, that said, I do think this was a miscarriage of justice. I think we really need to get past all this stuff and realize that in an American court of law, there would have to be unanimity for the jury to convict Amanda Knox and to me, given the evidence or lack thereof, I think she should have been acquitted. In Italian law, a majority, not unanimous vote, convicts.

At the risk of ONCE AGAIN facing the ridiculous charge of being an American exceptionalist, whatever that is, I put this straight out there: it is what it is.

I don't know that much about Mignoni and will have to do more research on him but again, if he is an evil motivated prosecutor that doesn't indict the entire Italian population.

[beac]

187. Glad to hear you aren't joining the 'BOYCOTT ITALY!' crowd.

I am kind of shocked that anyone on DU would support such a Bill-O'Reilly-esque reaction. Will people be demanding 'freedom dressing' on their salads next?

FYI, the Italian jury WAS unanimous on the conviction. They disagreed on whether to give them life or something less, but they ALL agreed on their guilt.

Knox's fate was decided by two Italian judges and six jurors. After more than 11 hours of deliberations, they reached a unanimous verdict, which found Knox guilty of murdering her British roommate, Meredith Kercher, in the cottage they shared.
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/AmandaKnox/mother-amanda-knox-tells-courage/story?id=9267454

Italian juries decide the verdict AND the sentence in one step, unlike here in the US, so that's likely where the confusion about the unanimity of the guilty verdict came from.

As far as your research, may I suggest a couple of websites that might help provide a view to balance the uber-pro-Knox coverage in the American press?:

http://truejustice.org

(Good analysis on Mignini situation: http://truejustice.org/ee/index.php?/tjmk/comments/prosecutor_mignini_offers_some_helpful_advice_to_a_factually_challenged_rep/ )


AND

http://www.perugiamurderfile.org





***edited for small typo***

[CTyankee]

193. It's just laughable that anybody would get away with a "boycott Italy" campaign!

Americans FLOCK to Italy when they get a chance (or have the money). Italian culture flourishes here as well. My grandson in California is in a public school that offers Italian immersion language kindergarten and here in New Haven we have fabulous little Italian food markets. We love the food, the language and the amazing art history of the place. It's hard to find a town in Italy that American tourists haven't invaded...it's one of the reasons I liked Perugia so much.

Thanks for clarifying the unanimous jury thing with the Knox trial. I will do the research on the sites you suggest. Of course, like anyone else here I have an opinion based on not a complete picture of what went on in that trial. What I do know has led me to believe her innocence. However, neither does someone here who believes she is guilty have that complete a picture...

[beac]

196. Thank you for the opportunity for calm and rational discussion of our differing viewpoints.

Quite refreshing!

It will be interesting to see what the jury report says when it is released in 90 days. Another aspect of Italian verdicts that differs from the US is that the jury can form their OWN theory of the crime based on the evidence presented, so that report is crucial to understanding the outcome.

[CTyankee]

198. I don't understand why people are so emotional about this.

I like to think that I can rationally sift the evidence and get to the truth. But here that is not really possible, IMO. I can only base my opinion on what I have read. Interestingly, the day after the verdict, on Morning Joe, a reporter who had covered the trial and who was himself an attorney, said he would NOT have voted for conviction if he had been on the jury. Perhaps he was referring to the standard of "beyond a reasonable doubt", at least in these kinds of crimes and as opposed to "clear and convincing" and "preponderance of evidence." Do you happen to know what the standard in Italy is?

[SoDesuKa]

214. There's No Reason to Cancel Your Trip to Italy

If I had plans to visit Italy I certainly wouldn't cancel them. There's nothing to be afraid of. What happened to Amanda Knox doesn't happen very often, and it might not happen again for fifty years. So go ahead and enjoy your trip.

[Joe Chi Minh]

136. Ah, that keen, forensic mind again, clinically dissecting every point,

and responding with the histories of the Dreyfus Affair and various other political trials!!!!

Thank you, but we do have Wikipedia. Unfortunately, the issue here is that such histories are supremely irrelevant. How about Stalin's show trials? What's the matter with them? Couldn't you have fitted in at least one of them?

[seeinfweggos]

138. Ken Saro-Wiwa was the priceless one.

[Joe Chi Minh]

141. There is something particulary foul about such genuinely political

maladministrations of justice, but of course this could scarcely be further from one. Although in a sense, ultimately all judicial processes are political of course in their provenance, and for that matter have on occasions been hideously abused in the US by the Republicans on entirely political grounds from start of finish, where actual politicians and elections are concerned.

Hideous as Saro-Wiwo's case was, I believe that for apolitical reasons, specifically, extreme racism, innocent African Americans in the US have been knowingly rail-roaded to the execution chambers, maybe still are. Even when hard evidence is produced attesting the impossibility of the Accused's guilt - which of course are, themselves, crimes crying to Heaven for vengeance.

Incidentally, it seems Knox's people have finally realised that insulting Italy and the Italian judicial system is not the best way to 'make friends and influence people', after all. The girl is now saying that the trial was perfectly fair, and that those who have been insulting the Italian nation/people are not helping her Appeal prospects. Sense finally prevails.

[SoDesuKa]

144. Limited View

You have a limited view of what's political. The Saro-Wiwa case was more emphatically and explicitly political, but you are incorrect to imply that the Knox case is political only because all prosecutions are political. Your point about the "girl" saying her trial is fair is even farther off the mark. She's not saying this because she actually believes it. She recognizes the extent to which official vanity has played in the prosecution itself, and she's groveling only because she has to.

You still haven't spoken to the character attack that began with the indictment. Do Italians believe that debauchery leads to murder? Amanda was at first a drug-crazed slut; then she became a drug-crazed murderer. This was the central point of the prosecution's summation. The jury not only bought it, they also convicted her on that basis. Mignini started ugly, and he finished ugly.

Knox is stuck. If she says what she really believes, the same people who have allowed the unscrupulous Mignini to rise to prominence will probably take offense. These are the people who allowed the prosecution to conduct trial-by-tabloid in the first place, and now they have even higher cards. A moment's reflection on Knox's situation would have kept you from your smug remark that sense finally prevails. It does not. Knox is still a prisoner.

[Joe Chi Minh]

165. your imputation that I said that Knox's trial was political is scurrilous,

but not surprisng. In the most general way imaginable, I said that all judical processes are political, simply because politicians make the laws - in the US, they are often called, law-makers.

However to decribe Knox's trial as political is no less farcically dishonest today than it was when the risible claim was initially made.

'You still haven't spoken to the character attack that began with the indictment. Do Italians believe that debauchery leads to murder? Amanda was at first a drug-crazed slut; then she became a drug-crazed murderer'

Utter rubbish, as usual! I had absolutely no quarrel with the judges summmation. If you think for a minute, you might recall it was you who had that problem. I wouldn't call it an attack. I would call it a description. You also missed out that she is heartless liar, who bore false-witness to incriminate an innocent man - who in any case lost his business, as a result of her lies. In earlier times he might have been physically crucified.

'Mignini started ugly, and he finished ugly.'

What sort of infantile remark is that? My patience with your emotional idiocy is nearing its limit. Do you think maybe Manson's judge did the same - since you raised the comparison, seemingly ironically. 'Started ugly ands finished ugly'? Why not look at the facts of the case and speak to them, instead of pouring out all this emotional loghorrea. Don't bother to answer. We all know why. She hasn't an evidentiary leg to stand on.

You might choose to be careful in your excoriation of the judge, or you could find yourself the object of a lawsuit. People who work in the law tend to be less reluctant to go to law.

It's interesting that it is you who used the word, 'slut' and 'murderer' in relation to Knox. Like the judge, most people expect that she did not wield the knife - although she might as well have. I used the word' debauched' because I consider the word, 'debauched', apt enough in connection with an act of predatory promiscuity that did actually lead to a murder. No fantasy about it.

[GoneOffShore]

142. this thread has gone awfully quiet

The apologist for Ms Knox seems not to be able to come up with a rebuttal.

But then we knew that was going to happen.....

[Violet_Crumble]

143. I suspect they're off planning an invasion of Italy n/t

[SoDesuKa]

145. Invasion

The Knox case seems to bring out the bully in people. Your crude humor at her expense is a good example. You know the trap she's in; it's obvious to everyone. She can't condemn her captors; she has to praise their "fairness" and their "integrity."

Those of us who believe that a terrible injustice has been done have to be similarly on guard not to further provoke the Italian authorities. Vanity seems to have been a strong motive for the original prosecution. Calling them out on it doesn't help Amanda. You know that; we all know that.

However, just between us . . . tell me. Do you really think debauchery leads to homicide? That's the lowbrow argument Mignini led with, used throughout the trial, and highlighted in his summation to the jury. And they bought it!

[Violet_Crumble]

147. Don't start slacking off now! Have you got Amnesty International to start a campaign yet?

I have it on good authority that AI are good at working on freeing political prisoners!

Your crude humor at her expense is a good example.

The word crude means something else in the US? Anyway, don't worry. There's more where that came from! That's how much respect and concern I have for a convicted murderer ;)

Seriously, I find it a bit disturbing that you and others like you have shown absolutely no sympathy for the victim (she's the one that Knox murdered) and her family, such is the obsession with Knox....

[SoDesuKa]

154. Talking Points

Shifting the focus away from the faulty process to concern for the victim is an old dodge. Right wingers do it all the time. Do you really believe that debauchery leads to homicide? It's not that easy to kill somebody; and even people who actually do commit murder don't start out cold-bloodedly, the way the prosecution alleges Amanda did.

I've wondered too, whether the fact that both Amanda and Meredith were foreigners disposed the prosecutor to take the low road approach he did. After all, if Meredith had been an Italian, she'd be buried in Italy and her memory would be dishonored by the wrongful conviction of her friend. As it was, Mignini didn't mind saying that Meredith died as the result of a pot party that took a wrong turn - an absurd allegation. An American jury would have laughed him out of court.

We expect courts to be sophisticated enough to determine the underlying truth. By contrast, the Knox verdict sets a terrible example and punishes the innocent. This is not justice.

[Violet_Crumble]

158. Yr very adept at them :)

Love how you start off by acting as though it's a fact that the process was faulty. It's not a fact at all, and I doubt anything I hear from you about the case is going to be something I can put much trust in, so here's how I see it - Until someone provides something other than bigoted attacks on Italians and the arrogant attitude that somehow pretty white American women are saints who are totally innocent of crimes when they're overseas I'm going with the only rational conclusion, which is she murdered a student, and you and all her cheer-squad should be grateful that Italy's not like the US and doesn't have the death penalty. I think there's a large dollop of US xemophobia and anti-European sentiment at play here as if this had happened in the US, most of you wouldn't have paid the slightest bit of attention to it. It's only cause the media worked itself up into a frenzy that some of you are acting as though yr so heavily personally invested in what happens. I also don't think you and others realise how badly yr putting off people like me who could have been persuaded with a rational and thoughtful explanation of why Knox is supposedly innocent, btw...

[SoDesuKa]

159. No Need to Show Motive

It's true that prosecutors don't have to prove a motive, but if they're going to advance one, it should at least be plausible. Mignini says Knox and Guede and Sollecito were having a pot party when they decided to force themselves on Meredith. Later on, only Guede's fingerprints are found in the bedroom, proving that Knox and Sollecito cleaned their own fingerprints and left his. Is there a theory how they managed to do that?

We're left with the theory of the pot party that got out of hand. Marijuana, sometimes called the weed with its roots in Hell, is known to be a gateway drug to gang rapes and homicide; that's why it's illegal. Perhaps that's the reason Mignini didn't need to flesh out his tale of depravity-leading-to-murder. Is there another theory of the crime, one that doesn't rely so heavily on old movies like Reefer Madness?

Without a motive and without convincing physical evidence, the case is about Italian nationalism. We don't dare criticize Italy because we have shit justice in our country, too. Who are we to talk? Amanda ought to be glad she was convicted in such a liberal country! That wouldn't have been the case if she'd gone before a magistrate in friggin' Burma.

[DanTex]

164. Exactly

"I also don't think you and others realise how badly yr putting off people like me who could have been persuaded with a rational and thoughtful explanation of why Knox is supposedly innocent, btw..."

I agree 100% with your post and particularly that last sentence. As I posted earlier, I actually tend(ed) to think she was innocent, although there were some very disconcerting things, such as the fact that she falsely accused her boss. I could potentially have been swayed by a rational analysis of the case, the evidence, why it was flawed, etc. But instead, the most absurd theory I've heard is not the sex-party-gone-wrong prosecution theory (which, I admit, sounds a bit far-fetched), but rather the theory is that Italians are so vengefully anti-American that the entire jury, after sitting through a year-long trial, decided to punish an obviously innocent woman because she liked to smoke pot and have sex. In fact Italians apparently hate attractive, sexually active Americans so much that they also sent an innocent Italian man to jail, even though he comes from a prominent family, his sister is a cop, and he was able to hire an expensive big-shot defense lawyer.

Advice to the pro-Amanda crowd. When you stubbornly claim there was no evidence at all, and that it's "obviously" just anti-Americanism being fueled by a crazy egomaniac prosecutor, you're not persuading anyone.

[CTyankee]

203. Violet, knowing what you have learned, would you have convicted her in a U.S. trial?

Not trying to goad you. I am curious to know how you would have voted. I would have voted to acquit, but I realize that I do not have all of the evidence presented to me that was presented at the trial. So many of us here only have sketchy details or biased internet sites, both for and against. I find it VERY difficult to sift the evidence, but for me the clincher is that there is no evidence that she is guilty beyond the shadow of a doubt in this case.

What is the basis for your verdict?

Thank you for considering my request!

[SoDesuKa]

146. Awfully Quiet

A drunk with a gun comes on a subway car; how do you respond? You shut your mouth.

[TorchTheWitch]

155. none of the apologists have in any of the Knox threads

And all of the apologists have a horrifying lack of the most basic info about the case. Not a single one of them has supplied even a single source ever in their attempts to rebut anything (and most of the time they don't even try and just spout the same Friends of Amanda claptrap) and have used many statements that come directly from Friends of Amanda sometimes practically word for word. This anti-Italy blatant bigotry is the most revolting nonsense yet.

[SoDesuKa]

157. Underlying Issue

You might offer your own opinion on the motive for the murder. Does debauchery lead to homicide, as Mignini alleged? He didn't say this one or twice; he maintained this absurd theory throughout the trial. Have you ever smoked pot yourself? Did it want to make you go out and kill somebody?

[TorchTheWitch]

173. motive doesn't matter

and I've said that many times. I've said many times that it doesn't matter that the prosecutor is a nutter with a stupid sex game theory or that the girl smoked pot (which by the way, she herself uses as an excuse to cover up why she claimed later that should couldn't remember where she was, who she was with or what happened that night when her previous claims of not being there at all and with her boyfriend at his house all night proved to be lies) or that she did cartwheels or had a silly nickname. I've said continually that it doesn't matter what idiocy the tabloids come up with or the stupid motive theories that the prosecutor comes up with OR the lack of motive theories the defense comes up with because motive is never a necessary element of a crime and shouldn't be. You're the one claiming she was found guilty for no other reason than everyone on the jury believed all this prosecutorial rubbish and took absolutely no note of any actual facts or evidence from 130 witnesses in an 11 month trial. Then again, I don't expect you'd know what I've said in rebuttal to your drivel because you've addressed none of it... how typical of the apologists that have fallen all over themselves ignoring any of the actual facts and evidence in this case.

Meredith got killed because she was found murdered. Three people wanted to do her harm and all of them lied about it, covered it up, blamed each other (and in Amanda's case blamed a complete innocent). Whether she got killed because of some sex game or because they hated her or because they were bored and couldn't think of anything else to do or whatever anyone's theory of "why" or "why not" might be is immaterial. ALL that matters in a criminal case is that it was done and who done it. For someone who has been crying foul of the Italian justice system surely if the motive was taken into consideration in this case you'd actually have a legitimate reason to cry foul, but instead you're upset that motive WASN'T taken into consideration.

Both prosecutors and defense attorneys delve into why and why not in damn near every criminal case when it is never an element of proof of guilt or innocence and I've never believed they should be allowed to for that reason. They do it because people are just more comfortable feeling like they know the "why" or "why not" of something when it not only doesn't matter but is not permitted to be used as an element of guilt or innocence in deliberations. But both prosecutors and defense attorneys in most justice systems do this including the US.

[Matariki]

129. She was doing cartwheels down the hall when her boyfriend was being questioned.

Her mother justified that odd behavior with "that's just Amanda being Amanda".

Her roommate has just been murdered and she's doing cartwheels. Maybe she didn't do it, but that certainly seems sociopathic and doesn't make a good case for her.

And that's just one in a list of things.

[devilgrrl]

130. Oh come now, who doesn't do cartwheels when their roommates get their throats slashed?

:sarcasm:

[SoDesuKa]

160. After-the-Fact Conclusions

I don't know what sorts of after-the-fact conclusions can be drawn from Amanda's behavior. You seem confident that you would behave appropriately upon learning of a terrible crime committed against someone close to you. Perhaps your confidence comes from never having had that happen to you. How do you know how an innocent person would react to such a report? I suspect that after a lifetime of watching television dramas and movies that you only think you know how you would act.

Incidentally, the report of "cartwheels" comes from people with an interest in the outcome of the case - the police. There's no way to determine the extent of bias in their perceptions. These are the Perugia cops, not big time homicide guys.

The whole prosecution thing has an air of nattering about it. Amanda's guilty because she had sex with more than one guy; Amanda's guilty because she smoked marijuana; Amanda's guilty because she didn't act the way we know Julia Roberts would have acted . . . etc. Two things are still lacking, however, both of them important: a plausible motive, and evidence that she actually committed the crime. Mignini went on the throw-shit-at-the-wall theory of prosecution. Surely some of it is bound to stick.

By the way . . . what's your own experience with marijuana? Did it make you horny and want to kill somebody? Maybe Mignini's onto something.

[devilgrrl]

161. Amanda Knox was found guilty of taking part in the murder of her British roommate - END OF STORY!

I'm sorry that the Italians weren't snowed by that sociopath you feel the need to defend. :hi:

SOCIOPATH.

[SoDesuKa]

168. Sociopath

What's your own experience with marijuana? Did it make you horny and want to kill somebody?

[devilgrrl]

169. No, my experience with marijuana makes me want to listen to 1960's Jamaican Ska

Again, Amanda Knox was convicted of murder - it's that simple.

Innocent people don't change their stories everyone other minute. And if she got rooked, then why did a upper middle-class born and raised Italian guy get convicted on the same evidence presented?

I bet if this happened in the United States - she'd be found guilty as well. She wouldn't get the death penalty but she'd get 25 years if this had happened in Seattle. Shit, she would have be able to go on Nancy Grace!

F*** that giggling little sociopath - she reminds of W.

:nuke:

[SoDesuKa]

171. Maneater 1.0

The story has been toned down since the original version came out. The official story - let's call it Maneater 1.0 - became more modest over time. Still, I'd be curious how much of Maneater 1.0 was left in the jury's mind by the time Maneater 6.2 was released.

The case has riveted Europe, tapping into prurient curiosity as more sordid details leak out from judicial documents as well as partisan political divisions in a nation divided over immigration. A 19-page report, released by investigating judge Claudia Matteini, tells a squalid tale of dangerous sex games and a disturbing tale about Knox, the blond, blue-eyed student from Seattle who adopted the online name "Foxy Knoxy." According to Matteini, "something went wrong" after the three suspects tried to get Kercher to submit to violent group sex. The judicial officer, saying that Kercher was tortured and repeatedly sexually assaulted, speculates that Knox held Kercher down while Sollecito, Lumumba and the mystery fourth suspect assaulted her. Forensic evidence shows that Kercher's neck was lightly scratched twice with a knife before a third and fatal swipe slit her throat. The coroner's office believes that she was conscious during the two painful hours it took her to die, but that her injuries made it impossible for her to call for help. Matteini surmises that the suspects wanted "to try a new sensation" when they initiated the sex. "And in the face of the victim's refusals they did not have the presence of mind to desist, but tried to force the will of the girl, using a knife that Sollecito always carried with him," she writes.

As the British and Italian media went into frenzies over the saga, they gleefully singled out Knox as the real villain in the tale. The judge wrote that she believes Knox instigated the sexual attack; one British tabloid called her a "maneater with mommy issues."

http://www.newsweek.com/id/70610

So marijuana didn't make you horny and want to kill somebody? Glad to hear it. It never had that effect on me either.

[devilgrrl]

172. My opinion on this case has absolutely nothing to do with anything that's stated there.

I couldn't care less if she shagged the Italian World Cup soccer team - she's a punk - and now she's in jail.

BTW, why haven't we heard a word about the victim Meredith Kercher from the Knox crowd? Not one word from them about her from her family or PR Firm.

Say? While I'm on the subject of PR. Every time I think of public relations I can't help but think of 'Toxic Sludge is Good for You'



:popcorn:

[SoDesuKa]

177. Toxic Sludge

There was plenty of toxic sludge in the prosecution's case, and it's disingenuous to pretend that the jury wasn't splashed with it repeatedly. The case is about tabloid justice versus a fair trial based on a dispassionate evaluation of the evidence.

I will be very surprised if Amanda Knox is still in prison 18 months from now. The case is already a cause celebre, and will only become more so if the Italians dig in their heels and endorse the willful stupidity of the Perugia court. I anticipate a backlash against Italian products and Italian tourism.

Free Amanda Knox!

[devilgrrl]

191. Amanda Knox would have been convicted had this happened in the USA too.

:popcorn:

[beac]

192. And she'd be on death row, not taking singing/acting lessons while wearing her own clothes in a cell

equipped with a shower and cooking facilities.

[devilgrrl]

197. I doubt she'd get the death penalty here but she'd get 25+

Another thing that I find bizarre is that her family, instead of hiring the best defense lawyers, they hire a PR firm? :wtf:

No sympathy for the victim from them either and I'd love to hear what the two other roommates had to say about all of this.

I personally, don't think she did the deed but she was there and tried to cover it up. The little punk.

[TorchTheWitch]

176. does it make you black out and tell lies?

Both Knox and Sollecito used the excuse of their having smoked pot that night to excuse why their stories didn't wash and contradicted each other. Knox has used the claim of her having smoked pot that night as an excuse as to why she claimed after many other lies about where she was, who she was with and what she did as to why she then claimed to not recall where she was, who she was with or what she did.

You and I both know that smoking pot doesn't make you black out or tell lies. Yet there have been Knox supporters on this board that actually had the audacity to claim Knox's alleged inability to recall where she was, who she was with and what she did that night was because of her having smoked pot that night for no other reason than because that's what SHE claimed... at least that's what she claimed after being absolutely positively certain that she was not at the house all night, that her boyfriend was with her all night, oh, and then being absolutely positively certain that she WAS at the house that night without her boyfriend and with her boss who killed Meredith.

And here you are stomping all over Knox's and Sollecito's pot smoking excuse. Good. About time you acknowledge that their pot smoking excuse is a load of shit.

[SoDesuKa]

179. Denouement

Yes, there are going to be support rallies to get Amanda out of prison. It's one thing for the Italians to puff themselves up about self-determination, but they're not immune to being called out for bullshit justice.

Amanda's story isn't difficult to comprehend. A grasping prosecution invents a salacious theory of the crime and can't bring himself to back down from it. The physical evidence, such as there is, is at best ambiguous and possibly tainted by the police. The jurors, disposed to retaliate against foreigners, opt to believe the prosecutor's improbable fantasy and vote to punish the temptress at the center of the case.

Here's a prediction. Starting in March or April, crowds of Americans will assemble outside the Italian embassy in various cities. Their placards will have the usual "Free Amanda" messages, but some of them will make witty references to the lewd imagination of the prosecution. Dozens of books explaining what really happened are in the planning stages. There's going to be a whole Amanda Knox section at your local bookstore.

[TorchTheWitch]

215. WHICH of Amanda's stories?

Damn, you still haven't acknowleded that she doesn't HAVE one story. And I see you once again ignoring your foolish pot smoking threory seeing as how you didn't even realize that all these posts you made about how pot wouldn't have effected Amanda or Sollecito was what one of THEIR excuses was. You couldn't possibly spell it out any more clearly how much you don't know about this case and you're continuing to try to argue their innocence under those conditions just makes you look more and more foolish.

You've long since outed yourself as to being woefully uninformed about this case and watching you continue this diatribe about pot smoking not being an excuse when being so obviously unaware that pot smoking WAS used as an excuse by both Knox and Sollecito has been hilarious.

Give it up or grab a shovel... you'll need one to dig yourself even deeper than you already have.

[beac]

182. Funny how the OP is sticking to his pot obsession and refuses to address

the many facts that you, I and others have presented in this thread that shred the FOA talking points and clearly point to Knox's guilt.

As for his prediction below re: protests, that may be the only insight he's had so far. I can definitely see a crowd of tea-bagging nutjobs doing just that--- perhaps with signs reading "Make American's the offical Justice!" :eyes:

[SoDesuKa]

183. Many Facts

There aren't many facts that justify the guilty verdict. There are at best only the ambiguous inferences that can be drawn from Knox's somewhat erratic behavior after the murder of her house mate. Of course we all know how Julia Roberts would have acted under the circumstances - she'd be completely cool and rational. That's how it is in the movies.

The books that will be written about the Knox case will provide the DNA experts' analysis that the judge wouldn't allow the defense to present. Some of them will offer a far more plausible explanation of what really went down. It's not just the obvious fact that marijuana doesn't make you horny and homicidal; it's the rest of it as well. Betcha there's loads of animosity between the citizens of Perugia and the straniere at the University.

[beac]

185. 'Betcha' there isn't.

People who are open-minded enough to live in another country aren't rabid xenophobes like yourself.

Really, your unwillingness and/or inability to address ANY of the MANY FACTS presented to you that point to Knox's guilt is just pathetic.

Fortunately, it is likely that your ineffective defense of her here has imspired many people to investigate the case for themselves and will only aid in exposing the Knox's PR BS for what it is.

[sabrina 1]

219. I asked this before, but I'll try again since you have not answered.

Where was Amanda on the night of the murder?

And you don't seem to know this, so FYI, there was more than one prosecutor on this case.

Also FYI, thanks to her PR team and rabid defenders whose defense of her has been limited to attacks on the Italian Judicial system, Amanda is not a very popular woman around the world, including in the US.

As someone else said above, some of us were open to considering the possibility of her being innocent, but the refusal to acknowledge the holes in her defense and the tactic of attacking an entire nation, rather than EXPLAIN and ADDRESS those issues, left me and others wondering why they could not stick to the facts of the case.

If I believe someone is innocent, I try to persuade others by sticking to the allegations and explaining why I do not believe them. But the Amanda defenders never do that. They repeat and repeat the same talking points, as if they are all reading from the same script.

And then there are the outright false statements such as this: 'In Italy, you are considered guilty before being proven innocent'. What a glaring lie that turned out to be. I took the trouble to check it out. Seems that Art. 27 of their constitution states the exact opposite. So, when people lie, as Amanda did, and now her defenders, they lose credibility. That's what got her convicted, she told so many lies, starting even before she was a suspect.

The lies and nasty attacks on Italy have done little to persuade anyone of her innocence, either in the court of public opinion or in the courtroom where her lies were proven beyond any reasonable doubt. What they did do was to cause fair-minded people to look into the case themselves, and when people do that, Amanda doesn't look very innocent at all.

If she is innocent, then forget all the talking points which mean nothing. Try to make your case. You could start by answering my question above ~ 'where was Amanda on the night of Meredith's murder'?

[devilgrrl]

220. The more Knox supporters prattle on the more guilty I think she is.

She's a textbook Psychopath.

[Joe Chi Minh]

167. 'I don't know what sorts of after-the-fact conclusions can be drawn

from Amanda's behavior.' How about, a whole lot better than 'before the facts'? Sound reasonable to you. Pass... You're a lummox.

And as for your befuddlement concerning the most plausible conclusions concerning Knox's behaviour... you're clearly not too bright. I think we can eliminate an arrested worldly intelligence in her, however. What other kind of human quality in her might have been arrested or even absent?

'Perhaps your confidence comes from never having had that happen to you. How do you know how an innocent person would react to such a report?'

It's a part of what we call, 'being human'. That how.

'Incidentally, the report of "cartwheels" comes from people with an interest in the outcome of the case - the police.'

There you go again fantasizing. Country-bumpkin cops, eh? What can you do with them? You're the kind of guy Colombo used to like running rings round. That is their job to be interested parties. It doesn't require them to set aside what they believe to be the truth, although that is clearly what you impute to them. But, characteristically, you brazenly imply that the other parties concerned were not interested parties. I think it just a little likely that you and your family would be 'interested parties', if you were one of the prime suspects. Everything you write is piffle.

Your final paragraph plumbs the depths. Again, characteristically, you oversimplify everything said by your opponents. Assuredly, highly imaginative, but not such as to hold the reader's interest. Don't give up the day-job.

[SoDesuKa]

170. Police Drama

Your allusion to the TV detective Colombo points to how you see this case - as some kind of crime drama. Finding the blonde guilty is a surprising ending - satisfying to some but disappointing to others.

How much better an ending there would have been if some unambiguous evidence had been presented in the last five minutes of the show. Face with the discovery, the perfidious Amanda would shout from the witness stand, "Yes, I did it! And I would do it again!"

Incidentally . . . what's your own experience with marijuana? Did it make you horny and want to kill somebody?

[Joe Chi Minh]

190. 'Incidentally . . . what's your own experience with marijuana? Did it make

you horny and want to kill somebody?'

Your cavalier, trivialising attitude to personal morality, implicit in your prurient question and virtually the entire burden of your facile and squalid arguments, don't, alas, persuade me that anecdotal chat is something anyone playing with a full deck would want to share with you. To answer it in any way, would only encourage you to continue to mischaracterize the welter of circumstantial evidence incriminating the pair, by reducing it by a risible over-simplification to the level of an irrelevant diversion.

Mind you. I've been thinking about that political dimension to the trial you hit upon. Maybe you're right. Christ, after all was condemned and crucified on political grounds. Maybe you're right - allow me to put words in your mouth reflecting your apparent 'take' on the principals in the trial - maybe the Chief Prosecutor, Mr Mignini, was an amalgam of Caiaphas and Pilate (the nationality fits... and, heck, maybe he is Jewish, as well!) and the Police Chief was a kind of Judas-figure, wanting to make a name for himself and get promoted. The African guy she accused was Barrabas. And they let him go, only to condemn the lamb of SoDesuKa! Sound reasonable to you?

How we can fit Sollecito into this I don't know. But his figuring in this affair has never bothered you, anyway, so why worry? He might as well not have existed. Heck, it would have been a whole lot more convenient for you, what with that business of those nasty Italians being so bigoted against Italians and Italy and all; so full of hate for them, and rejoicing at the chance to get'em.

I bet most of the Duers on here would have given their eye-teeth to see you, as a young blade, doing a cartwheel and the splits in an American police station, and to see how your police reacted to it. Tasered while doing your splits and cartwheels?

[Joe Chi Minh]

194. Why do those Italians hate Italy and persecute Sollecito? While these

American police love America, but one of 'em was apparently viciously attacked by a Canadian endeavouring to cross the US-Canada border. It's them rotten foreigners again. Aliens, that's what they are!

[Joe Chi Minh]

135. That's what we feared.

[cynatnite]

166. I'm not convinced that's the case here. n/t

[KG]

178. political prisoner? please.

actual political prisoners would disagree.

[BlueMTexpat]

184. Amanda Knox is in no way, shape or form a political prisoner.

You demean those who are political prisoners by this uninformed knee-jerk response.

[asdjrocky]

188. +1

You said it before I had a chance.

[Crabby Appleton]

216. I agree completely. nt

[Lord Helmet]

189. I don't think so.

[southernyankeebelle]

207. Yeah right. Ah what about her boyfriend who got 25 years? He is after all an Italian.

You can thank the Bush administration for the terrible relationship between our country (witch by the way I don't believe there is). I have Italian cousins and aunts and uncles over there. I was born and raised here my mother was from Italy but she loved america. She is dead now and I honestly don't think my parents would be proud what is happening in our country. Amanada Knox made her bed now she has to deal with what is going on. There system is different than ours. But she doesn't have many explanations for what happened. She keeps changing her story. Don't buy the bull that Italians hate americans that simply isn't the facts.

[beac]

209. It was double-reverse-double-plus discrimination against Sollecito, dontcha know?

;)

The only "anti-" anything I've seen with regard to this case is Knox's supporters' and PR team's virulent anti-Italian slurs and xenophobia. it's absolutely disgraceful and I am sure you are right that your mother would be horrified to see it.

**edited for typo**

[Taverner]

222. Um, no

Now I have no idea if she did it or not, but certainly not a 'political prisoner'