Wednesday, April 10, 2024
Knox Calunnia Retrial: Prosecution Makes Strong Case For Letting 3 Year Felony Sentence Stand
Posted by Our Main Posters
The Prosecutor General of Tuscany
1. Today’s Happenings
The Florence court met for its first tense and briefly heated session today.
The verdict for Knox in the calunnia retrial, in which she is accused of criminal slander against Patrick Lumumba, her boss, is postponed to 5 June.
The Florence Prosecutor-General Dr Ettore Squillace Greco (tellingly a very big gun) asked for confirmation of the three-year sentence for Knox, who was provisionally acquitted of murder by the Supreme Court’s Fifth Chambers (bizarrely, that is the family court) in 2015.
During the session’s opening, the fiery lawyer Carlo Pacelli, Patrick Lumumba’s lawyer, shouted “Amanda is a liar” to Ms Knox’s lawyers.
He was interrupted by the judge, and Ms Knox’s lawyer replied: “We cannot restart the murder trial again, we are here for a defamation case.” (An odd response, as that is why Patrick’s team is there too.)
According to the Prosecutor General, when Knox wrote her “memoriale” on 6 November 2007 she would have been “aware of Lumumba’s innocence” and “aware of suggesting to investigators the name of a person who had nothing to do with the murder”.
It was explained to the court that the ECHR was simply mistaken in its summary of Knox’s treatment on the night of her arrest.
The court has before it all the documents we summarized in the two posts just below.
2. Some Context
Knox of course repeatedly undermined her own case by testifying under oath in December 2007 and at trial in 2009 that she was treated well.
We now know that a major reason for the ECHR’s confusion was a pretty fictional account by Knox lawyer Dalla Vedova, who did not seem to have anything compelling to say in her support today.
The case Dalla Vedova made to ECHR was kept confidential by Knox’s defence for years. When Italian prosecutors finally got to see it, they were amazed and amused. All it asked for was the equivalent of about $1 million in damages. No verdict rollbacks. The ECHR only recommended a payment to Knox of about $20,000.
Amanda Knox wrote her “memoriale” in English before being transferred to Capanne Prison, and she handed it to Officer Ficarra (who has no English) with a gleeful laugh. In it she seems to be trying to walk back damage done in her sessions with Ficarra and Dr Mignini before daylight on that same day.
Knox’s memoriale makes no mention of having been pressured or abused except a claimed tap on the head that all witnesses and her own lawyers denied. (In her other calunnia trial Judge Boninsegna in effect accused the cops of being too kind!)
Nor did she claim this to the supervising magistrate, Dr Matteini, several days later, or to Dr Mignini on 19 December when she was interrogated (actually her first interrogation) at her own request.
Even Knox’s own lawyers made a public announcement denying any abuse in early 2008. They never filed a complaint - something they could be disbarred for if they really believed Knox.
Knox did not actually go looking for this appeal, which could have major impact on her “I’m the victim” flow of cash. The Italian Parliament dropped it in her lap with a change of the rules. Did Sollecito lawyer and Member of Parliament Bongiorno not think this thing through?
Or maybe she did. Like the Sollecitos, she has always seemed to want to see Knox brought down.
Posted by Our Main Posters on 04/10/24 at 04:17 PM in Hoaxes Sollecito etc