The Dangers Of Not Extraditing Convicted Felons Labeled An Explosive Threat To Other People

Above: Sydney moslems leaving wreaths- for the non-moslems killed

1. Lessons From Australia

It looks like several Australian judges may have wrecked their careers for allowing Man Haron Monis to be at large even though police said he should be denied bail.

Man Haron Monis was the former Iranian who took 17 hostages in downtown Sydney and caused the death of two others and himself. Coming to light is how many times previously the Australian justice system had treated him with kid gloves for major crimes.

Reporting from NBC:

Iran tried to extradite the gunman behind Sydney’s deadly hostage crisis years ago, Tehran’s top cop said, amid questions over how the self-styled cleric had found his way to Australia but not onto a watch list…

Monis grew up in Iran as Mohammad Hassan Manteghi. In 1996, he established a travel agency, but took his clients’ money and fled, Iran’s police chief, Gen. Ismail Ahmadi Moghaddam, told the country’s official IRNA news agency Tuesday.

Australia accepted him as a refugee around that time. The police chief said Iran tried to have Monis extradited from Australia in 2000, but that it didn’t happen because Iran and Australia don’t have an extradition agreement.

Australia’s Prime Minister Tony Abbott said he wanted to know how Monis had been granted permanent residency and why he had been receiving welfare benefits for years, despite being able-bodied “if not necessarily of sound mind.”

Monis had a gun licence, a rarity in Australia - and he walked free after being charged for writing letters of hate to families of dead Australian soldiers, and for having a hand in the killing of his wife.

2. The Relevance Of This To Knox

Regardless of extradition treaty situations, countries almost universally extradite convicted murderers. They dont want dangerous people to have another chance to cause deadly havoc in their own midst.

Knox is already a felon for life. If Knox is confirmed guilty of murder next March she will be a DANGEROUS felon for life.

The Italian-US extradition treaty gives a US judge no wiggle room other than to check if the paperwork is in order and then send her on her way.

But another bent judge could again throw a spanner in the works.

How dangerous is Knox? Our psychologists generally think that, untreated, she is not good news. Not a latent serial killer, or one who sits around and plots, but one who could again explosively hit back when she imagines or exaggerates slights.

More than anyone in Perugia, Meredith tried to get along with Knox. But Knox showed no sign of a learning curve. The very heavy drug use went on, the sleeping with a drug dealer went on, the dirtiness and laziness around the house went on, and the noisy sex episodes with strangers through paper-thin walls went on.

She really was the housemate from hell.

For a month or two after Meredith died, Knox was highly erratic about her role in that death, and showed an extreme eagerness to talk with the prosecution which resulted in the long session with Dr Mignini on 17 Dec.

In a move serially misinterpreted by the dimwits of the Knox brigade, the prosecution, suspecting she was both mixed up and high on hard drugs, in effect offered Knox and her team a way to a lesser count, when they said that the murder could have been a taunting attack which spun out of control.

In her book, Knox describes how the family and lawyers worked hard on Knox to destroy all elements of trust. By the summer of 2008 she was in a mood of full-blown paranoid mistrust, and all chances of a lesser charge were gone.

At trial in 2009 Knox was daffy and uncomprehending, making irrelevant interventions and really shooting herself in the foot when she took the stand. Raffaele Sollecito and Patrick Lumumba, almost the last two in Perugia to still give her the time of day, both said she was very odd.

Knox was mentally tested in Capanne Prison and apparently scored high on the psychopathic chart. The four courts hardest on Knox all knew this - the Matteini court, the Ricciarelli court, Cassation, and the Nencini court - which was a major reason why Cassation did not allow bail in April 2008.

Assuming she killed once, in what was an exceptionally barbaric attack, Knox may or may not kill again. She is certainly inciting or condoning a massive amount of dangerous hate toward Meredith’s family and toward the Italian officials of the court.

One unhinged attack has already occured - that of the disturbed Michele Moore against Dr Mignini in the Perugia court - and the British resident David Anderson has screamed at meetings and runs an incessant campaign to stir up hate. Court officials have received messages of hate, and there is a small mountain of false and dangerous accusations against them on the web.

Left untreated and unpunished, a convicted but not extradited Knox would be a killer walking loose on American streets and could continue to condone or incite violence for the rest of her life.

If Knox killed and remains loose, could she kill again or cause others to kill? Any extradition judge needs to ask as the Australian judges did not:

Do we REALLY want to find out?

Posted by Peter Quennell on 12/18/14 at 11:18 PM in The judical timeline, The legal followups, US etc related, The wider contexts, Italian context, Europe context, N America context

Comments

Excellent article Peter. Thank you very much. Of course, we do not want to find out what would happen if Amanda Knox was not extradited. She writes under several pseudonyms on twitter and disqus forums in a vain effort to make it appear as though she has a lot of support. But we know better. She blows her cover every time as now there really are not so many supporters left and she is very easy to detect. To this day, she still taunts the Kerchers and Meredith as if this were all just a game! She laughs at the prospect of going back to prison and is a very deranged psychopath who belongs behind bars right now! Thank you again.

Posted by Johnny Yen on 12/19/14 at 07:18 AM | #

Yes, thank you Pete…clear and unequivocal as ever.

The Australian tragedy is yet another heartbreaking reminder that it is incumbent upon society to keenly ferret out such unstable persons with psychopathologies, and then be resolute and firm in taking the required steps to protect the others who are trusting and honest.

The judiciary and police, and social services too, really do need not to dither around such people, who of course would play on being given the benefit of the doubt.
We have seen all this…in fact have been given a seven year course in how to be irresponsible, and deceptive.

But we are not deceived.

Posted by SeekingUnderstanding on 12/19/14 at 03:42 PM | #

Excellent post, as always, Peter.

In such cases I tend to blame the hyprocrisy of the system in general, from rabble to political leaders, who, more than being unable to rein in such criminals, actually promotes them in an effort to appear “enlightened” and “unprejudiced”.

Take Army Major Nidal Hassan (of Fort Hood, TX fame), who, despite graduating in the lower 25% of his class, was promoted ahead of his peers; when treating injured soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan (I’ve always been anti-war myself, but those were injured humans), he adressed them as war criminals; then, after shouting “Allahu Akbar!” and mowing down a bunch of unarmed soldiers inside the military base, his case was swiftly categorized as “workplace violence” (blood boiling right there) and not terrorism.

The system is the main culprit for letting Hassan get in the position from which he was actually able to spread death around him, and laying wreaths for victims after the fact by certain groups afraid of retaliation doesn’t help anybody, really (more credibility would be gained if those groups actually clamored for the execution of the offender, or storm the jail cell where he is held and bash his head in themselves).

In the case of Amanda Knox, yes, the system should move quickly and lock up this deranged murderer where she belongs, and that would be a minimum that it could deliver.

The people who try to interfere with this are guilty of obstruction of justice, and aiding and abetting a criminal.

Posted by Bjorn on 12/19/14 at 05:21 PM | #

Unfortunately, in the West there is a blind opinion that if an individual thinks a person is innocent then it must be so. They use such things as freedom of speech to denigrate others. Knox thinks she can get away with this for just that reason, and her attacks upon the Kerchers are every indication of her psychosis since she sees them as enemies and by extension her belief that killing Meredith was justified. This has it’s roots in her racist view of being better than others due to the color of her skin. Of course people who think this way do not see themselves as racist, after all to them it’s just a normal way of life.

I find it tragic that so many of the FOA are simply blind to what is obviously a large con job by Knox and individuals who are in this for personal gain such as the Moores, Fischer and others who are of the opinion that they have some say and can persuade others in how Knox’s future will go. They do this to try to bolster their own shallow view of themselves since secretly they know they are failures in this world. Fischer bankrupt, Moore having lost his employment over and over again. Some, such as those on groundreport and elsewhere, think of it as a game. ie we win you lose. They do this and advance their hate of anybody worthwhile thereby showing their hate of themselves since they know full well that they will never amount to anything at all in this world. “Birds of a feather” for example. Consider the differences here. Some people do not believe what they are told and do their own research. Others are Walmart shoppers and so it goes. I have no doubt that some judge somewhere in the US will try to offer an injunction which will be heralded with much fanfare by the FOA. Let them. Their ego will be in for an even bigger fall plus all the others who will say “Well I knew she was guilty all along.” This is what Knox and her supporters fail to understand which is the fickle approach of the general public to anything they care about. For example there will always be those who believe in Knox rather like George Barlow and a few others who believe that Jody Arias is innocent, such is the stupidity of some of the unthinking great unwashed.

Posted by Grahame Rhodes on 12/19/14 at 06:49 PM | #

Before I forget the change in US Cuba relations with the swapping and extraditing of individuals does not bode well for Knox. The exchange of people convicted of either espionage or smuggling is just another nail in the Knox future.

Posted by Grahame Rhodes on 12/19/14 at 06:54 PM | #

@Bjorn
...“in an effort to appear ‘enlightened’ or unprejudiced “.
Very good point - the ‘Politically Correct’ attitude : it gives us many problems over here, and impedes common sense and sensible precautions.

Posted by SeekingUnderstanding on 12/19/14 at 08:17 PM | #

I’m sure it will have occurred to them but (just by way of a question) which countries in South America do not have extradition treaties with the USA a la Joran Van der Sloot? After all Steve Moore still has some mode of air transport available and rabid supporters of Knox will try anything when the proverbial excrement hits the fan.

Posted by Grahame Rhodes on 12/19/14 at 09:19 PM | #

The horrible Monis certainly fell through the cracks of the system. The brave young Australian manager of the Lindt cafÃ© jumped the evil Monis and tried to save the hostages. It cost the brave young man his life.

That good Australian is like the anti-Raffaele. The daring Aussie tried to prevent a murder not aid one. He has covered his name in glory and lifted his family and fellow Aussies. He’s the opposite of Raffaele who has dragged his people in the mud. Amanda has rained shame on her family.

@Bjorn, I agree the Fort Hood shooter is another terrorist jihadi who should already have been executed for his treachery against U.S. military.

Deal with the violent offender, extradite known killers. Knox belongs in an Italian prison.

Posted by Hopeful on 12/20/14 at 04:53 PM | #

OK I looked up the counties. Venezuela seems to be the only choice. However, that will never work because by running for it she will admit that she is guilty and will have to survive. That takes money and after the legal fees are all in there will be nothing left, It would be my guess that there isn’t too much left in the cash drawer now. Sure she can have a couple of interviews but in order to do that she will have to expose her whereabouts and therefore be arrested as a flight risk.

Posted by Grahame Rhodes on 12/20/14 at 09:51 PM | #

OT, but it’s poetically inevitable somehow that Richard Branson should be drawn to tweeting support for AK. They are both life-long narcissists and inveterate self-publicists.

Maybe he’ll buy her out and rename her “Virgin Amanda”. Umm no, maybe not - he’ll surely know that oxymorons are best avoided in brand names.

Posted by Odysseus on 12/21/14 at 01:28 PM | #

I do not fully agree, Grahame. Of course she is guilty but if I were innocent, after trying very hard to get justice, before final verdict I would run to Brazil or wherever I had the highest chance of not being caught and come back only if justice gave the right verdict. Living in that society would not make sense, would call it anomie.

If I were guilty I would calmly go to jail, given the leniency of the tariffs in Italy and the possibility to study and work. Would give myself up immediately and waste no time.

I may be wrong but Knox always seemed perfectly content in prison. I think it is because she knew she deserved it.

Posted by Popper on 12/21/14 at 02:55 PM | #

on the second part I agree, you need a lot of money and must be a hard cookie to live as a fugitive outside Europe. In her case she would also need plastic surgery as PR made her face known worldwide ... Italian and British tourists are in every corner of the world, as policemen who are eager for a better career

Posted by Popper on 12/21/14 at 03:22 PM | #

Hi, Grahame & Popper, I tend to agree with Grahame on this one, in the sense that if she ran away she would admit guilt (and display cowardice, what else is new) - a true innocent would try to change the game even at the 11th hour and tell the truth, but the truth is so incriminating, you see.

As far as I’m concerned, but I don’t mean to be insensitive to others, especially to Meredith’s family, I would just *love* to see her run away - she would be fair game and all the bets are off, whoever gets his hands on this tart can call himself lucky, we’re not talking settling down and starting a family in Nicaragua or Panama or Venezuela or Brazil, but hard, once-in-a-lifetime thrills with a disposable psycho (who’s gonna report her missing, just imagine titles like “Cadaver de la rubia desaparecida encontrado mutilado en barranco” in the sleazy newspaper of a town that doesn’t even show up on Google).

She wants thrills, she’ll get them (for free), Knox is not the only deranged criminal out there.

Posted by Bjorn on 12/21/14 at 03:55 PM | #

Yes, I agree with your last sentence, Popper, ...that Knox ‘knew she deserved it’...also, knew she needed it.
Organization and planning ahead are not her strong points, neither is delayed gratification.

Posted by SeekingUnderstanding on 12/21/14 at 04:24 PM | #

We’ve created a new tweet about the bloody footprint on the bathmat:

https://twitter.com/harryrag/status/546679433634250752

https://twitter.com/harryrag/status/546677445559336960

I think it’s worth a retweet.

Posted by The Machine on 12/21/14 at 04:53 PM | #

Hi Popper

“I may be wrong but Knox always seemed perfectly content in prison.”

I agree. Prison was the one place in life where she could do a lot of those things she liked without the pesky requirement of having to find a job or face peer review. Rent was free. She had Curt and Edda and the especially obnoxious Chris mostly out of the way. And she was out of reach of any revenge by the REAL drug dealer (not Guede) she caused to have put away.

Her “liberation” in Italy in 2007 was something that appealed. She clearly blew it and spiraled down to a vicious attack on someone who had tried harder than anyone to be her friend. But in the period from November 2007 to early 2008 there were a number of mini-incidents suggesting she knew she went way too far. And she said several times after she had paid her dues Italy would be a nice place to live.

The US is a more unforgiving place and if her guilt is ultimately confirmed in March the US media looks set to open up with all cannons blaring against her. Legal commenters are all set. Casey Anthony (who was found not guilty) and Jodi Arias, part trois.

Posted by Peter Quennell on 12/21/14 at 04:54 PM | #

I guess now I have to suggest a reason or some reasons why she was “scared” to come back to Italy for the Florence appeal.

Prior to that appeal Ghirga and Dalla Vedova flew to Seattle and argued hard that she should be in court. She refused, which left them reportedly very ticked off.

So why did she not come back? My takes:

1) Marriott and Curt Knox might have been counseling that so she could shoot arrows from afar, as she did with the ludicrous email to Judge Nencini which was from end to end insults and lies. She knew this time around there had been no judge-shopping, and so nobody like Hellmann would find her cute (and Guede not cute).

2) She had singlehanded tanked her drugdealer and been the direct cause of his being sent to prison.

3) Her very ill-judged 2013 book (and Oggi excerpts) was fiction at best and she had nastily slimed in it not only Mignini and the cops but just about everyone she had ever met including her flatmates, the English friends, Patrick (obviously), and pretty well everyone in prison except the priest. Even Sollecito did not emerge as her number one.

4) Even Hellmann had concluded that she had lied about the 5-6 Nov 2007 “interrogation” and confirmed her sentence and payment of damages to Patrick which made Cassation’s over-ruling in 2013 something of a no-brainer. She knew the re-doing of the DNA without Hampikian’s “help” that Cassation and Nencini ordered would give her no break.

5) Despite world-record bloodmoney she had not paid Patrick and for reasons why she had argued and argued and argued that up was down and black was white.

So. By her own doing, there were not a lot of people there in Italy waiting to welcome her with open arms.

Posted by Peter Quennell on 12/21/14 at 05:10 PM | #

Remember the case of Christine Paolilla in Texas who killed her best friends in order to get money for drugs. It’s in the ‘Mail on line’ by the way. There has always been this stupid “But Where’s the motive?” etc: Not only by Sollecito, but the rabid Knox supporters who lie to others as well as themselves at every opportunity rather than face the truth. Anyway there it is because Paolilla also killed out of jealousy. So many parallels here. Consider Drugs, jealousy, revenge, and rent money, plus the availability of Knox “Best truth I can think.” in order to ensnare some unsuspecting black person by arranging a rape by another unsuspecting black person then blaming another unsuspecting black person upon someone she saw as inferior due to her racist background. I’m still of the opinion that Knox was high for all the time she was in Italy.

Posted by Grahame Rhodes on 12/21/14 at 07:59 PM | #

@The Machine. Bathmat tweet rocks. Raffaele’s bloody footprint places him at crime. Branson needs to know it’s not just about bra clasp.

Posted by Hopeful on 12/21/14 at 08:03 PM | #

We’ve created a tweet about the staged break-in:

https://twitter.com/harryrag/status/547102030838632448

https://twitter.com/harryrag/status/547102305951436800

Please retweet. Thanks.

Posted by The Machine on 12/22/14 at 09:27 PM | #

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