Category: The officially involved

Monday, August 09, 2010

The Judges’ Sentencing Report For The Guilty Verdicts In The Case Of Meredith Kercher

Posted by Our Main Posters

This is the report of Judge Massei and his colleagues, now translated into English.

This was a joint effort of PMF and TJMK and all who worked so hard on the report are active on Perugia Murder File and are or will be posters here on True Justice For Meredith Kercher.

The five months of work by all of us, on three continents, was done in memory of Meredith Susanna Cara Kercher, who was known to her friends as Mez.

Rest peacefully, Mez. We’d have been so honored to have been your friends.

Friday, July 30, 2010

Oregon’s David Wu: Another Opportunistic American Congressman That Takes An Anti-Italy Stance

Posted by Peter Quennell

Are there REALLY no Italian-Americans in Oregon’s Congressional District 1 (map below) which is Mr Wu’s political district? 

Would someone please ASK him?!

This undated take on the case by David Wu, a letter to a constituent, was posted a few days ago on the New York Daily News website.

We already know that the Italian justice system has been almost excruciatingly fair, that the evidence is massive and conclusive, and that there is a snowball’s chance in hell of the US federal government even raising this case with the Italian government.

Let alone using any actual political capital to try to spring Amanda Knox in face of what was a fair trial.

Nevertheless, complete with nasty attitude, errors, and illusory claims, Congressman Wu’s letter is being feverishly spread around by the adolescent Knox groupies. Together with the claim that somehow, therefore, Amanda Knox’s support is growing. 

Thank you for contacting me to express your support for the fair treatment of Amanda Knox, an American student who was found guilty in an Italian court for killing her British roommate, Meredith Kercher, while studying abroad in Italy in 2007.

I appreciate knowing your thoughts on this important matter. In December 2009, Ms. Knox, a native of Seattle, was convicted by an Italian jury on charges of murder and sexual violence. During the trial, the prosecution claimed that Ms. Knox killed her roommate with the help of her boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, and an Italian drug-dealer named Rudy Guede. Ms. Knox was sentenced to 26 years in prison.

I was saddened by the verdict, and I agree that many facets of the prosecution’s case against Ms. Knox raise serious questions about her guilt.

In April 2009, Ms. Knox’s attorney, Ted Simon, stated before national media, “There’s brand new information presented as part of Amanda’s appeal by another person…that states for the first time that Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito were not present or were not involved.”

Mr. Simon said that he is confident that new evidence in the 200-page appeal of her murder conviction will force Italian courts to take a hard look at the validity of her prison sentence.

Although the United States government’s ability to influence Italian criminal procedure is limited, I believe that Ms. Knox deserves a fair trial, especially in light of the defense’s new evidence.

I will be closely monitoring Ms. Knox’s appeal, and I will seize any opportunity to stand up for the values of fundamental justice and the rule of law. Thank you again for sharing your concerns with me.

As this tragic case plays out on the international stage, I will keep your views in mind.  If I may be be of additional assistance, please call my Oregon office at 503-326-2901 or 800-422-4003.

With warm regards, David Wu Member of Congress

Below: Congressional District 1 is David Wu’s home district

Tuesday, July 20, 2010

That Widely Watched LA7 TV Interview With Giuliano Mignini - Herewith A Full English Translation

Posted by ziaK

This is a translation of the YouTube video posted by my fellow poster True North two weeks ago.

Many readers asked for a translation of what Mr Mignini said in that interview, and True North, who has pretty good Italian but is not a professional translator, requested some help from the translation team. The sound of the video is not always crystal clear but this appears to accurately reflect what was said. 

Male interviewer: In the biological evidence, is there any one item which is the one which you consider, especially in terms of the trial, to have had the most value?

Giuliano Mignini: I think that, in terms of the trial, the most important were the knife, the bra hook and also the biological traces in the bathroom. From the point of view of the trial, the knife certainly links the two defendants and the victim. Therefore it was (interrupted).

Andrea Vogt: There was low copy number, and that’s not normal, is it, to use DNA when there’s low copy number?

Giuliano Mignini: However, I hold that those traces were nonetheless indisputable traces. That is, there was not an absolute huge amount, in terms that are perhaps more understandable [ndt: to an Italian speaker, “low copy number” is not necessaryily understandable, because it is an English term]. The trace might be really high, with a high quantity, or it may be very low, but however the trace may be, it was never reasonably explained in any other way. That knife was never touched by the victim. She was never (inaudible: possibly “at Raffaele’s”] during the period that the two young folk, the two defendants, knew each other. It was a very short period: we think the relationship was (inaudible) or a week.

Male interviewer: Certainly. However, (inaudible) limited, either a contamination in the place of the crime or a contamination in the laboratory? This is not meant as a criticism of the work, however it is a danger that we technicians have which we must confront.

Giuliano Mignini: Yes. Well, that point about the knife comes from the specific questions of Professor Finsi himself, and of the Superintendant (Parebiochi?), and it was clearly shown that that knife was collected with absolute”¦ that is, there was no possibility of exposure to contact [with the victim?]. Because it was found in Raffaele’s house and it was take with all precautions. This was shown in (inaudible). I was keen to show that (inaudible) that knife.

Andrea Vogt: Also the hook was very controversial because you found it 46 days after.

Giuliano Mignini: Yes, yes. I know. I understand. This, alas, can happen when there are places that are so full of objects, full of”¦ When one is doing an analysis of this type, it can happen that (inaudible) is moved. However, it remained within that room. And (Andrea Vogt interrupts). And then, if there is contamination, that means that Sollecito’s DNA was somewhere within that room. We’re still there (i.e. at the same conclusion). I think that all the evidence was limited [ndt: to the one place?], and the first findings were of an investigative nature. In particular, that includes the numerous contradictions made by Knox. Which were then repeated during the investigation, during the interrogation in jail, and in my opinion also during the questioning and counter-questioning in court.

Andrea Vogt: I want to talk a bit about the motive.

Giuliano Mignini: As a first impression of the [inaudible: crime?] it was clearly, it appeared clearly to be a crime of a sexual nature. It was extremely clear. A young woman, killed in that way, and almost completely stripped/naked.

Male interviewer: Excuse me, but on the contrary, at times I have heard attributed (inaudible) a different reason, a fight which ended badly, and then instead a transformation of the crime to put forward the idea that it was a sexual murder. Also because, in fact, the position of Rudy, who was however found guilty, also from the beginning changed a bit. There’s his responsibility.

Giuliano Mignini: Also Rudy gave indications which then changed a bit. Rudi too, for example, said that there was an appointment with Meredith. Then in later interrogations he said that Meredith had asked for him to be there, and (Male interviewer interrupts: The reconstruction [by Nabil?]: what could have happened?). Yes, according to me, there was a situation, a progressive situation of disagreement between the two girls. That seems undeniable to me.

Friday, July 09, 2010

Third Of Three Excerpts In Italian from LA7 Program On Meredith’s Case

Posted by True North

Again, thanks to TJMK poster Cesare Beccaria for the video links. We posted some background last Friday.

This is the interview with Rudy Guede’s defense lawyer Walter Biscotti, and the continuation of the re-enactment of the crime - warning: it is very jarring, with graphical shots of Meredith’s room after the crime, and then three figures running and two later kissing.

Walter Biscotti claims to the LA7 reporter Andrea Vogt that Rudy Guede entered the house with Meredith, they talked for a while, and then they had consensual sex. Rudy later goes to the bathroom.

He hears Amanda’s voice enter the house. He hears an argument over money between Meredith and Amanda. While listening to his iPod Rudy hears a loud scream.

When he enters Meredith’s room, he sees her bleeding and tries to stench the flow of her blood with a towel. Rudy hears two people outside the house running away, and he also runs away.

Mr Biscotti cannot explain the damning evidence of Rudy found on the pillow under Meredith’s body.

*************

Inserted by Peter: We have been told that Biscotti was trying to claim sexual intimacy not sex. Apparently there is some difference. Please read the following paras by True North in that context. Judge Micheli didnt believe ANY claim of intimacy at Guede’s trial, so Biscotti is contradicting the Micheli sentencing report without making that clear. There is ZERO proof of intimacy, and the claim is ugly and highly disrespectful to Meredith and her family. Biscotti should withdraw it.

*************

The sex claim is old, totally improbable, not born out by any facts in evidence, or by the timeline, Meredith’s moral disposition, or her known plans for the second half of that evening. These were to complete an assignment, and then, since she had been up late the night before (Halloween) to get plenty of sleep.

Meredith never - NEVER - had casual sex and she already had a boyfriend (then traveling) who lived in the apartment down below. Even Walter Biscotti may conceivably be repulsed by this line of defense, but he seems to have no other way of placing Guede legitimately in the house, or explaining the signs of Guede having been involved in a sexual attack on Meredith.

Many have pointed out that it seems a severe weakness of the rather soft-line Italian system that Rudy Guede’s defense can continue to make such offensive claims about a victim, make no confession, offer no full apology, and still emerge with a sentence of only 16 years. Meredith’s family and friends are very ill-served by this, and it fuels a dishonest line by Knox’s supporters. 

Mr Biscotti does strongly finger Amanda Knox by name and one other person who everyone watching would take to be Raffaele Sollecito. The lone-wolf theory, also totally improbable, is not even mentioned here. Nor are the claims by convicted baby-killer Mario Alessi that Guede said he had two other accomplices.

There is of course no huge outcry among Italians over the “wrongful imprisonment” of their fellow Italian Raffaele Sollecito. People in Italy followed the trial in far more depth than they could in the UK or US, and they are not susceptible to any blown smoke, almost certainly including the nasty claims Biscotti makes.

Thursday, July 08, 2010

Second Of Three Excerpts In Italian from LA7 Program On Meredith’s Case

Posted by True North

Thanks to TJMK poster Cesare Beccaria for the video links. We posted some background last Friday.

This is the interview with Knox defense lawyer Luciano Ghirga at his law offices in Perugia, plus a fleeting but telling reenactment.

When the LA7 reporter Andrea Vogt asks Mr Ghirga to explain Amanda’s version of events, he emphatically responds that throughout the trial Amanda has been painted as a liar.

He says that Amanda stayed and never left Sollecito’s house between 5:00 pm and 10:00 am the next morning. He disputes the eye witnesses who claimed to have seen Amanda at the convenience store, and at the piazza above the house with Sollecito around 11:00 pm.

When Ms Vogt asks Mr Ghirga what he thinks about the quality of the evidence, he raises the fact that the bra clasp wasn’t retrieved until 46 days later. He believes the bra clasp evidence was contaminated because it had moved from its original location.

Andrea Vogt says to Mr Ghirga: “You always argued that there was only one perpetrator”. He responds that the trial forensics experts never ruled out the possibility that all of the body wounds, including those on Meredith’s neck, mouth and knees, could have been committed by one person.

**********

Note that in this interview Mr Ghirga never states that Sollecito never left his house that night. He only mentions that Amanda never left that house. In line with the observations of our poster Cesare Beccaria that the defenses rarely give the other defenses any breaks, and often make things more difficult for them.

Both the Micheli sentencing report for RG and the Massei sentencing report for AK and RS conclude that the wounds on Meredith with two knives and the sexual assault HAD to have been done by more than one person, and that dozens of evidence points confirm this.

And Mr Ghirga’s arguments at trial that Knox never left Sollecito’s house were very weak - and undermined by Knox herself and by Sollecito. Even the few straws he grasps at seem to be floating out of reach.

Tuesday, July 06, 2010

First Of Three Excerpts In Italian from LA7 Program On Meredith’s Case

Posted by True North

Thanks to TJMK poster Cesare Beccaria for the video links. We posted some background last Friday.

The male reporter asks Prosecutor Mignini what was the most damning evidence in this case? Mignini replies: the knife, the bra clasp, and the mixed blood traces in the bathroom.

Mignini stands firm when answering Andrea Vogt’s repeated question of what about “the low copy numbers?” He asserts that it was indisputably Meredith’s DNA on the knife. There was never any transfer or contamination of DNA on the knife because Meredith never touched it nor had she ever been to Sollecito’s house.

While admitting that the bra clasp had not been retrieved until 46 days later, there was never any transfer or contamination of DNA on the clasp. He stresses that the bra clasp never left Meredith’s room and yet still had plenty of Sollecito’s DNA on it.

*********

Added: As suggested in Comments below, there seems very good reason to translate all of Mr Mignini’s remarks, and we will be posting a full transcript of this video one day this week.

Monday, July 05, 2010

Curt Knox And Edda Mellas Back In Court - And This Time In The Dock

Posted by Peter Quennell

[Perugia old-city’s smaller piazza with the court at right and Lumumba’s bar ahead down the hill]

Possible to feel some sympathy for Edda Mellas and Curt Knox for the turmoil that their kid has put them through.

Hard to feel too much, though, because of the huge sliming by their campaign of others, the concretely-proven lies they have told on TV, the damage done to the Italian image in the US, and the untold agony to Meredith’s family and friends, for whom they have still shown zero real sympathy.

Barbie Nadeau has the report on their own trial about to start. If their sentence is less than three years, for a first offense it would not incur prison time. However it might not have been the worst experience in the world to see them cooling their heels for a while.

We hope from now truth really breaks out and Edda Mellas gives a full explanation of this, a key aspect of the trial that no reporter and no book-writer has ever pursued (so what’s new?!)

Did Edda Mellas actually lie on the witness stand? Lie when she was under oath?

Friday, June 25, 2010

Amanda Knox’s Supporters Obtain Rome Embassy Cables About Knox, Prove Of No Help

Posted by True North

The American Embassy in Rome above, and the State Department in Washington below.

Ninety-nine percent of the reason why countries put embassies in other countries is because they really want to get along.

The US and Italy in fact do get along, extremely well, and there are thousands of transactions between the two countries every day. Thousands of Americans live in Italy, and millions of Americans are of Italian descent.

At the request of the US Administration, the Italian government recently put a large contingent of Italian troops in Afghanistan.

Under the US Freedom of Information Act,  any American citizen can request and usually obtain astonishing amounts of official documentation, far beyond what can usually be extracted from the bureaucracies in most other countries.

Occasionally this information has embarrassed the department concerned, or the party in power in the Congress or the White House. But usually the documents are innocuous and without drama. Conspiracies simply never show up.

The blogger History Punk on his website Historiographic Anarchy has posted some cables (pdf format) from Rome to Washington, which report periodically on the Rome Embassy’s monitoring of Amanda Knox in Capanne Prison and her trial and appeals in Perugia.

As we would expect, these cables are extremely mundane. They were sent by a middle-level official in the consular section of the Rome Embassy to the Italy desk in the State Department.

They report carefully on the careful Italian legal process, and they never remark on anything wrong. No charges or claims or complaints are relayed from Amanda Knox. There is no talk of any anti-Americanism. No instructions, questions or comments are cabled from Washington in return.

One cable was not released. It was marked confidential and the contents are unknown. Here’s a guess at its contents: “Please keep those xenophobic ranters on a chain - they are doing the American cause in Italy no good at all”. 

My first post here on TJMK and proud of it. This is a good fight I join.

Tuesday, June 22, 2010

The Aviello Story Seems To Show The RS & AK Defenses All But Concede Guilt Of All 3

Posted by Peter Quennell

Defenses Grasping At Straws?

The Sollecito defense latched with alacrity onto baby-killer and jailhouse-snitch Mario Alessi three months ago.

This seemed to have been widely taken in Italy as a sign of the Sollecito defense’s desperate weakness, rather than as a get-out-of-jail-free trump-card for RS.

Several weeks ago, the Amanda Knox defense latched onto Camorra clan-member and jailhouse snitch Luciano Aviello.

With a lot less alacrity though - his various stories have been around for a long time.  This seemed to have been widely taken in Italy as a sign of the Knox defense’s desperate weakness,

Luciano Aviello, who is now in prison, and his brother Antonio, now on the run, are or were connected to the Camorra (NBC Dateline report above) which is Naples’s equivalent of the Cosa Nostra in Sicily and the NDrangheta in Calabria. The Camorra was in some ways the older, larger and badder of the several mafia arms.

Luciano Aviello and Antonio Aviello were living in Perugia at the time the crime against Meredith took place. Over a year ago, our poster Catnip posted this translation of a report from Italy on the Perugia Murder File board.

Saturday 09 May 2009

Prisoner writes: ‘I know real murderer’s name’

“I know the real name of Meredith’s killer, a fellow-brother Albanian friend of mine told me, and it’s not Raffaele Sollecito.” Luciano Aviello is Raffaele Sollecito’s ex-cellmate and, now, maybe encumbering his admirer, is writing another letter to Court of Assize president Giancarlo Massei.

A few weeks ago he had sent a letter in which he claims to have asked two of his friends to break into the murder house to prove that anybody could have done so. Yesterday, the page count of his letter jumped to five, and the tone was angrier.

He’s had it with journalists, because they’ve referred to his less than clear past, and because they wrote about his previous never-proven-true “revelations” on various important and dramatic criminal cases (like the disappearance of little Angela Celentano).

He’s had it with the police too, in whom he confided his secret about Raffaele’s innocence and who didn’t even give him the time of day.

He maintains that, actually, he has a letter written by an Albanian friend, which contains the real name of the murderer, and he wants to speak only to the court president, Giancarlo Massei, to reveal it to him.

Even the lawyer on the civil side of the case, Francesco Maresca, acting for the Kerchers, remains skeptical: “That letter ought to be re-read carefully: it’s not flour from his grainsack*”.

*****************

* This is a proverbial phrase (non è farina del suo sacco = “it’s not grist from his own mill”) meaning it wasn’t written off his own bat, and that other hands contributed to it.

And there is a video of a Sky News Italy report in Italian dated 21 April 2009 which in effect says “this isn’t any big deal’.

Judge Massei showed no interest in him. So Aviello and his kaleidoscopic claims thereupon went onto the back burner.

Fast-forward to several weeks ago, when the Knox defense engages in a high-profile, noisy flurry of activity to get a deposition from Luciano Aviello.

This time, Luciano recalls,  it was actually his own missing brother who did it, and he himself buried some clothing, a knife, and some keys.

Casting total doubt on everything Luciano Aviello ever says, his hometown newspaper Il Mattino in Naples comes out with this report. It is our translation.

The Meredith Case - A Mariano Clan Supergrass Pops Up

“Amanda Is Innocent”

By Gigi di Fiore

In the newsroom of the Mattino he seemed at ease. Luciano Aviello was [20 years ago] just over twenty years old, and had asked to recount his experience as a “streetwise youth in the Mariano Camorra clan”.

In an earlier time, a war was in full swing in the Spanish Quarter [of Naples] between the Mariano clan, the “picuozzo” [another name for this clan after the “picuozzo” or cord around a monk’s habit] and the Di Biase family, also known as the “faiano”.

The DDA (Direzione Distrettuale Antimafia or Distict Anti-Mafia Directorate) did not yet exist, but Federico Cafiero de Raho was already employed as prosecutor in the investigations into organized crime.

It was he who dealt with that bloody war. Twenty years later, Aviello had become a news-magazine character. Now in his own words, he claims to have a rolet in the Perugia trial for the Meredith Kercher case as a “decisive” witness.

On 19 April of last year, he addressed two little hand-written pages to the President of the Court of Assizes of Perugia, Giancarlo Massei. He declared himself ready to tell the truth, and revealed that he had twice given some friends of his the task of breaking the seals on the house where the crime took place.

On 31 March of this year, Amanda Knox’s defense team video-recorded the declarations made by Aviello, who is now 41 years old. As the weekly news-magazine “Oggi” writes, he said: “It was my brother who murdered Amanda [sic]. I can recover for you the knife used in the crime and the keys of that house”.

This fellow arrived on the third floor of via Chiatamone [Editor’s office of the Mattino] wearing casual clothes with a pretence of elegance: he never retracts anything, always seeking to find suitable words to best describe his “revelations”.

Contact lenses, slim, a cousin killed because he was affiliated to the Mariano clan, Aviello spoke, revealing an outline personality, in a shadow world of braggadoccio, always on the sidelines of the dealings and violent acts of those in power among the clans of the Quarter at that time.

He ended up in jail, having confessed to a murder. It wasn’t true, but they had promised him 5 million lira, a lawyer and an annuity.

The clan didn’t respect the pact, and so he began to talk freely. Enticed by the good life, he began to act as a gofer/go-between selling “black lottery” tickets. He felt important. He earned 500 thousand lira per week.

It wasn’t bad. Then he did “embassies” [message-running], little services, but never great criminal leaps. The clans considered him “not very trustworthy”.

He was implicated in the investigation into the Spanish Quarter Camorra, and convicted.

Today, Federico Cafiero, now deputy prosecutor and DDA Coordinator for the investigations into the Caserta province clans, says of him: “He was altogether untrustworthy, although every so often he would invent a new one [new story]. A revelation, as he would call it, which would subsequently reveal itself to be out and out nonsense”.

Such as when he said that he knew where Angela Calentano was to be found, or that he knew the hideouts of the main fugitives of the D’Alessandro di Castellammare clan.

For his “revelations” against Tiziana Maiolo, ex president of the Justice Commission of the Chamber, he was hit with a trial, in 1997, for calumny.

Two years ago, he fired off his biggest tale yet: he accused a public prosecutor from Potenza in the famous trial on “dirty robes” between Catanzaro and Salerno. He was given an audience by the prosecutor Rosa Volpe in Salerno.

He had announced revelations. His contradictions were immediately exposed.

On those occasions also, the sources of his stories were newspaper articles or gossip with his cell-mates. Such as Raffaele Sollecito, or Gennaro Cappiello for the “dirty robes” investigation.

A compulsive liar, a seeker of publicity?

Twenty years ago, Aviello seemed to be a self-centred person, proud to present himself as a witness to “important facts”. But he never managed to arrive at a scheme of constant collaboration.

For various crimes, he has so far served 17 years in jail. Now the Perugia case appears. Who knows?

Our poster SomeAlibi seems to have had the last meaningful word on the absurdity of this tale. SomeAlibi posted this rather devastating satire on the PMF forum.

I can see it now..

Ghirga: “Well thank you Mr Luciano Aviello, that testimony I think the court will find extremely interesting concerning why Amanda Knox couldn’t have done the murder because it was your brother who was responsible. Despite the fact he’s missing. But thank you and I believe we’re finished.”

Luciano Aviello (quietly): “We ain’t finished”

G: “Uh?”

LA: “So, about this de-fa-may-shun thing.”

G: “Uh?”

LA: “She didn’t do it.”

G: “Sorry?”

LA: “She didn’t dooo it.”

G: “But Mr Aviello we brought you here to talk about the murder not the—”

LA: ”—see it sounds like you ain’t hearing me too good. Perhaps you need a little airation of your ears to help you with that. How would a 22 millimetre hole strike ya? She didn’t say nothing. She didn’t doooo it, capice?”

G: “But, she said it in interview. And in court. I mean, we were all there”

LA (putting tooth-pick on witness stand) “See, now you are making me repeat myself and I don’t like that at all, no I don’t. But I am a tolerant man, so maybe once more for luck ok? She didn’t dooooooooo it.”

G: “All of us were there!... She doesn’t actually disagree she said it…. hello… Mr Aviello… hello… what are you…. what are you doing… why are you counting?”

LA: “Now requiring this many pine boxes ain’t going to be ecologically acceptable my friend, so I suggest EVERYONE here learns to listen up real good ok?”

Court (all): “Huh?”

LA: “Repeat after me. She didn’t dooooooooooooooooo iiiit”

Court (all): “Like hell she didn’t”

LA: “Wise guys, huh?”

Well… that certainly went very well! This all reads like an Italian movie called in English Johnny Stecchino by Italy’s favorite funny actor Robertio Benignii

He accidentally finds himself confused with a mafiosos in Sicily, sees his days are very numbered, and starts talking fast. Very fast… He gets out of it, somehow, but the real mafioso still takes the hit.

Nice knowing you, Luciano…

Friday, June 18, 2010

Why UK Media Deniers Like The Independent’s Amy Jenkins Come Across As Bigoted And Nasty

Posted by The Machine

“I can’t personally prove that Amanda Knox is innocent but I would bet every penny I own that she is.”

Bet away, Amy Jenkins.

The meme that Amanda Knox was being railroaded or framed was not too difficult to whip up in the United States.

Amanda Knox was not the first to get some Americans exercised over the notion that foreign meanies were picking on an American “just because he or she is American”.

Historically there have been a few cases for real. And it was easy to research the US dimensions of Meredith’s case in Seattle, and much harder to research the London, Leeds and Perugia dimensions. London, Leeds and Perugia are over there and in Perugia the language is Italian. 

But in London it is much easier to research Meredith, and to nail down the truth about this case.

Meredith was an exceptional person, with a very bright future ahead. And Amanda Knox probably had underlying issues even before she left Seattle, she was certainly on drugs and quite possibly an addict, she was running desperately short of money in Perugia, she quite possibly thought she had been fired because of Meredith, and in her relations with Meredith (and the other two girls in the flat) she was already like oil and water.

Meredith’s family have given some interviews with reporters who won their trust (you can see an image of one in this post) and people who knew Meredith in London and Leeds have talked about her with reporters who won their trust (you can see several in this post).

So it is always a real shock to read those stridently anti-evidence, anti-prosecution, anti-Italy, and frankly anti-Meredith pieces being pushed by a BRITISH journalist.  .

There have been maybe half a dozen British media deniers so far, and the online comments below their reports usually point out in spades how they got many many hard facts wrong. With the exception of the frankly peculiar Peter Popham of The Independent, toward whom not even one good journalist seems to have respect, they are then heard from on the case no more.

But their pieces hurt, and they do real damage. They are hurtful to Meredith’s friends, they have to be very hurtful to her family, and they are hurtful to Italy, the cause of justice, the memory of Meredith, and (in terms of equal and opposite reaction) to Amanda Knox herself. In Italy they do her no good whatsoever.

One of the WORST was this recent article in The Independent by the London-based freelance writer Amy Jenkins.

False claim: Amy Jenkins’s qualifications

Usually she writes about lifestyle, and particular about her own, concerning which she seems to have endless fascination - her articles are usually riddled with “I’ and “me” throughout. The photo below, with her kid for a prop, was actually posted with one of them.

Needless to say, these pieces don’t require very much in the way of research.

Here are some of the non-qualifications for Amy Jenkins to, all of a sudden, for the very first time, focus her attention on a foreign crime.

• She appears to have no history of criminal research and no special knowledge of the law (she dropped out of law school in the first year) 


• She has never stepped foot inside the courthouse in Perugia or attended any of the many court sessions.


• She hasn’t had full, if any, access to the the prosecution’s 10,000 plus pages of evidence.


• She obviously hasn’t read the Micheli report of January 2009 or the Massei report of March 2010.


• She seems not to have a clue who the true victim Meredith Kercher really was or reached out to any of the very handy UK sources.

In other words, Amy Jenkins knows almost nothing about the real facts of the case. She seems to be knowledgeable ONLY about the list of spurious facts disseminated by the FOA, the PR campaign, and the adolescent bunch of Knox groupies..

Any even half-competent journalist would surely have enough common sense and cynicism not to accept what they are told without question, and would independently check all their facts to make sure they are accurate and reliable. She didn’t.

Any even half-competent journalist would also make sure to research all dimensions of a story before settling for a point of view - especially for a very strident, inflammatory, libelous and hurtful one. She didn’t.

False claim: “No forensic evidence”

If any proof was needed that Amy Jenkins knows almost nothing about the case, she provides it right up front by bizarrely and erroneously claiming that that there is no forensic evidence.

If she had actually bothered to read the judges’ sentencing report, which has been available to the public since 4 March, she would have known about all of this forensic evidence:

• The double DNA knife which had Knox’s DNA on the handle and Meredith’s DNA on the blade.


• The detailed medical reports that led the judges to conclude that Meredith must have been stabbed with two different-sized knives.


• The evidence of countless forensic experts who testified that Meredith was attacked by multiple attackers.


• The five instances of Knox’s DNA mixed with Meredith’s blood in three different locations of the cottage.


• Knox’s DNA had united with Meredith’s blood into one single streak on the basin and bidet which means they were deposited simultaneously.


• Knox’s bare bloody footprints which were revealed by luminol in the hallway.


• Three traces of Meredith’s blood in Knox’s room which were revealed by luminol.


• According to two imprint experts, the woman’s bloody shoeprint on the pillow under Meredith’s body matched Knox’s foot size. It was incompatible with Meredith’s shoe size.


• Rudy Guede’s visible bloody footprints led straight out of Meredith’s room and out of the cottage which means he couldn’t have staged the break-in in Filomena’s room or gone into the blood-spattered bathroom.


• The abundant amount of Sollecito’s DNA on Meredith’s bra clasp which proves that Guede and Sollecito were both involved in the stripping of Meredith and her sexual assault.


• The bloody footprint on the blue bathmat which matched the precise characteristics of Sollecito’s foot, but couldn’t possible belong to Rudy Guede.

The forensic and other evidence against Sollecito also implicates Knox. Computer, mobile-phone and forensic evidence provided irrefutable proof that Sollecito’s and Knox’s alibis were false and that they had lied repeatedly to the police.

False claim: “There was no motive”

Actually there were PLENTY of possible motives for Knox at minimum starting a violent taunting of Meredith, and the Miss Represented website suggested a while back that both Sollecito and Knox may have fantasized it.

And while Amy Jenkins seems to think that the prosecutors have to prove a motive in order to secure a conviction, prosecutors in America, Britain and Italy DON’T have to prove a motive. One of the reasons for this is that no-one apart from the murderer or murderers ever really knows for definite why they killed their victim.

Judge Massei suggested the motive was “erotic sexual violence” and that Knox and Sollecito were acting under the influence of drugs, but he could have advanced no firm conclusions and his reasoning and verdict would still remain intact.

False claim: “No previous trouble with the law”

One of the reasons why Amy Jenkins thinks Amanda Knox is innocent is because Knox had no previous legal record. This is argument is quite frankly ridiculous. There have been countless murders throughout history committed by people with no previous record. And in fact Amanda Knox DID have a record.

Perhaps the reason why Amy Jenkins claimed Knox had no previous record was to highlight Rudy Guede’s alleged criminal background?

It seems to be totally obligatory for all Innocenisti journalists to sooner or later refer to Rudy Guede as a “drifter” and a “drug dealer” and to claim that “his DNA was all over” Meredith or the crime scene. Amy Jenkins is no exception:

“Rudy Guede was a drifter and a minor drug dealer. He was on the run and his DNA was all over the murder scene.” 

These two sentences are straight out of the FOA’s handbook. The same terminology has been parotted over and over again by Innocentisti journalists. It seems so obvious that the PR campaign and/or the FOA are spoon feeding these gullible journalists with lines.

Amy Jenkins is clearly ignorant of the fact that Rudy Guede had lived in Perugia since the age of five, and he had his own apartment. Also that he didn’t have a criminal record for drug dealing or any other crime at the time of Meredith’s murder. And also that his DNA was NOT all over the crime scene - there were in fact very few traces..

Amanda Knox is the only one of the three who had a record at the time of Meredith’s murder. She was charged with hosting a party that got seriously out of hand, with students high on drink and drugs throwing rocks into the road, forcing cars to swerve. She was fined $269 (£135) at the Municipal Court after the incident: Crime No: 071830624.

Raffaele Sollecito also had a previous brush with the law. He was stopped by the police and found to be in possession of a small quantity of drugs.

False claim: “Amanda Knox had no lawyer or interpreter”

Amy Jenkins further betrays her ignorance of the case by making the following claim: “She was interrogated with no lawyer and no translator present. She made a phony confession.”

Precisely as in the US or UK, the police weren’t required to provide Knox with a lawyer in the first (quite short) interrogation, because she was being questioned as a witness then, and not as a suspect.

And in fact Knox WAS provided with an interpreter, Anna Donninio. Anna Donninio’s testimony was widely reported-on by the British and American media. In fact Knox herself spoke about her interpreter when she testified at the trial. She says it right here in the video - she actually says the interpreter was trying to help her..

This was very widely reported. If Amy Jenkins had followed the case in the media, she would have known about this. Ten minutes in the archives of The Independent would have turned this fact up.

False claim: “Amanda Knox’s confession was phony”

Amy Jenkins claims that Knox made a phony confession. Hoever it did not escape the judges’ and jury’s attention that Knox’s several confessions contained significant elements of the truth.

• Knox claimed that she was in Piazza Grimana on the night of the murder, which was corroborated by Antonio Curatolo.


• She claimed that there were three people at the cottage when Meredith was killed: herself, Raffaele Sollecito and Diya Lumumba.


• The police were already suspicious of Knox and Sollecito, but they were not aware that there was a third person.


• Knox knew that Meredith had been sexually assaulted before the results of Dr. Lalli’s autopsy report were presented to the court on 8 November 2007.


• Knox knew that Meredith had been sexually assaulted by an African man.


• Knox claimed that she heard Meredith screaming. Nara Capezalli and Antonella Monacchia testified that they heard a loud scream on the night Meredith was murdered.


• Knox stated she heard thuds and this would explain how Meredith received wounds to her skull. The prosecutors believe that Meredith was banged against the cupboard.

And Amy Jenkins has completely ignored the fact that Amanda Knox made a false and malicious accusation against an innocent man, Diya Lumumba, and NEVER withdrew it while he was inside..

Knox admitted that it was her fault that Lumumba was in prison, in an intercepted conversation with her mother on 10 November 2007.

She and her mother both KNEW that her accusation was inaccurate and unjust and that she was responsible for it. However, she didn’t recant the allegation the whole time that Lumumba was in prison.

False claim: “Knox was charged because of frivolous behavior”

Amy Jenkins here willfully misrepresents the prosecution’s case by suggesting that they they thought Knox was guilty simply because she turned a cartwheel at the police station:

“she turned an inappropriate cartwheel. In a Catholic country, it’s clearly not such a leap to go from there to stabbing your room-mate in the neck during a violent sexual assault ““ because that’s the leap the prosecution made.”

So the anti-Catholic venom surfaces here. This bigotry is so common among the deniers. 

Knox wasn’t found guilty because of an “inappropriate” cartwheel and it is not mentioned anywhere in the judges’ sentencing report.

Jenkins reveals a simplistic and superficial knowledge throughout of Italian law. “If convicted of this “slander” the Italians will add six years to her sentence.”

This claim is simply not true. Six years is the maximum sentence. It’s not automatic.

False claim: “It was all because of a need to save face”

“However, at this point the rumour mill about Knox and her boyfriend had been in full flood for 18 days and the authorities had already put Knox behind bars….  To save face, Knox and her poor boyfriend had to be somehow levered into the frame.”

So the anti-Italy venom surfaces here. This bigotry is so common among the deniers. 

Amy Jenkins didn’t even attempt to provide any counter arguments to the mountain of forensic and circumstantial evidence against Knox and Sollecito. Instead she put forwards a silly conspiracy theory:

The notion that several police departments in Perugia and Rome, the three interpreters, and more than TWENTY different judges, including the judges of the Italian Supreme Court, are involved in some huge, sinister conspiracy to frame two innocent people (one of whom is Italian) so that they can all of them save face, is utterly preposterous - and almost certainly it is libelous.

Diya Lumumba was released from prison because unlike either Knox or Sollecito he had an airtight alibi and there was absolutely no forensic evidence linking him to the crime scene. But if the authorities simply wanted to save face they could have kept him in prison instead.

It’s unforgivable for Amy Jenkins or any other journalist for that matter to get basic facts wrong about the case when they can read official court documents.

There is some very bad news on the horizon for David Marriott and the FOA: the judges’ sentencing report will soon be published in English - and very widely disseminated.. They won’t find it so easy to pull the wool over the eyes of gullible, lazy, bigoted journalists like Amy Jenkins in the future.

If Amy Jenkins has even the slightest decency, she will apologize to Meredith’s family and friends.