Headsup: Disney's Hulu - mafia tool?! First warning already sent to the Knox series production team about the hoaxes and mafia connections. The Daily Beast's badly duped Grace Harrington calls it "the true story of Knox’s wrongful conviction of the murder of her roommate". Harrington should google "rocco sollecito" for why Italians hesitate to talk freely.
Category: Evidence & Witnesses
Monday, May 03, 2010
From The Book Darkness Descending: The Insights On Knox And Sollecito
Posted by Peter Quennell
This is Hamburg above. And that is Berlin and its parliament (the Bundestag) below.
Amanda Knox speaks German and she spent several months in these two cities, staying for some weeks in in Hamburg with her relatives, and several days in Berlin, before moving to Perugia to start her study period there.
Darkness Descending is the book on Meredith’s case by two British writers from which we excerpted on Meredith a few days ago.
As far as we know the writers did not visit Seattle, and their focus is more generally on Italy and to some extent the UK. But they did offer this brief take on Amanda Knox, and also one on Raffaele Sollecito.
**********
From Darkness Descending by Paul Russell and Graham Johnson (Pocket Books) pages 291 and 292
Meredith had enjoyed making the pop video with her University of Leeds friends, but Amanda’s summer job, before travelling around Europe and going to Perugia, had not been so successful.
A politically well-connected uncle in Hamburg had got her an internship to die for - a job working for a German MP at the Bundestag. Kindly Uncle Uwe also set Amanda up with a flat on the .outskirts of Berlin.
Astonishingly, two days later, his seemingly ungrateful niece walked out on the job without telling anyone, moaning that she had nothing to do and she wasn’t sure if she was getting paid. Again, money was a big feature in her thoughts.
She’d spent most of the time reading Harry Potter and showed no curiosity about how the parliament or the high-powered people in there worked. She ignored conversations about its history and architecture.
After walking out, she spent her time drinking wine in the local bars and reading more Harry Potter.
Two days later she left Berlin for Hamburg, where her uncle was waiting for her. He was furious - she had let him down.
It seems Amanda craved excitement on her terms, usually based on getting drunk and goofing around.
Her friends said she simply feared boredom like any young girl. She showed a healthy streak of youthful carelessness, they said, no worse or better than anyone else. A video posted on YouTube showed her drunkenly giggling in a friend’s kitchen after downing shots.
On campus, back in the US, Amanda had been fined for being drunk and disorderly at a party held in a fellow student’s house. During the incident she had also insulted the police.
However, her defenders gave another version, portraying a magnanimous Amanda. They said that in fact she was courageously fronting up for her underage friends, who were in no state to talk to the police; she was the only one sober enough to handle the situation.
A big plus in her character assessment, they said, possibly displaying a sense of chivalry that would later get her into deeper trouble in Perugia.
Despite her college party lifestyle, there was no denying that Amanda was clever and that she could compartmentalize her life.
She made the Dean’s List, an elite commendation of the University of Washington reserved for the institution’s brightest students, and an honour that would ultimately qualify her for a prestigious and sought-after place on the study-abroad exchange programme.
If Amanda wanted something, she would go all out to get it, no messing around.
Raffaele Sollecito’s later years were quite different: he seemed to laze around and evade responsibility.
He posted pictures of himself on the internet wrapped in blood-covered bandages, brandishing a meat cleaver, and wrote a weird story to go with the images. In a blog he expressed satisfaction at once being lodged in the same hostel as the infamous ‘Monster of Foligno’, a murderer who slaughtered two youths in the 1990s.
And yet his new-found fascination with gory horror and violent comics would have surprised the friends he left behind at Licea Scientifico Einstein secondary school at Molfetta.
They said Raffaele suffered from excessive softness - his kickboxing instructor recalled that he even hesitated when kicking out, for fear of hurting the hardened expert.
***********
A few interesting insights there, though we could use more on Sollecito. For most of it, this is a pretty good book, the weak part being the closing analysis of the evidence. Two small corrections.
- The house where the notorious rock-throwing party took place was where Knox herself was living at the time. See here.
- Knox was not on an official University of Washington study-abroad program, as the university has rather anxiously tried to make plain. See here.
If Knox had indeed been on a proper study-abroad program - something many caring parents actually insist upon - her behavior might have been more restrained. She may not have moved in with Sollecito for one thing.
She may not have hit the drugs so hard. And she would not have run so desperately short of money, just when Patrick was apparently about to hire Meredith to replace her. No monthly checks were arriving from Seattle.
Maybe the second correction is not such a small one.
In fact, it is a pity that no writers have really explored all of this - there is, if anything, a surfeit of motives in this case, and the writers might be able to narrow them down.
Although he went to highschool in Molfetta (bottom shot here) and the book is correct on that, Raffaele Sollecito actually comes from Giovinazzo which is ten minutes drive south along the coast.
Both are north of Bari, where his father practices medicine.
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
A New York Supreme Court Admits Low Copy Number DNA Testing As Valid
Posted by pat az
[above: the Queens New York Supreme Court]
Cross-posted with an added intro from my own website on Meredith’s case at the kind invitation of TJMK.
The large kitchen knife (image at bottom) found highly cleaned in Sollecito’s apartment was considered by the prosecution (and now by the judges) as the weapon used by Knox and Sollecito to kill Meredith.
Previous posts on the knife on TJMK can be found here. and here, and here, and here, and here, and finally here.
The knife evidence has been persistently attacked by the defenses and their surrogates on these three fronts.
- First, that it didn’t match the fatal wound on Meredith - although, in fact, it did, perfectly.
- Second, that the DNA charts could match others - but, in fact, there were perfect matches at all points with the DNA of both Knox and Meredith.
- And third, that the sample of Meredith’s was too small for valid results using a new kind of testing which it was claimed would be invalid in US courts.
A ruling in the Queens County New York Supreme Court, released on Feb 8th 2010, presents difficulties for Knox supporters using this third argument. It is this same type of DNA test that the Queens Supreme court issued its ruling on, a ruling that allowed results from the new DNA test to be admitted into the Queens trial.
The testing is performed on a very tiny amount of DNA material, and it is called Low Copy Number (LCN) DNA testing. The Queens ruling establishes that results from LCN DNA testing can be entered in as evidence, and is the first challenge to LCN DNA testing in a US court.
While the Queens ruling is only applicable in that jurisdiction, it does establish precedence, and an argument for LCN DNA test results to be accepted at other trials in America.
The DNA test results presented at the Knox trial were key evidence that directly implicated Knox as participating in the murder. Meredith’s DNA was found via LCN DNA testing on a knife found in the apartment of Knox’s boyfriend, and Knox’s DNA was found on the handle of the knife through a regular DNA test. Based on this, Knox was also found guilty of transferring a murder weapon, which added additional time onto her sentence.
The Queens ruling cites “Frye vs. the US” (1923) to determine criteria for acceptance; Frye “requires the proponent of new or novel scientific techniques to establish by sufficient evidence the general acceptance and reliability of the technique within the relevant scientific community”.
The Queens ruling is that the LCN DNA procedure passes this test, and actually isn’t even a “new or novel” technique; merely a refinement of a generally accepted technique. It further states that while the defense may argue critiques of LCN DNA testing (interpretation issues, transference issues), these arguments “do not affect the admissibility of the evidence for trial purposes pursuant to Frye”.
The Queens Supreme Court is one of 62 in the state of New York, and is similar to circuit courts elsewhere. The highest court in the state of New York is called the “Court of Appeals”.
References here and here. An abridged version of this post was first posted here.
Friday, March 12, 2010
Rudy Guede Now Counter-Claims From Prison That Knox And Sollecito Were Real Instigators
Posted by Tiziano
Please click here to read Rudy Guede’s hand-written letter from Viterbo Prison (above) in Italian.
Below is our translation of the letter as posted by TGCom.
Rudy Guede was obviously provoked into putting his version of events out by the claim of Alessi (see video at bottom of this post) that he had a colleague with him on the night, and also by the finding of the judges in the Dispositivo that he was the prime instigator.
The complete text of the letter written by the Ivory Coast man.
Guede’s letter to News Mediaset.
Viterbo 07/03/2010
As usual in this beloved beautiful country of ours, there are many dishonest people given over to lying. And there are likewise those who give these people a voice without the slightest questioning of their consciences, whether it’s worth the trouble of giving space to certain conjectures.
In recent days the only things I have heard have been blasphemous insinuations about me; baseless gossip which has done nothing other than harrying, hither and thither, TV news channels, even though for reasonable people it is the pure invention of a wicked mind.
It must be said that all I have heard in recent days in the media, about what has been falsely stated by this foul being by the name of Mario Alessi, whose conscience is nothing but stinking garbage, are purely and simply the ravings of a sick and twisted mind, his ravings are the dreamed-up, untrue declarations of a monster who sullied himself with a frightful murder in which he took the life of an angelic little human being, as is known throughout Italy. This fellow, now, is telling lies about things that I never said to him and (other things) that I never said, things that don’t exist either in this world or the next.
To his ““ or rather their- rotten declarations, it’s my intention to put in black and white that I never confided in this disgusting creature, since moreover that I’ve got nothing to confess or anything else (to say), and everything that I had to say I have already said to the judges and I will go on shouting and fighting while I am still alive, until the truth itself and justice itself prevail over such lies, and even less did I speak one to one or together with other people or with other inmates about my trial affairs, and if I had ever had something to say, don’t you believe that I would have talked about it with my lawyers? Giving rise to and giving credit to what is a blasphemous statement made by a sick mind, to a monster who had no pity for a child.
With this latest scenario, which my lawyers, my family and I are now used to, from this latest person, the monster Alessi, I hope that Italians and the rest of the world realise that they are dealing with pigs, pigs which stink of the slime of falsehood, but which, not withstanding everything, go around showing their faces and suffocating people with their fetid lying.
Like their umpteenth scenario which does nothing more than give me the strength and the awareness to struggle more than ever, so that the truth that they want to hide is revealed for everyone to see.
As far as I’m concerned, (I have) the serenity and the calm of complete peace of mind, as a person who does not parade this unfair suffering, but who trusts in justice and in the good sense of Italians.
And finally I wish that sooner or later the judges will recognise my complete non-involvement in what was the horrible murder of the splendid, magnificent girl who was Meredith Kercher, by Raffaelle Sollecito and Amanda Knox.
Guede Rudy
Below: Alessi’s statement at Viterbo Prison to Raffaele Sollecito’s defense team. Warning: this very self-serving statement by Alessi is graphic and offensive, as well as, in our view, almost certainly untrue.
Rudy Guede will be interrogated on the claims in this statement today Friday by Mr Mignini and Ms Comodi at Viterbo Prison. There could be news coming out of this interrogation later today.
Thursday, March 04, 2010
Sentencing Report: Barbie Nadeau Quotes The Motive, Physical Evidence, And Alibis
Posted by Peter Quennell
Please click above for Barbie Nadeau’s full report on the Daily Beast website. Key excerpts.
1) The motive
“One can hypothesize that the bad decision came after the consumption of stupefying substances.”
But they disagreed on the motive. The prosecution lawyers began their case in January, 2009 by arguing that Kercher was killed during a sex game gone awry. By closing arguments, they had changed the theory slightly, trying to make the case that Knox resented her prissy British roommate and killed her in hatred. The jury rejected both theories, and the reasoning document declares that “the killing was carried out with no planning, no animosity and no revenge against the victim.
“The two young lovers, interested in each other and in the intellectual and cultural world around them, would not have made a conscious decision to kill Kercher. Instead, the judge wrote, they killed spontaneously under the influence of drugs. “One can hypothesize that the bad decision came after the consumption of stupefacente””stupefying substances””that Amanda verified in her testimony.”
As the jury saw it, Knox, Sollecito and Rudy Guede, the Ivory Coast native who was convicted for his role in Kercher’s murder after a fast-track trial in 2008, came to the house the two girls shared in order to get high. Guede used the toilet, then became aroused when he saw Knox and Sollecito making out. He went to Kercher’s room and made sexual advances toward her. The reasoning refers to evidence presented at Knox’s trial that Guede was the type of guy that “bothered women” when he was under the influence.
Then, according to the reasoning, Kercher cried out for help, but instead of helping her, Knox and Sollecito, their judgment impaired, decided instead to help Guede. The killing was based on “sexual-erotic violence” but not with Knox as the mastermind. The jury felt that it was Guede who led that attack, and the other two, too high to know better, joined in.
2) The physical and forensic evidence
The judge’s reasoning also underscores what the jury believed to be the most important elements of the prosecution’s forensic case. They believed that a kitchen knife with Knox’s DNA on the handle and a trace of Kercher’s on the blade was the weapon that made the large fatal wound in Kercher’s neck. They also referred to Sollecito’s “knife habits,” surmising that, as an admitted collector of blades, he likely used his own knife to make the second wound. The jury agreed that Sollecito and Knox conspired to stage a break-in in another bedroom to cover their tracks.
And they attributed an unidentifiable bloody shoeprint found on the pillow under Kercher’s body to Knox, even though the prosecution only implied that it was compatible with a woman’s shoe size. A spot of Knox and Kercher’s mixed blood in one of the bedrooms, found using Luminol, and four additional spots in the small bathroom the girls shared also swayed the jurors.
“These were left when Amanda was cleaning her hands and feet of Kercher’s blood,” the judge wrote.
3) The Knox and Sollecito alibis
The judge also wrote emphatically about the lack of credible alibi. Although Knox and Sollecito claimed to be at his apartment all night, “Not one phone call, not one meeting, no computer activity or any other element proved that they stayed at that apartment.” And the judge was particularly hard on Knox for accusing Patrick Lumumba, an innocent man, of the murder “knowingly and deceivingly.”
Overall, however, it appears that the jury was sympathetic to the two suspects, but ultimately felt that they committed a crime for which they must pay a hefty price.
Sunday, February 28, 2010
This Was Definitely Not A Close Or Indecisive Case - Reasonable Doubt Was In Fact Totally Eliminated
Posted by FinnMacCool
Trashing Of Hard Evidence Gets Worse
You can see from the posts directly below that the Knox-was-framed camp is, if anything, becoming more superficial with all those pesky facts rather than less.
Hard reality is that nobody has ever come within light-years of constructing an alternative scenario of the crime. Hard reality is that for Knox and Sollecito the totality of the facts, seen together as the judges and jury did, are extremely damning. Hard reality is that the verdicts were decisive and unanimous. And hard reality is that Judges Sentencing Report due out some time this week will apparently be quite definitive.
Please click here for more
Friday, February 05, 2010
True Justice Is Rendered For Patrick Lumumba (Sort Of)
Posted by Tiziano
Above & below: Patrick’s bar which Knox managed to drive out of business.
1. Explanation of calunnia
Knox was prosecuted by the Republic of Italy, not by Lumumba, on a calunnia charge and her prison sentence was extended when she was found guilty of that.
The charge of calunnia (art. 368) has been commonly translated as “slander” in the English/US media. This translation is incorrect, however, as calunnia is a crime with no direct equivalent in the respective legal systems.
The equivalent of “criminal slander” is diffamazione, which is an attack on someone”Ÿs reputation. Calunnia is the crime of making false criminal accusations against someone whom the accuser knows to be innocent, or to simulate/fabricate false evidence, independently of the credibility/admissibility of the accusation or evidence.
The charges of calunnia and diffamazione are subject to very different jurisprudence. Diffamazione is public and explicit, and is a more minor offence, usually resulting in a fine and only prosecuted if the victim files a complaint, while calunnia can be secret or known only to the authorities. It may consist only of the simulation of clues, and is automatically prosecuted by the judiciary.
The crimes of calunnia and diffamazione are located in different sections of the criminal code: while diffamazione is in the chapter entitled “crimes against honour” in the section of the Code protecting personal liberties, calunnia is discussed in the chapter entitled “crimes against the administration of justice”, in a section that protects public powers.
2. Knox Defense
Knox took the stand for two days during her trial, of course, trying to explain why she did what she did to her kindly former employer.
She only seemed to dig herself in deeper.
3. Patrick’s Win
Now Terni In Rete confirms his government compensation for his several weeks in Capanne and some damaging badmouthing.
CASSATION: EIGHT THOUSAND EUROS FAIR COMPENSATION FOR PATRICK LUMUMBA
February 4th, 2010
By Adriano Lorenzoni
The fourth criminal session of the Court of Cassation has established that the sum of eight thousand Euros is fair compensation for Patrick Lumumba, the Congolese involved in spite of himself in the murder of the English student, Meredith Kercher.
Lumumba was dragged into involvement by Amanda Knox, and precisely because of her statements spent 14 days in prison. Then the elements gathered by the investigators completely exonerated him. For that unjust imprisonment Lumumba had requested damages of 516 thousand Euros.
In the trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher, Amanda Knox was condemned to 26 years imprisonment, her ex-fiancé, Raffaele Sollecito to 25.Knox, precisely for her false accusations against Lumumba, was condemned to the payment of damages of the sum of 50 thousand Euros with an interim award, immediately applicable, of ten thousand Euros. Neither Lumumba nor his lawyer wished to comment on the decision of the Court of Cassation.
Thursday, January 07, 2010
The False Accusation By Amanda Knox Against Patrick Lumumba
Posted by The Machine
This incisive video by our main poster ViaDellaPergola explores Amanda Knox’s accusations against Patrick Lumumba - made even though she knew very well he had then been at his bar.
These accusations resulted in Patrick’s arrest and imprisonment on the morning after the night that she first voiced them. Knox first made the claims as a WITNESS and so no lawyer was present, and so the statement was not entered into evidence.
But later on 6 November 2007 when she was in her prison cell as a SUSPECT she wrote her claims all out again. This purely voluntary written statement (alibi version 4) by definition puts her at the scene of the crime.
This written statement WAS entered into evidence - and not retracted or modified in any way until all believability had flown, and Patrick was already back home with his family.
In fact, it was not until she was on the stand on June 12 and 13 2009 that Amanda Knox came up with Alibi Version 5. This is the one never supported by Sollecito - where she claimed she was at his place all night. Amanda Knox STILL has no alibi that stands firm.
Knox is being prosecuted by the Republic of Italy, not by Lumumba, on a calunnia charge.
Explanation of
calunnia
The charge of calunnia (art. 368) has been commonly translated as “slander” in the English/US media. This translation is incorrect, however, as calunnia is a crime with no direct equivalent in the respective legal systems.
The equivalent of “criminal slander” is diffamazione, which is an attack on someone”Ÿs reputation. Calunnia is the crime of making false criminal accusations against someone whom the accuser knows to be innocent, or to simulate/fabricate false evidence, independently of the credibility/admissibility of the accusation or evidence.
The charges of calunnia and diffamazione are subject to very different jurisprudence. Diffamazione is public and explicit, and is a more minor offence, usually resulting in a fine and only prosecuted if the victim files a complaint, while calunnia can be secret or known only to the authorities. It may consist only of the simulation of clues, and is automatically prosecuted by the judiciary.
The crimes of calunnia and diffamazione are located in different sections of the criminal code: while diffamazione is in the chapter entitled “crimes against honour” in the section of the Code protecting personal liberties, calunnia is discussed in the chapter entitled “crimes against the administration of justice”, in a section that protects public powers.
Friday, November 27, 2009
The Summations: Patrick Lumumba’s Lawyer Describes Defamation By Knox As Ruthless
Posted by Peter Quennell
Click here for Nick Pisa’s noon report from the courtroom. Some excerpts:
Today the lawyer acting for bar owner Patrick Lumumba, who Knox blamed for the murder, was harsh in his judgement of the American student.
Lawyer Carlo Pacelli described Knox as a ‘talented and calculated liar, who had deliberately gone out of her way to frame Patrick.’
Mr Pacelli recalled how Knox had told police she ‘covered her ears as Patrick murdered Meredith. This was all a lie, his destiny at that moment was marked.
‘It was a ruthless defamation that destroyed Patrick as a man, husband and father. By naming him she hoodwinked the officer in charge of the murder investigation.’
Mr Lumumba was held for two weeks in custody before being released without charge after witnesses came forward to say he was at his Le Chic bar the night Meredith was murdered.
Mr Pacelli added: ‘Who is the real Amanda Knox ? Is it the one we see before us her, simple water and soap, the angelic St Maria Goretti (a teenager made a saint by the Catholic Church after she was murdered by an attempted rapist)?
‘Or is she really a she devil, a diabolical person focused on sex, drugs and alcohol, living life to the extreme and borderline -is this the Amanda Knox of November 1st 2007 (night Meredith was murdered).’
As he spoke, Knox could be seen writing notes to herself on the pad before her.
‘Conclusions drawn before knowing anything,’ she wrote, before adding: ‘In prison you don’t become a better person you become worse unless you have a inner light that guides you.’
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Italians Have For A Long Time Known How Depraved And Cruel The Final Struggle Was
Posted by Our Main Posters
An Exceptionally Vicious Attack
As you can see in the prosecutors’ scenario posted below, we did not translate and post quite everything.
Meredith’s final 15-minute death-struggle is not there.
Back in January of this year the Micheli Report described in great detail Meredith’s autopsy, the wounds on her body, and the horrific state of her room.
Please click here for more
Monday, November 23, 2009
The Prosecutions’ Closed-Court Reconstruction Of A Brutal And Prolonged Torture Attack
Posted by Our Main Posters
Prosecution video not entered in evidence; this is from the fairly accurate Lifetime Movie
1. The Presentation In Closed Court
The time-line and reconstruction of the attack below were presented in court on Friday 21 November 2009 by the national crime-scene team.
From interviews Italian media reported an account of a premeditated and prolonged attack on Meredith. It included a very graphic computer simulation which upset many in the closed court.
This post relies on those media reports and documents later filed with the court. The simulation was deliberately not placed in evidence as there were fears that if uploaded to YouTube the expected highly negative public reaction could be too prejudicial to the accused.
2. Timeline For Night Of 1-2 Nov
The timing of all the events depicted were multiple-sourced except for the arrival of Rudy Guede, the timing of which is unknown but seems to have been late - maybe around 11:30 pm. Prior to that Knox and Sollecito are depicted as being on watch from the park above while a disabled car is removed. Meredith is inside from around 9:00 PM.
15:48: Meredith texts to her English friends that she will be slightly late for her dinner meeting with them.
16:00 - Meredith leaves the house in Via della Pergola to go to the home of her friends. A few minutes later Raffaele and Amanda leave the cottage in Via della Pergola to go Sollecito’s place.
18:00 - Amanda Knox leaves Raffaele Sollecito’s house. This is indicated by cell phone records.
18:27 - Raffaele Sollecito interacts with his laptop to watch the film “Amelie” alone at home.
20:18 - Amanda Knox in Via Ulisse Rocchi receives a text message (sms) from Patrick Lumumba telling her not to come to work that night.
20.30 - Amanda Knox goes back to Via Garibaldi to the apartment of Raffaele Sollecito.
20:38 - Amanda sends a text message (sms) in reply to Patrick Lumumba.
20:46 - Sollecito turns off his mobile phone. He is still at home in Via Garibaldi.
20:45 ““ Meredith’s meal of pizza with her English friends ends. She starts off in the direction of Via della Pergola with a girlfriend who will leave her halfway to go to her own home.
21:00 - Meredith is at home, she eats a mushroom, she lies down on her bed, and she reads some university lecture notes.
21:10 - From this point on there is no more human interaction with Raffaele Sollecito’s computer.
21:45 - Amanda and Raffaele leave his apartment and go to the Piazza Grimana. Less than 100 meters away from the house in Via della Pergola, the two talk and watch the house and decide what to do. They show a suspicious attitude which is reported in court by the witness Curatolo
23:20 - Amanda opens the door of Via della Pergola.
23.20 - Amanda, Raffaele and Rudy enter the house in Via della Pergola, where Meredith is already present in her room [On the court video there is no simulation of the meeting between Amanda and Rudy, because the reconstruction is based on testimony, the autopsy evidence and medical findings.]
23:21 - Amanda and Raffaele go into Meredith’s bedroom, while Rudy goes into the bathroom.
23:25 - A scuffle begins between Amanda, helped by Raffaele, and Meredith. The English girl is taken by the neck, then banged against a cupboard. Rudy Guede enters and joins in.
23:30 - 23:45 [see Part 3 below] Depiction in the timeline and computer simulation of a prolonged struggle with Meredith at knifepoint, largely undressed, with her several times trying to regain her feet. She was not raped, though sexual humiliation occurred.
23:50 - Amanda and Raffaele take Meredith’s mobile phones and they leave the apartment. Guede goes into the bathroom to get several towels to staunch the blood, then puts a cushion under Meredith’s head.
00.10 - Meredith’s mobile phones are thrown into a garden in Via Sperandio.
00.15 - From this moment, there are no certainties on the times for the rearrangement of the crime scene carried out by Amanda and Raffaele Sollecito. However according to the prosecution in the wee hours of the night Knox and Sollecito returned to the scene of their crime to try and clean up some footprints and to break the window glass of Filomena’s room. The aim was to simulate a robbery that ended in murder and they are charged with this too.
3. Reconstruction Of Attack
It must be emphasized that these EXCERPTS of SUMMARY notes by the crime scene team are only intended to accompany (1) extensive narrative descriptions by various members of the team, (2) references to numerous items in evidence, (3) the simulation video, and (4) questions from the court.
It was made clear that the analysis indicates that Meredith put up a tremendous fight, over a period of approximately 15 minutes, with three strong attackers, before she finally succumbed holding one side of her neck to try to stop her lifeblood running out. She may not have died for as long as one hour.
Italian media reported that those in the closed court told them the Knox and Sollecito defenses raised no disputes or objections of any length except over having the video placed in evidence. Rudy Guede and his legal team had no standing in this court.
RECONSTRUCTION OF ATTACK - FRIDAY 21 NOVEMBER 2009
Excerpts from pages 4 to 14 of the technical report on file with the court.
On the left door of the white wardrobe with sliding doors is found, at a height of approximately 50cm, a high concentration of blood traces.
It is reasonable to suppose that, at the moment of the assault, the victim was kneeling down, or in a similar position, in front of the same wardrobe.
The woman then dragged herself (or was dragged by the attacker or attackers) along the floor to the inside left shoulder of the same piece of furniture, and was later found dead in this same spot (this consideration is drawn from the presence of clear blood streaks).
This reconstruction is further confirmed from a technical scientific point of view, by the results of the technical report on B.P.A. (Blood Pattern Analysis) performed by the Principal Technical Director [D.T.P.] Physics, Dr. Francesco Camana, as a result of the site inspection on 18 December 2007”¦
On the left hand of the victim it is possible to observe numerous blood spots and, in particular, a larger patch on the tip of the index finger of the same hand.
The circumstances lead us to believe that the victim’s hand was near the wound when the blow was inflicted or was brought to that point a few moments later.
This consideration can lead us to think that the individual who was holding the victim still, immediately after this blow, struck in all likelihood by another person, relaxed his or her grip and the woman was able, at the same time, to put her left hand on the wound.
It is interesting to observe that there were no stains of a similar nature on the woman’s right hand.
It cannot be excluded, therefore, that the victim’s right arm remained in the grip of the attacker who, in so doing, probably held the body of the victim until the moment she fell onto the floor.
“¦ The observation, in sequence, of the light blue sweatshirt, of the white T-shirt worn by the victim, of the type of stain in the breast area of the victim and of the bra, allow us to develop other important evaluations.
Firstly we must focus our attention on the characteristics of the stain on the aforementioned sweatshirt.
In fact, this appears to be soaked with blood on the right hand side, i.e., in correspondence of one of the lesions produced in the victim of the attack.
This aspect is a confirmation of the possibility that the garment was worn [by the victim] at the moment of the crime.
Further observations lead us to believe the garment was rolled towards the neck and that the zipper was open.
Further, it must be held that the aforementioned sweatshirt was removed in a second moment from the body of the victim who still wore it. “¦
The clear splashes of blood found on the central part of the breasts allow us to argue as follows.
At the moment the blow was struck the breasts were covered only by the bra and as the sweatshirt and the white T-shirt were rolled up towards the shoulders….
The victim’s bra was found near the feet of the dead body, both straps and the closing band appear to be neatly cut.
On the bra cups and on the breasts of the victim there are numerous traces of blood.
Therefore, the bra was certainly worn by the victim before the violent action by the attacker [started and] caused its removal, allowing blood spray to cover that part of the body. “¦
An analysis of the autopsy photographs shows the presence of bruises on both elbows and on the right forearm of the body, caused by the tight grip of one of more persons who in one or more stages of the event interacted violently with the arms of the victim.
Such lesions are, in fact, due to the rupture of subcutaneous capillaries following strong pressure on the point “¦.