Category: Excellent reporting
Meredith Stories In Croydon Guardian Now Top Ninety EDIT
Posted by Peter Quennell
[click for larger image]
Above: the new shot of Meredith that the UK’s Croydon Guardian is now running with its stories which appear about weekly.
Meredith was not born in Croydon half an hour south of the center of London. But she went to school there, and she lived most of her first 18 years there.
Although she made many friends during her two years at Leeds University, and quite a few in Perugia, those friends she would have known longest all lived in this area.
In our early days, a Croydon Guardian reporter reached out to us, and the paper ran a story on TJMK. We got to be labeled “conspiracy theorists” whereas our main role is just the opposite, but the story meant well and we keep an eye on the website.
The paper’s reports on the case have all been factual and sympathetic Even if they were the only source of news on the case locally, Croydonites would be better informed on the case than most Brits. Nothing in-depth written about Meredith herself, though, and no friends of Meredith ever quoted as of yet.
She appears to be wearing braces in the shot above, by the way. Setting herself up for a lifetime of nice smiles.
Posted by Peter Quennell on 04/08/09 at 04:43 PM •
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Excellent New Report From Italy In The Latest Newsweek
Posted by Media Watcher
Click above for the story by Rome-based Barbie Nadeau.
The best so far on the Meredith v Knox focus that we are here to re-balance. Newsweek has now set us up with a real challenge, it seems.
By the way, Newsweek has emerged as a real powerhouse of a news magazine in the past four or five years, with a really terrific group of writers.
On the news-magazine front, it is now about as influential as the New York Times on the newspaper front, and the BBC on the broadcast-news front.
Thanks for reading, muffle up well if you are in cold climes, and see you on Monday.
Posted by Media Watcher on 01/01/09 at 05:05 PM •
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Honest, Accurate TV Coverage Has Been HIGHLY Overdue
Posted by The Machine
[Above: Anne Bremner blows smoke]
NBC have shown the other American television networks how to make an objective documentary about the case.
I know that a lot of work went into making the NBC Dateline programmes with over 40 hours of tape shot for both stories. I hope the the likes of CBS News and ABC News now follow suit.
And that they always - always - remember this: Meredith Kercher’s murder was exceptionally brutal and sadistic. Specifically:
- She was sexually assaulted and viciously teased with a knife for many minutes before the final stab.
- And after the torture, she died a slow and intensely painful death, clutching her neck with both hands.
- She might still have been saved - but a conscious decision was made that she wouldn’t be.
- And this was then followed by two days of apparent glee on the part of the two defendants.
The news channels have to get their coverage right from now on. The case is precedent-setting in several ways, and far too important for the media to play fast and loose with the facts.
Hints of anti-Italy xenophobia have abounded in the American commentary. Such abysmal coverage would never have happened if this was an all-American case - the real victim would be there front and center, not a defendant with a notably odd history.
The parents of the prime suspect should not be allowed to dictate the content of the documentaries and news reports. The media have a duty to report objectively and not be used as vehicles for the Amanda Knox PR campaign. Some of the documentaries on the case have been essentially free advertisements for Amanda’s PR company.
I hope any future documentaries don’t include an interview with Curt Knox talking with great authority about Amanda’s interrogation despite the fact he wasn’t actually present. Amanda’s lawyer has already stated for the record that Amanda wasn’t hit by the police, so Curt can’t repeat that false allegation.
Juju Chang of ABC won’t be able to repeat the wild claim that the double DNA knife has been essentially ruled out after Patrizia Stefanoni confirmed that Meredith’s DNA is on the blade of the knife and Judge Paolo Micheli accepted it as evidence.
Rudy Guede was convicted of the sexual assault of Meredith, which means that the deeply offensive and untrue claim that there was no evidence of sexual assault can’t be repeated.
Instead of Anne Bremner analysing the wrong crime scene and ranting about Italian incompetence in a desperate attempt to discredit the investigation, the documentary makers should interview somebody who is actually an expert in forensic investigations.
Renato Biondo would be the best person to interview. He provided independent confirmation that the forensic investigation was carried out correctly, following international protocol. The only person guilty of incompetence was Anne Bremner.
It is always highlighted in documentaries that Amanda’s confession was thrown out by the Italian Supreme Court. However, they never mention that one of Amanda’s statements in which she admits to being at the cottage when Meredith was murdered was not thrown out by the Italian Supreme Court.
Her note to the police on 6 November is almost identical in content to the statements that were not admitted as evidence.
And Amanda Knox was not given the nickname Foxy Knoxy by the European press. It was a nickname she used herself on her MySpace page.
It’s wrong that inconvenient and incriminating facts are airbrushed out of these programmes. There has been a deliberate attempt to mislead and manipulate the general public.
The media should always have an ethical commitment to the truth, and they should never forget that it was Meredith who was the real victim of this terrible crime.
Unfortunately, this hasn’t always been the case. Well done, NBC, for breaking the mould.
Now CBS News, ABC News, and other television networks owe it to Meredith and her poor family to get it right, the next time they cover the case.
Posted by The Machine on 12/22/08 at 12:14 AM •
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US NBC TV’s Fair And Factual “Mystery of Meredith’s Murder”
Posted by Skeptical Bystander

The consensus here is that the NBC Dateline presentation a few days ago was the most balanced US media treatment of the case to date.
One of the first US network presentation, by CBS on its 48 Hours program, was particularly bad and the word is out now that CBS is wrapping up its second attempt. Maybe the CBS producer will take a page from the Dateline book - or at least lose Paul the plaintive PI this time around.
Dateline did an especially good job of cutting through the fog created by the media storm over this case since the first arrests were made on November 6, 2007.
Dateline also did a good job of laying out the basics in an objective and comprehensive manner for people with no prior knowledge. There just were a couple of factual errors””for example, that DNA was found on a tampon. In fact, the swab used to obtain such samples is called a “tampone” in Italian.
The Dateline program drew on some collaborative work by the posters on the PMF forum and predecessors. Here is the pleased observation of Kermit, a major contributor there and here.
A word of congratulations to all of us, the descendants of Steve Huff’s boards. What a surprise I had as I watched the Dateline show and saw, on the projected screen behind the presenters, our measurement analysis of the Double DNA knife.
It was obviously ours, as it came out of a discussion on the original board… concerning the length of the knife. At the time of that discussion in the spring, I dug up a Matrix screen shot of the knife (easily identifiable by the red “Matrix” tag in the upper lift. Since the ILE ruler didn’t go the whole length of the knife, I doubled it, then marked 17.5 cm length that I estimated the knife blade to be.
And now NBC has used that item. Such material, along with translations and analysis you just won’t find [other than on these forums]
The crack former FBI profiler Clint Van Zandt, very widely respected here in the U.S., was the anchor crime analyst on the piece. Mr Van Zandt still thoughtfully interacts with people who post comments on his own excellent blog and he had this to say there of his role:
This case has been challenged by the family, friends and supporters of Knox, some who have spoken to me to provide their version of what happened and why Amanda is innocent. As seen on the Dateline special, Knox’s family states what they believe as truth, although, of course, they were not there.
I have received a ton of e-mail this past year with criticism for either supporting Knox or trying to convict her. Neither, of course, is true. Like many of you, I only want to see justice done for Meredith and want those responsible for her death held responsible the part they played in her death.
Another excellent blog, the Eclectic Chapbook, has been offering commentary on this case within its usual eclectic mix of posts on crime and literature from the outset. No comments - or comment deletions, unlike the notorious Seattle PI reader’s blog which was a front for a secret book till we blew its cover. Just an excellent, straightforward presentation of the facts and the plot twists.
In reviewing the Dateline program, Eclectic Chapbook caustically remarks that NBC did not escape the PR-driven parent trap, and it played into the fiction that Amanda’s parents are what the PMF commenter DLW has referred to as a modern-day Ozzie and Harriet, the American TV icons of married bliss.
I have only one criticism of the show. One segment included an appearance by Amanda Knox’s biological parents together. I was very offended by it. I felt it was a deliberate attempt to mislead and deceive the public, because their joint appearance misrepresents the household and home environment from which Amanda Knox emerged before she traveled to Perugia.
From what I understand, Knox came out of a blended family. Each of her parents has remarried to other spouses. Amanda Knox’s home environment consisted of her biological mother and sister, plus her mother’s new spouse. This new spouse never appeared on the show at all, which I found very weird. I presume Knox may have some step-siblings, too, in addition to her natural sister.
The joint appearance by Amanda Knox’s biological parents came off as a sham, a charade and a fraud. It was an insult to the intelligence of the American Public. Blended families are not so unusual these days. I’m sure the American Public can cope with the issue
Early on, it was apparently decided that Knox’s biological parents made a better team in the role of parents on television and in press interviews, even though Curt Knox and Edda Mellas got divorced nearly twenty years ago (Amanda Knox is 21) and both have since married again.
They do sometimes look like strangers thrown together by fate. Which, come to think of it, is pretty close to reality..
Posted by Skeptical Bystander on 12/16/08 at 12:01 AM •
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The Kerchers’ Hometown Paper Profiles Our Site
Posted by The Editor
This story has just been posted on the Croydon Guardian website.
Thank you, Croydon Guardian of south London. We are honored that this first media mention was right there where Meredith’s family lives.
And where the great sadness and loss and sense of wrong we also feel lingers on.
The one amendment we might offer to the story is this. We don’t see a conspiracy of the media to misreport as such.
But we do think there was something of a herd-mentality media rush-to-judgment here that was pretty light on the facts.
And that some misreporting continues, right up to today. Just scroll down below and you will see it.
The tide seems to be turning, though, and a rebalancing of the coverage is perhaps now in progress.
Meredith was the real victim here. And her much-suffering family in south London. The last media holdouts should take note.
Posted by The Editor on 11/11/08 at 08:39 PM •
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