Category: The prosecutors

Sunday, May 19, 2013

Contrary To Reported Claim By Amanda Knox There Is Zero “Wave Of Defamation Suits”

Posted by Peter Quennell





No defamation suits have begun. But actually it is WORSE. And Knox would be suicidal to leave her story unchanged.

Bob Barnett and Ted Simon and anyone else presumably trying to give Knox good advice might like to take note. Canada’s National Post is reporting this:

Her book, which earned her an advance of almost $4-million, also risks inflaming Italian public opinion, offending the nation’s judges and triggering a wave of new defamation actions by the police and prosecutors she accuses of framing her.

“People asked me if I would change the book and I said absolutely not “¦ I am not going to change my story just because someone is threatening to sue me but I mean “¦ it sucks. It sucks and it sucks.”


Defamation, slander and libel refer to private, personal, civil suits against other persons who tell a malicious untruth. Knox and Sollecito are not (or not yet) facing anything like that.

Each through their unwise books and interviews has sparked a single investigation by a Chief Prosecutor (in Florence, Verona and Bergamo) into whether they are in contempt of court.

Those who would seek to undermine the due process of the Italian justice system and the proper functioning of the courts (very, very rare now) in this or the associated Monster of Florence case seem to include all of the following:

  • The three regional mafias;
  • A few defense lawyers and well-funded defendants;
  • Politicians shielding corruption;
  • In some instances the freemasons.
  • Those wanting investigations like MOF/Narducci to drop dead;
  • Muckraking magazines like Oggi;
  • Some anti-Italy foreigners.

None of them are simply pro-Amanda. All of them have hidden agendas, and all are already under the eye of law enforcement. Fighting institutions that make the public safe can make for strange bedfellows.

It has also especially in Italy led to powerful if usually latent ways to push back. 

If officers of the Italian courts are publicly accused of crimes in the media while a legal process is playing out, and the claims are malicious and untrue, this is not a civil matter (defamation, slander or libel).

It is a criminal matter (in the UK and US too) for which sentences can include long prison terms.

If the officers of the Italian court who are attacked are very senior and have an antimafia role they are REQUIRED BY LAW to request a criminal investigation by a chief prosecutor to take place.

They esentially have no further role themselves except to provide true testimony in court.

A range of measures is then available to investigating chief prosecutors, up to and including invoking the powers of the Council of Magistrates and even the President of the Italian republic. 

Knox and Sollecito both seem to have point-blank accused a number of officers of the court of crimes. In Deputy Prosecutor General Mignini’s case, he has been accused by both of them. The most serious:

  • By Sollecito of offering an illegal deal to make him sell out on Knox. Both Mignini and Sollecito’s father categorically stated that this was a criminal lie.

  • By Knox of illegally interrogating her about Patrick with no defense lawyer present. But the trial record shows Mignini was not even in the room.

These seem to be about as open-and-shut as contempt of court cases can ever get. “Sollecito and Knox, did you make these false claims or not? Yes or no?”

If the answer is yes, they’ll lose any criminal case in the blink of an eye. Thereafter many private or civil defamation suits can be expected.

Posted by Peter Quennell on 05/19/13 at 10:08 PM • Permalink for this post • Archived in Defendants in court,  Amanda Knox,  The officially involved,  The prosecutors,  The legal followups,  Knox followup,  Hoaxes against Italy,  3 No evidence hoax,  9 Mignini v Knox hoax,  Hoaxes Knox & team,  16 Interrogation hoax,  Hoaxers from 2007,  Knox-Marriott PR,  Hoaxers from 2011,  Amanda Knox #2 • Comments here (25)

Tuesday, February 03, 2009

Amanda Knox Defence Team Strongly Objects To Seattle Sliming Strategy

Posted by Peter Quennell


Above: Luciano Ghirga (left) and Carlo Della Vedova.

Click for a larger image. They are apparently thoroughly ticked off. Here’s our previous post on exactly what made them so ticked.

Once again, the demand from the Amanda Knox legal team goes out: Pipe down, Seattle. And give Amanda Knox a break.

Translation below by poster Kermit is of the story in today’s La Nazione

“Those American personalities are not helping Amanda”

Lawyer Ghirga: “I have spoken with Prosecutor Mignini”

by Enzo Beretta - Perugia

“There are people around the figure of Amanda who have no formal role in the student’s defence team, which is formed by myself together with my colleague Carlo Dalla Vedova.

These people are not only not helping our client in the difficult judicial process in the Corte d’Assise in which we have to defend her, but on the contrary, they are harming her judicial position.”

Luciano Ghirga, lawyer for the American accused by the prosecutor of sexually assaulting and killing Meredith Kercher with her former boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito and Rudy Hermann Guede, once again distances himself from the Stars-and-Stripes “know-it-alls” who repeatedly have tried to throw mud on the work of investigators and have even personally attacked Giuliano Mignini, head of the murder investigation.

There is strong evidence which supports the prosecution, unlike the “macaroni” pleading endlessly and one after the other on American television broadcasts, who pay lawyers, show-men and private investigators not much inclined to read the documentation.

That documentation was studied a lot by the Review and Court of Appeal judges, who confirmed preventive prison for the suspects, and the GUP Paolo Micheli, who has sentenced Rudy to thirty years in prison (with the abbreviated trial) and sent the ex-boyfriend and girlfriend to trial. This is a validation of the good work done by the investigators.

Lawyer Ghirga has not acted on a video in which the correctness of the findings of the forensic investigators is called into question, thereby attacking the protagonists of the case. But he will play his cards at the appropriate time in the trial, which resumes Friday.

“On a personal level I expressed my impressions to Dr. Mignini,” Ghirga said.

The lobbying work by Amanda’s side fits into a framework of traditional adversity by Americans when their fellow citizens are left in the hands of another country’s justice.

Posted by Peter Quennell on 02/03/09 at 01:23 PM • Permalink for this post • Archived in Various hypotheses,  Defendants in court,  Amanda Knox,  The officially involved,  The prosecutors,  The defenses,  The wider contexts,  Seattle context,  Hoaxes Knox & team,  20 No-PR hoax,  Hoaxers from 2007,  Knox-Marriott PR,  More hoaxers • Comments here (1)

Monday, February 02, 2009

Why The Smears Of Prosecutor Mignini By Knox “Friends” Are Really Simply A Sideshow

Posted by Peter Quennell


Other than, of course, for the corrosive effects on Amanda Knox’s own defense.

Having attracted a defamation suit for his paper from Mr Mignini for his reporting of the antic Friends fund-raiser, Mr Shay (left above) then jubilantly surfaced on the blog of another Seattle newspaper.

As I reported accurately, I was told by people attending the charity that Mignini is mentally unstable. His over-the-top response seems to indicate that this is so, but (disclaimer) I am not degreed in the field of psychology and therefore cannot for certain diagnose Mignini as having the mental problems others have said they have noticed he has. Ironically, I have heard numerous reports on American and European TV that claim Amanda Knox is a “sociopath” because we do not see her cry on camera. I wonder if Mr. Mignini has objected to all these reporters calling her this?

To which the first response of the excellent Seattle Crime Blog (which added the boldface above) was as follows:

If you can’t diagnose it, then don’t mention it…or at the very least, put the term “mentally unstable” in quotes. You write news stories for a fairly well-respected publication, Mr. Shay. Giving opinions on matters such as this is not your job, and the comments above have just provided further fuel for Mignini’s fire.

A good reporter lets his stories speak for themselves, without launching attacks against those who criticize them. Now - whether this is the case or not - you’ve come across as defensive, and just another body who drank the “Amanda is Innocent” Kool Aid. And the snide rhetorical questions do little to help your case.

Do Mignini’s claims hold any legal bearing? Probably not. Is he overreacting by filing a claim that does little more than make a statement? Probably - though let’s not forget that this is a man who has a job to do, one that has been an uphill battle from the start given the media circus surrounding the case since Kercher’s death more than a year ago.

The defamation suit in question seems rather appropriate.

And with regard to Mr Shays’ “sociopath” claim, if you spend real time online studying this case, one big surprise is there’s little professional reporting that demonizes Amanda Knox. And even less that seriously talks negatively about her psychology. She does draw reporters’ attention for sure, but she sometimes gives the impression she seems to like that and might even provoke it.

The demonization of Prosecutor Mignini, on the other hand, seems to have developed into quite a behind-the scenes industry. We have been sent some of the material that is circulating, and it ranges from improbable to frankly very nasty. We’ve checked extensively, and virtually none of it rings true to those in Italy who have encountered Prosecutor Mignini.

Perhaps the commonest response is that he wouldn’t be in his job if it did. And anyway it seems irrelevant to the case going forward.

For one thing, Prosecutor Mignini has alongside him at all times the excellent and very experienced co-prosecutor, Ms Comodi. It would be very tough to put anything over on her, and watchers in Italy all know that. 

And for another, there is the ongoing momentum of the case within the Italian system of justice, with all of its cautious checks and balances. Many or most of them are in favor of defendants, and they are all tough for prosecutors to contend with.

Prosecutors in Italy are possibly quite envious of the more all-encompassing, wide-ranging powers of prosecutors in the UK and the US. Many prosecutors in the US are elected, of course, and if you want to see prosecutors with REAL powers, check out some of those guys.

Here is how Prosecutor Mignini’s powers always have been more constrained than the Friends-driven meme is suggesting, and how his powers seem to become almost of only academic importance as the case proceeds.

  • In Italy, the indicative evidence is summarized in a large and complex case in a huge volume; the famous 10,000-pages-plus in this case. It is the raw work of dozens of evidence professionals.
  • In Italy, the judges (in this case already around a dozen) and the juries and defense lawyers all have to spend a lot of time reading and studying that body of work, and they really get to know the indicative evidence by the time of the hearing or trial.
  • In Italy, the work of the prosecutor at trial is comparatively lightened because of this. The prosecutor and his team get the evidence together, and then they have a relatively restrained role at the trial itself. And remember Judge Micheli openly disagreed with Mr Mignini on the theory of Rudy Guede’s crime. Not that it mattered very much though - Guede still got handed 30 years, and Mr Mignini had only asked for 25.
  • And in Italy, the work of the judge and jury before trial and at trial is relatively heavy because of this. Change prosecutors at this point and there would be barely a hiccup. And then the judge must come out with the sentencing statement. In the case of Judge Micheli’s report on Guede, it is an astonishingly dense 106 pages, which takes some hours of reading and figuring-out.

Given all this, even those who seem to see Mignini as evil-incarnate would find it incredibly hard to make the case (none of them have yet) for how the body of evidence could have been falsified and the prosecutor could have hoodwinked 12 judges, most of Italy, and the close-case-followers - now up in the thousands.

And comparisons being made between Prosecutor Mignini and the rogue American prosecutor Mike Nifong in the Duke lacross-team case are unfounded. Nifong was back then facing an election for prosecutor,  and he had to face none of these checks and balances with the Duke case, so he really could run rampant. And the minute Mr Nifong had to pass his case over the lowest of hurdles, it simply turned into dust. No comparison there.

A good trial for Amanda Knox and justice for Meredith could both use less of this irrelevant sideshow.

Posted by Peter Quennell on 02/02/09 at 01:56 AM • Permalink for this post • Archived in Defendants in court,  Amanda Knox,  The officially involved,  The prosecutors,  The wider contexts,  Seattle context,  Hoaxers from 2007,  Knox-Marriott PR,  More hoaxers • Comments here (0)

Friday, January 30, 2009

The Amanda Knox Defense Team Complains Of Being Undermined By Hotheads In Seattle

Posted by Peter Quennell



Carlo Della Vedova (left) and Luciano Ghirga.

1. Fine Team In Italy

Knox still has two of the smartest defense lawyers in Italy, though the smartest of all did walk off.

They are widely regarded as above-average and as excellent players within the Italian system. They have a long list of acquittals to their names.

And they are said to get along very well with Prosecutor Mignini and to respect his role in the process and like him personally.

If there are any lawyers in Italy that Amanda Knox can look to for a powerful defense that could get her off and out of there, it would seem to be the team she has now.

2. Sliming By Seattle Crazies

Mr Ghirga and Mr Della Vedova have previously voiced extreme irritation over sliming of police and prosecution from safely-distant Seattle. They had essentially asked Seattle to pipe down.

We haven’t yet heard from them on the rabid new sliming of one of the lead prosecutors, Dr Mignini, from Seattle.

Lawyers following the case in New York and Italy seem stunned at the ferocity and pure foolishness of the attacks.

Several have remarked that they might walk right off a case if they were so undermined in their handling of a defense. And that they might sue if they were the prosecutor.

Now Mr Mignini actually has gone to court. He has just filed a defamation complaint, and Paul Ciolino and the West Seattle Herald are among those cited as causing harm.

In Italy, this is widely reported and seems to be a pretty popular move.



Posted by Peter Quennell on 01/30/09 at 06:02 PM • Permalink for this post • Archived in Defendants in court,  Amanda Knox,  The officially involved,  The prosecutors,  The defenses,  The wider contexts,  Seattle context,  Hoaxers from 2007,  Paul Ciolino,  More hoaxers • Comments here (10)

Sunday, January 25, 2009

Knox “Friends” Paul Ciolino & Co Smear Prosecutor Mignini As “An Out Of Control Maniac”

Posted by Peter Quennell





At the Salty’s hatefest in West Seattle, Paul Ciolino whipped up the crowd with a rant about Dr Mignini being “an out-of-control maniac”.

We see no proof. We check this whole point of view almost daily but we never, ever, ever get independent confirmation.  The BBC also checked it out and found zero proof of ANY of Ciolino’s wild-eyed claims.

We are repeatedly told that Mr Mignini is tough, fair, and effective, in an Italian system of justice where things are not particularly loaded on the side of the prosecution.

And that he has the reputation of being very, very caring of the victims and their families. The Kerchers have expressed their full confidence in him.

Also that Mr Mignini’s stepping-aside would probably make just about zero difference to the momentum of the case at this point.

There seems to be just too much suggestive evidence waiting to be explained, and a dozen careful judges have endorsed it as suggestive, and the strongly dominant mood in Italy seems to be one of: let us proceed.

Amanda Knox is of course very well represented by counsel. They have already shown irritation over attacks on the prosecutor.

Calling the prosecutor a maniac sure won’t be music to their ears. Is this whole PR campaign quite loopy, or what?!

Posted by Peter Quennell on 01/25/09 at 02:44 PM • Permalink for this post • Archived in Various hypotheses,  The officially involved,  The prosecutors,  The wider contexts,  N America context,  Hoaxes against Italy,  9 Mignini v Knox hoax,  Hoaxes Knox & team,  13 AK persona hoax,  20 No-PR hoax,  Hoaxers from 2007,  Knox-Marriott PR,  Heavey, Bremner,  Paul Ciolino,  More hoaxers,  Hoaxers from 2009,  Steve Moore • Comments here (17)