Wednesday, June 25, 2014
Knox Interrogation Hoax #8: Testimony Of Interpreter Donnino And Central Police Officer Giobbi
Posted by Our Main Posters
Knox shortly before rising to try to persuade court against this damning testimony
1. What Really Happened on 5-6 November
The introduction to Hoax Post #1 explains what really happened at Knox’s recap/summary session on 5-6 November 2007.
In a sentence: Knox was there unwanted and grumpy, was advised to go and sleep, refused, agreed to build a list of possible perps (she listed seven, including Rudy Guede), spontaneously broke into a wailing conniption over a message she sent to Patrick, was semi-calmed-down and repeatedly provided refreshments, and insisted on writing three statements without a lawyer all of which said she went out on the night of the attack, all framing Patrick, one even pointing at Sollecito.
The headers of all previous posts in this series can be found at the end of Post #1.
2. Testimony Of Interpreter Anna Donnino
Click below to open up Anna Donnino’s testimony kindly translated by Catnip. She did a lot of the case-related interpretation and translation throughout November 2007. She was present at the recap/summary session with Rita Ficarra on 6 November from around 12:30 am which concluded with a first statement Knox insisted on dictating at 1:45 am.
Anna Donnino was also present at the formal legal-rights session with Dr Mignini on 6 November from around 5:00 am which conclude with a second statement Knox insisted on dictating at 5:45 am. Donnino translated both those statements and the third Knox scribbled around noon. .
The transcript below describes this and other work done also. She was not the only interpreter or translator used by the police in November, but she did the bulk of the work, and she was present at several key sessions.
3. Relevant Testimony Of Officer Edgardo Giobbi
Click below to open up Edgardo Giobbi’s testimony kindly translated by ZiaK. An officer from Rome, he was in the central police station that night. He doesnt make a fully credible witness, as he includes claims about his role that night which we are told are inflated and perhaps beamed at his superiors in Rome.
These exaggerations were skeptically challnged by Dr Mignini. However for what it is worth his testimony backs up certain aspects of the statements of those who actually were face to face with Knox and Sollecito that night. Nobody else testified that Knox was called to the questura and several testified that she wasnt and turned up and insisted on staying on her own account.
ZiaK’s full translation of Dr Giobbi’s testimony can be found on McCall’s Wiki.
4. Transcript Of Interpreter Anna Donnino
Prosecutor Mignini
GM: What work do you do?
AD: I am the proofreader/translator/interpreter at the Perugia Police Station.
GM: For how long?
AD: For more than 22 years.
GM: Have you undertaken work in your field of expertise in the investigation into the death of Meredith Kercher?
AD: Absolutely yes. I have assisted various persons in the course of declarations and I have translated much written material, as well as having provided transcriptions of various recordings.
GM: You were present during the interview of Amanda Knox on the night of the 5 and 6 November?
AD: Yes.
GM: Tell us what happened, when you arrived and what happened, except only, obviously, the declarations, which must not be mentioned or quoted or referred to.
AD: I remember having received a telephone call from Assistant Lorena Zugarini, the precise hour exactly I’m not able to say, though orientation-wise it would have had to have been before 23:30 because I was already in bed and at the latest I go to bed more or less a little before that time. I had received this call and Assistant Zugarini had told me that I had to come into the Station because my expertise was required. And that’s what I did, I dressed myself and I went to the Station. You have to take into consideration that I don’t live in Perugia, I live outside, I’m about 40 km away, in the environs of Castiglione del Lago, so I didn’t immediately turn up at the Station, I would have taken around three quarters of an hour, however I believe to have gotten there no later than half past midnight and at that point I had started to carry out my work.
GM: At that point you had arrived and had commenced carrying your work of interpreting in the Amanda Knox interview?
AD: Exactly.
GM: Do you remember how Amanda was? How was her behaviour? Then later we’ll get more into the specifics.
AD: I had been made to enter a room where in fact there was Inspector Ficarra at a small table, another colleague from SCO, I only remember his first name, he was called Ivano, a police officer, and there was Miss Knox seated, I seated myself beside her, I introduced myself, I had said that I was an interpreter and I was there to assist her , to help her understand and initially I saw that she was sufficiently calm, she was answering the questions that were being put to her.
GM: There was at a certain point a change in her behavior?
AD: Yes.
GM: In particular at what moment?
AD: This moment I recall it especially clearly, it was really stamped in my mind, there was a moment in which Miss Knox was asked how come she had not gone to work and she replied that she had received a message from Mr Patrick Lumumba in which Mr Lumumba communicated to her”¦
LG: This is”¦
GCM: Yes, if we may, perhaps these are not going to be admissible. This change, at what moment did it happen, and in what did it consist of?
AD: The change had occurred right after this message, in the sense that the signorina said she hadn’t replied to the message from Patrick, when instead her reply message was shown to her she had a true and proper emotional shock. It’s a thing that has remained very strongly with me because the first thing that she did is that she immediately puts her hands on her ears, making this gesture rolling her head, curving in her shoulders also and saying “It’s him! It’s him! It was him! I can see/hear him or: I know it.[Lo sento]” and so on and so forth.
GCM: So an attitude”¦
AD: An extremely participative attitude.
GCM: These hands on the head how did you describe them?
GM: On the head or on the ears?
AD: On the ears, sorry, I made the gesture to imitate this gesture that she was making and that she made repeatedly during the course of the interview.
GM: From that moment onwards?
AD: From that moment onwards. Beyond everything else I wanted to add that the whole thing had occurred with an extreme emotional involvement, a thing that I am not going to forget easily. She was crying while she was making these declarations, she was visibly shocked and frightened and exactly because of this enormous emotional involvement we all of us, me especially, had believed them!
GM: At a certain point what had happened? The statement had been finalized?
AD: The statement at that point had been”¦ her, what she had been recounting, had been written down, the statement had been interrupted and she had been, if I’m not mistaken, at that point she was asked if she wanted a lawyer.
GM: And what was her response?
AD: She had answered no, I remember that she replied with no.
GM: You were present in the succeeding phase, when the writing of the statement was completed Amanda was where? You were still with her, or had you separated?
AD: No, I had always stayed in the room, I hadn’t ever left.
GM: And what was she doing? What behavior was Amanda showing?
AD: At the moment there had been this emotional breakdown, she really had also slumped on the chair, we had made her move, we had waited for her to calm herself a little bit and from that moment she had really started to recount, in a, I repeat, rather participative manner, very anxious, very credible.
GM: Was she in the same room or had she been taken outside?
AD: Absolutely yes, always inside the same room.
GM: Was there anyone, some police officer who, himself also, was staying there?
AD: Yes. I’ll explain Miss Knox was seated at the table, I was on her left and I was translating what she was saying, her questions, her answers, and in front of her there was this”¦ an agent from SCO actually, I remember that he was called Ivano, who through the whole evening had comforted her, had reassured her, I remember perfectly that I was extremely struck by the behavior of this person, by his humanity and by his patience, he was holding her hands and caressing her exactly because he had noted/realized the particularly prostrate/dejected state of the girl.
GM: How long did this phase last before the other statement came to be made, do you remember?
AD: Well a bit of time had passed by.
GM: You remember it”¦ you’ve described it, however I’ll ask it, was she threatened, did she suffer any beatings?
AD: Absolutely.
GM: She suffered maltreatments?
AD: Absolutely not.
GM: Had types of comfort been offered to her?
AD: Well during the evening yes, in the sense that I remember that someone went down to the ground floor, it was the middle of the night, so in the Station at that hour there are those automatic distributors, there’s nothing else, someone went to the ground floor and brought everybody something to drink, some hot drinks and something to eat. I myself had a coffee, so I believe that she also had something.
GM: What happened then?
AD: After which she was interviewed by you, sir.
GM: This interview, how did it turn out? Was it a spontaneous declaration?
AD: Absolutely yes. She had been asked, it was already deep night, we were all tired enough and she was asked if she wanted to make spontaneous declarations and if she wanted to recount what she could remember, what had happened, she said yes because she also wanted to do this last act before going to bed.
GM: Do you remember the expressions she used when she decided to make these declarations?
AD: I remember perfectly this continual gesture of putting her hands on her ears, of shaking her head, saying”¦ she was also saying something as regards Patrick, saying: “It’s him! He’s bad”. I also had the impression from her words that she was afraid of him, she was saying this, and she also said, she also said it to me, that she in the course of the night had made this gesture because she was hiding in the kitchen because she was hearing the screams of the girl, the screams of her”¦
LG: Although on the spontaneous declarations I ask that”¦
GCM: Look here, on this maybe, you aren’t allowed to refer to this.
AD: The signorina had said this even to me, though.
GM: The gesture of putting the hands on the ears alludes”¦ and on the ears and not on the head?
AD: Yes, on the ears.
GM: Has it got a meaning?
AD: I look”¦
GCM: The gesture only, anyone can offer an interpretation of the gesture later.
GM: So then she had decided to make these spontaneous declarations.
AD: Yes, spontaneously.
GM: You were present as interpreter?
AD: Yes, absolutely yes.
GM: You rendered these declarations, you translated them and how was Amanda when you had rendered these declarations?
AD: Let’s say that her response had been very clear.
GCM: Let’s put that aside…
GM: How was she in terms of behavior?
AD: She was rather exhausted, this yes, she was rather exhausted, she was shocked although she was also as if she were freed of a weight.
GCM: Pardon me, we are “¦
CDV: I would like it recorded that she may refer only to facts, without any kind of coloring nor even less any personal interpretations because we are not here making an evaluation.
AD: OK, I’ll stop.
GCM: It can be difficult separating the two things but it needs to be done, the witness must report.
GM: She continued to cry, she continued to repeat these gestures?
AD: Absolutely yes, yes.
GM: Then at a certain point the statement was finished.
AD: Yes.
GM: What happened afterwards?
AD: After she had said to me that she wanted to rest, she wanted to rest a bit and so it was done, in the sense that there was a little armchair, we made her seat herself, I myself had carried over a chair, she had rested her feet on the chair and she had almost fallen asleep for a little while.
GM: You were always present?AD: I was always present, I remained there in the room.
GM: What happened? She had slept for a bit?
AD: It seems to me that she had snoozed, not sleeping deeply although she was resting, yes.
GM: Then what happened? Up until what time did you remain there?
AD: I remained there definitely until eight in the morning because I had expected, I had waited for my colleague to change shifts, I had absented myself though a couple of times after the typing up of the spontaneous declarations statement because I had gone to the ground floor to get a coffee and then to the bar, when it had opened, it would have been around half past seven.
GM: And then around eight”¦
AD: I had left, yes.
GM: You were finished for the day?
AD: Yes.
GM: And Colantone took over?
AD: Yes, precisely my colleague Colantone.
GM: You then have said you undertook other activities, translations?
AD: Exactly. I had looked after especially the correspondence let’s say, all that”¦ the correspondence coming from the prison, I and my other colleague had curated this aspect, and also transcribing some prison recordings as well.
GM: In the course of your activity, corresponding to your responsibility, had you both come across, had you collated elements about which you had immediately informed the Flying Squad and had there then been investigations carried out, were there investigative developments based on what you both had come across?
AD: I have to say that this correspondence had been substantial, there had been a great quantity of material which we weekly divided up between ourselves, to read and then to refer to the Police in writing. Let’s say broad brush things important for investigative purposes I believe had not surfaced except for character aspects, behavioral ones of this girl.
CDV: Again! This is not a fact, this is an opinion.
AD: Very well, but I’m only saying what”¦
CDV: On what basis then are you providing your opinion on her personality?
GM: That on which she referred to the Flying Squad.
AD: Yes.
GM: You have referred on the basis of your activity as interpreter you both decided to refer certain aspects?
AD: Certain aspects.
GM: On which then investigations were based or not?
AD: I don’t think so, regarding the letters I don’t think so, it doesn’t seem so to me anyway.
GM: On the intercept activity?
AD: On the intercept activity, I transcribed, if I’m not mistaken, six prison recordings and I limited myself to transcribing the contents of the recordings and then I consigned the whole lot to the Flying Squad.
GM: On what you know based on these recordings were investigations then carried out? Did these intercepts produce any investigative results?
AD: Presumably yes, sir, but I don’t know, frankly it’s not my area, I’m not able to say.
GM: On the evening of the 2nd, were you present at the Station?
AD: The evening of the 2nd, no.
GM: So when did you arrive?
AD: I arrived on the 3rd in the morning, I started work on the 3rd in the morning.
GM: And on the 3rd you took part in the interview, you heard Amanda another time?
AD: No, the night of the fifth was the first time, I had not met her before.
GM: I have no other questions.
GCM: Please proceed, Civil Parties
Lumumba Civil Lawyer Pacelli
CP: In completing and consolidating in cross-examination the questions by the Public Prosecutor, I refer to the morning of the 6th of November, to the time when Miss Knox had made her summary information. In that circumstance, Miss Knox was struck on the head with punches and slaps?
AD: Absolutely not.
CP: In particular, was she struck on the head by a police woman?
AD: Absolutely not!
CP: Miss Knox was however threatened?
AD: No, I can exclude that categorically!
CP: With thirty years of prison”¦
AD: No, no, absolutely.
CP: Was she however sworn at, in the sense that she was told she was a liar?
AD: I was in the room the whole night and I saw nothing of all this.
CP: So the statements that had been made had been made spontaneously, voluntarily?
AD: Yes.
CDV: This”¦
GCM: Pardon, but let’s ask questions”¦ if you please.
CP: You were also present then during the summary information made at 5:45?
AD: Yes.
CP: And were they done in the same way and methods as those of 1:45?
AD: I would say yes. Absolutely yes.
CP: To remove any shadow of doubt from this whole matter, as far as the summary information provided at 5:45 Miss Knox was struck on the head with punches and slaps?
AD: No.
CP: In particular, was she struck on the head by a police-woman?
AD: No.INT: She has already said that.
CP: No, I had referred to the one at 1:45”¦
GCM: Yes, but pardon me, Counsel, she has already replied.
CDV: The preceding question was more general, it was referring to the whole night, therefore it is implicit that even the 1:45 statement, the question is”¦
CP: No, my questions are pertinent, Mr President, for a very simple reason that I will explain to my friend Dalla Vedova.
GCM: Pardon me, no.
CP: Everybody’s explaining, Mr President! If it is permitted this once I would like to say”¦
GCM: Counsel, let us ask questions.
CP: Miss Amanda says: “I was struck on the head” and in the spontaneous declarations she made before Judge Micheli she expressly says, and it was the basis of an incredible media fact, she had expressly said “I was hit on the head by a police woman”. Therefore there are two summary informations”¦
CDV: What is the question?
CP: The question is: at 5:45 when the summary information was being given in particular, had she been hit on the head by a police woman, our Miss Knox?
CDV: I don’t object to this question because it has already been asked before in general for the whole night, therefore I consider it to have already been answered.
CP: I asked it earlier about the summary information statement at 1:45, now I’m referring to the one at 5:45.
GCM: Pardon me, Counsel, but I remember you having foreshadowed this referring to the succeeding statement with the other question, “and also in the other interview there was conduct”¦”
CP: It was ad abbundianzam for later clarity.
GCM: Pardon all, but the exigency is that repeated questions be avoided.
CP: It is not a repetition, they are two summary informations.
GCM: Let us avoid a surplus of words though.CP: In sum, in the summary informations of 1:45 and 5:45 anybody punch Amanda in the head?
AD: No.
CDV: But this is another repetition! He’s insisting on the same question already asked and which has already been responded to, we are not opposed!
CP: If it please the court, Mr President, I have no further questions.
GCN: Please proceed, the defense.
Defence Counsel Ghirga
LG: The night of the 6th, why did the summary information formally commence at 1:45, this interview, let’s call it this, on what floor of the Station did it unfold?
AD: On the third floor, in the offices of the Flying Squad.
LG: Contemporaneously also under way was the interview, quote-unquote, of Sollecito?
AD: This I didn’t know.
LG: No I have asked you whether, minutes earlier, minutes later, for the one we have the opening and closing timestamps, for the other only the opening, contemporaneously, a little before, I don’t know, on the same floor of the Station there was Sollecito’s interview unfolding.
AD: Yes, I’m up to speed with this.
LG: Do you remember if anyone originating from the room where Sollecito’s interview was in progress came into your room, where Amanda’s interview was in progress, and said, saying that Sollecito in some way, quote-unquote, had dropped Amanda’s alibi or some wording of the sort?
AD: Let’s say that I saw it, I remember that Inspector Ficcara left”¦
LG: No I’m asking if anyone”¦
AD: If anyone had come in then, no, no.
GCM: So you remember Inspector Ficcara had left”¦
AD: I remember Inspector Ficcara had left.
GCM: But no-one who came in nor in particular coming in said this?
AD: Absolutely not.
LG: After this someone come in, someone went out”¦
GCM: No, someone left she remembers.
MC: No, no-one came in and likely someone exited.
GCM: We’re at the witness answers!
LG: But we days ago we had heard”¦ we were here in this courtroom”¦ I commented out loud but 15 days ago we heard that someone had come in.
GCM: It can be treated as contestable.
LG: Now I don’t have the transcripts of the earlier hearings because they haven’t been done, but in this light I would like to try to contest them. After somebody had exited, did the episode of the little message from Patrick occur at that moment or had it already come out earlier?
AD: Look exactly no, not at the same time, not anyway immediately after”¦ That is once Inspector Ficcara had re-entered, that’s what I want to say. That is this thing about the message was under way, now I don’t remember exactly if it had already been stated before or come out at another time, frankly I don’t remember this particular.
LG: The fact is that after the message there was the change in mood, the one that you have described.
AD: Exactly.
LG: You know that there’s a cafeteria in the Station.
AD: There’s a cafeteria.
LG: It’s managed privately and for some”¦
AD: I think it’s private, frankly I don’t know.
LG: Do you know when it opens in the morning?
AD: No, when I start work at eight the cafe is open, when it opens I don’t know.
LG: Thank you.
Defence Counsel Dalla Vedova
CDV: Still on the subject of the night of the 5th and 6th, you know, have said that you got there around half past midnight.
AD: Yes, around then, more or less.
CDV: Are you aware of when Amanda had arrived at the Station?
AD: No, frankly no.
CDV: So you do not know how much time that day Amanda had been interviewed?
AD: No, I had been advised by phone, I was told to go and I went, frankly other aspects I was not aware of at that moment.
CDV: You were always present with Amanda up until she had gone away?
AD: Yes, I was always present. I had, I was saying before, absented myself a couple of times, but it was already morning to go and get a coffee, but I’m telling you it was almost day, it was day.
CDV: You were translating questions that were being put by who exactly?
AD: By Inspector Ficcara in primis and also by SCO Agent Ivano, I don’t remember his last name, who in fact was proceeding to interview her, both of them were asking questions and I was looking after the translation first from one then from the other.
CDV: Do you remember whether any of the questions had fronted the fact that there was evidence that Amanda was in Via Della Pergola.
AD: I don’t understand, in what sense?
CDV: That is, do you remember whether it was put to Amanda that there was now evidence that she was at the house in Via Pergola that night, the night of the murder?
AD: No, I don’t think that was said to her.
CDV: Was there anyone who said the words: “you’re a liar”?
AD: Never.
CDV: Still on translating these questions, do you remember if one of the questions concerned the fact that Raffaele Sollecito had made declarations different from those with respect to Amanda’s?
AD: This came to be acknowledged, they came to be said, if I’m not mistaken, although I have to repeat a great deal of time has passed by since then so the details of the questions I’m not able to refer to with the requisite precision.
CDV: Only the main thrust.
AD: Yes, maybe something was said to her about that.
CDV: That”¦
AD: That Raffaele was not standing by her, he was saying things differently with respect to hers.
CDV: Do you also remember the reference to the message, SMS, on the mobile phone, exactly how it was used? The questions were about this message?
AD: There was a really simple question, very linear, I asked the signorina if she had replied to the message and she said: “no”.
GCM: Only the questions that were put to her.
AD: Yes, this in relation to the message.
CDV: How did the reference to the message come about? What was the first question? Who brought out the message?
AD: Because she was asked how come she had not gone to work that night.
CDV: And?
AD: And it came out that she had received the message from her employer which in fact told her that she did not have to go to work and everything snowballed from here.
CDV: Everything, that is there was a reply by Knox?
AD: There was a reply.
CDV: Do you remember the text of the reply?
AD: The reply”¦
GCM: Although on this maybe”¦
CDV: I have made a translation.
AD: The text was in Italian.
GCM: Perhaps we should stay with the questions.
AD: It was in Italian.
MC: [incomprehensible, out of microphone range]
GCM: Please, perhaps we can”¦
INT: If they want to do it, let’s let them.
MC: On the accord of the parties there is no limitation.
GCM: Please continue.
AD: The text of the reply was in Italian.
CDV: How come in Italian, Amanda is American?
AD: This I’m not able to say, ask her”¦ I don’t know. The text, the reply by Ms Knox was in Italian.
CDV: She had the capacity to speak and write in Italian in your opinion that night of the 5th and 6th?
AD: Look”¦
GCM: Was Amanda saying the occasional word in Italian?
AD: Yes, yes, she was comprehending sufficiently what was being asked.
GCM: So she was also speaking a little bit of Italian?
AD: Yes, yes.
CDV: Returning to the examination, the duration, these questions lasted until 1:45, then they were recommenced and then they were interrupted at 5:45 with the typing of the statements?
AD: No, no. Let’s say there was an interruption in the sense that there was”¦ I now frankly don’t remember the timing, but it seems to me that statement was done with quickly, all up, then there was a brief pause because we were also trying to comfort the girl, she had had this emotional shock so I had tried to help her, also, after which there was the interview with Dr Mignini.
CDV: Do you remember more or less at what time this emotional shock had arrived?
AD: That I actually don’t remember.
CDV: But before the redaction of the 1:45 statement or after?AD: No, this emotional shock occurred at the moment in which the message was referred to.
CDV: And therefore the message from Lumumba, therefore coinciding with the accusation against Lumumba. Can you remember at what time?
AD: I don’t remember this, sorry, but the exact time this happened I don’t know, I had arrived at that hour and frankly after that never looked at the clock.
CDV: But the 1:45 statement was typed before or after this emotional shock?
AD: It was typed at the moment in which the girl had had this”¦ they were trying at that moment to understand how she had spent the evening. So they were trying to understand what she had done from a particular time up until the following morning and in the course of that series of questions the particular about the message came out and at that point the statement was typed up, which came to be closed off, after which everything else.
CDV: But why did the message have such a reaction”¦
GCM: Pardon Counsel, but we cannot”¦
AD: I’ll tell you straight away.
CDV: No. no. wait I haven’t finished the question. I wanted to understand this emotional shock was caused by the message, by the reading of the message or by the fact that it was displayed or was there some other element of fact relative to the analysis?
AD: I can tell you straight away because I remember it distinctly, she said she hadn’t replied to the message. Once though the message was shown to her obviously that was a plain lie!
CDV: Do you remember who found the message on the phone?
GCM: Pardon me Counsel, who found it at that moment?
CDV: Yes, who realized that there was a message in the phone.
AD: I think Inspector Ficcara”¦ that is there was this phone on the table that was being checked, I now”¦
CDV: But was it Amanda who provided this phone?
AD: Yes, yes, she had handed it over, she was showing it, she had already handed it over to the officers.
CDV: Do you remember in particular if the message had been shown by Amanda?
GCM: Counsel you may close.
CDV: In particular was it Amanda who emphasizes the message, who showed the message?
AD: No, no, she had said that she had not replied to that message.
CDV: Although you have also said that she handed the over phone over.
AD: Yes, but she had already handed it over before, the officers were already looking through it if I’m not mistaken, from before.
GCM: Pardon me, Doctor, perhaps Counsel is asking if you can pinpoint this moment and whether Amanda had the phone or whether she had placed it at the disposition of those who were examining her, questioning her. Amanda Knox brought up the message on the phone or else it was someone else who”¦
AD: No, it was someone else.
GCM: Some person had found it?
AD: It was someone else.
GCM: Not Amanda Knox who showed everybody?
AD: Not her personally.
CDV: So the message was noticed by a functionary who was in the room?
AD: Yes.
CDV: Do you remember who? In the end there weren’t many of you.
AD: I think Inspector Ficcara, although I’m not certain.
CDV: You have said that this message had caused an emotional shock, there must have been a specific moment when this happened?
AD: Very specific, yes, that’s true.
CDV: But you don’t remember how they found this message?
AD: Now someone, I think Inspector Ficcara or Assistant Zugarini, I don’t remember now, had picked up this phone and this message was read, it was retrieved, maybe she hadn’t deleted it. Frankly, Counsel, I don’t know the detail.
CDV: Madam, you were the victim of an accident where you had a fracture of the legs?
AD: Yes, that’s true.
CDV: You recounted this episode to Knox that night?
AD: Yes.
CDV: Why?
AD: Because I had seen that the girl”¦ I want to point out one thing first, generally when I find myself in these interview situations, the first thing I look to do is immediately try to cultivate a rapport, to enter into contact with the person with whom”¦ above all treating young girls, I am a mother of two girls more or less the same age as Miss Knox and I was well aware that she could have needed assistance.
CDV: Do you remember also having mentioned to Knox that in this personal experience of yours you had suffered a trauma by which you were unable to remember the episode of how your leg fracture happened?
AD: Yes, it’s true, I told her about it.
FM: President, if it please the court, the Knox defence is in cross-examination, therefore the purpose should also be limited”¦
CDV: We are also evaluating the activity of the witness.
FM: But we’re in cross-examination with these questions”¦
GCM: Counsel, although it’s indicated at point 60 relative to the evening/night, so we can reintroduce”¦
FM: It was not subjected to examination-in-chief.
GCM: Please continue.
CDV: You then have recounted that a rapport of humane assistance was created even for a difficult moment which you have recounted.
AD: Yes.
CDV: And you recounted this personal experience where you, by virtue of this accident, have had a memory hole.
AD: Yes.CDV: So you have presented a proposition to Amanda where she also, who was in such a difficult situation at that moment could have had a memory hole in relation to all the questions that were being put?
AD: No, I didn’t say this.
FM: Mr President, there is opposition to this mode”¦
GB: [incomprehensible, out of microphone range]
FM: No, I oppose when I need to, first of all, then the President decides. At any rate since it is in cross-examination I formally object to this form of examination.
GCM: It’s true that it is in cross-examination, but the borderline is a little blurred by the indications that in the witness list the Prosecutor’s Office had formulated and here we’re speaking of “relating to the evening/night between 5 November and 6 November”. So we will be able to enter into this again later.
CDV: This is an ascertainment of a fact on the evening of 5/6, it’s a fact, so I am trying to understand.
GCM: We can proceed.
CDV: So you put to Amanda the possibility that in life during moments of stress one can have a memory hole?
AD: No, I did not say it in that way, Counsel. I repeat, as my principal duty, I do it habitually, to try to assist the best way possible any person who finds themselves in conditions of that sort, I often utilise even details of my personal life. I had also told her I have two daughters, that I had been thrown out of bed, jokingly, that night to come to the Station, that I had left them sleeping, that we had even, perhaps Miss Knox doesn’t remember, we had even swapped a couple of words in German because she had told me that she had been to Berlin. So in the context of all of this I had also spoken of having had this experience because I do it habitually exactly because I was aware that it was however a situation that required a modicum of solidarity.
CDV: However your experience was based on the fact that you had, in a difficult moment, had a memory hole?
GCM: Of this kind.
FM: (incomprehensible, outside microphone range )
GCM: We won’t translate, we will bypass translating the responses, we are at the witness responses!
CDV: But she said them before.
LG: If she said them then they’re recorded.
GCM: The response has been recorded.
CDV: But it’s impossible to carry out an examination like this, if I have to be continuously interrupted! I am asking perfectly legitimate questions on a fact that has occurred”¦
GCM: It’s important that you try to avoid returning to the same questions, this maybe can be avoided taking into account the responses that arise.
CDV: As a result of these stories of yours, had you noticed that Knox had some difficulties in remembering even her night with Sollecito?
AD: Yes, I noticed that. I told her her account was an extremely vague one, uncertain, fragmentary, she wasn’t able to remember, to give any precise answers.
CDV: When she was doing this was she crying?
AD: No, at that moment no.
CDV: But you said at a certain point she was crying, only when she had had the emotional shock”¦
AD: Yes, yes.
CDV: You don’t remember the exact time this emotional shock happened? Pardon me for insisting but I think it’s important.
AD: But if I keep on saying I don’t remember, I can’t”¦
CDV: I understand. On the question from Counsel, you at one point referred to someone having asked her if she had wanted”¦
AD: Yes.
CDV: How come this had not been put into the statements, the two declarations?
AD: I can’t really say, Counsel, it wasn’t me who typed up the statement.
CDV: Do you remember who made this reception, this offer, who had said to Amanda: “if you want you can have a lawyer”?
AD: Inspector Ficcara.CDV: Do you remember if it was before 1:45?
AD: Counsel, again, I don’t remember the time.
CDV: But was it in the morning when it was already daylight?
AD: No, no, I didn’t look out the window, I was concentrating on other things, I don’t remember if it was light outside.
CDV: You don’t remember if someone had said to her: “at this time a lawyer is worse for you, having a lawyer is worse for you”?
AD: I don’t understand.
CDV: That someone had said to her: “at this time a lawyer is worse for you, having a lawyer is worse for you”?
AD: To Miss Knox?
CDV: Yes.
AD: Absolutely no.
CDV: Do you also remember in the report that Raffaele in fact had made differing declarations that someone had said: “if you don’t tell me what you know they’ll put you in prison for thirty years”?
AD: No, I repeat that these things were not said!
CDV: Have you ever translated any words of this sort into English?
AD: No, I deny that.
CDV: On the correspondence can you be more precise? How many were these letters that you translated?
AD: Around about it would have been 600 letters incoming and outgoing.
CDV: In what time period did you have this task, from when to when?
AD: The whole period following the arrest of Miss Knox, I exactly now when this period started specifically I’m not able to say, but I imagine that already in the month of November it had started.
CDV: Up to?AD: Up to the closure of the investigations.
CDV: So in May/June 2008?
AD: Yes, around about.
CDV: You also worked on the intercepted conversations?
AD: Some yes.
CDV: Can you recount how they came about exactly?
AD: Either I or my colleague, this aspect of the investigative activity was looked after specially by my colleague Colantone, I helped her sometimes when she wasn’t able to go to prison. So one of us with officers from the Flying Squad went to prison, we were put in a tiny room adjacent the place, in the other room where the conversation would take place between Miss Knox and her parents or whoever was going to visit her and we would listen on headphones to the entirety, the straight conversation and then we would immediately refer it on if there were particular things that jumped out. Obviously on a second run we would proceed with a re-hearing of the recording which we were also watching on video and with the transcription of the contents.
CDV: In relation to your affirmation that you were pointing out what jumped out at you, in what way and by what criteria? What were the themes that according to you could have been of interest to the investigation? Had you received instructions or was it at your discretion?
AD: No, absolutely not, I attended to what I was told to do. For things relevant to the investigations, I referred to everything that related to the case, so each time anyone spoke about the case or of facts in it obviously these passages were rendered completely, all the rest, for example, when her Dad, often, used to recount in a very humorous way his misadventures in Italy, or what he had done during the course of the day, obviously these tracts of the conversation were rendered, also for lack of time, in indirect speech and summarized, in this sense.
CDV: So summarised by you two?
AD: Summarised by us certainly.
CDV: So it was not a translation of the words, but it was a summary of the context and of the argument treated?
AD: Yes, but always in a very detailed way.
CDV: But what were the instructions you received for evaluating the importance of these documents? Especially if you are also able to say who gave you the task and whether they had asked you: “check for this topic”, this is what I want to know.
AD: Counsel, it was requested to underline and refer totally everything that was said during the course of the intercepts relating to the case in question. Each time Miss Knox referred to her particular case, the trial, obviously these aspects were listened to, transcribed fully and they came to be given a certain relevance, graphically. This is what was asked to be done.
CDV: But the topics, what were they, those that you considered as important?
AD: Those relating to the case, the procedural case, to her memories of Meredith, to what she had done previously,to everything that related to the case.
CDV: So you found elements of this kind in the correspondence?
AD: No, I was speaking about the intercepts.
CDV: Yes, pardon me, this also applies to the correspondence?
AD: Yes, also to the correspondence.
CDV: Did you [plural] do a complete translation, sworn, word for word or did you make a digest of the correspondence?
AD: I’m telling you Counsel there were more than 600 letters, Miss Knox above all else is an able writer, in the sense that she likes writing a lot, she even writes ten-page letters, obviously in the accounts, in the transcription of the letters we translated completely any important letters that related to the case, while the others, of minor interest, for example when she was talking about her friends, when she was talking about her family, obviously those were”¦
GCM: Pardon me, about her friends with reference to which friends, those found in Italy?
AD: No, her friends in America, everything that related to”¦ and obviously those were reported in an abridged manner because there was not the time beyond anything else to do a full translation of all that material.
CDV: You worked on the 17 November intercept, on the analysis of the intercept?
AD: No, that if I’m not mistaken was transcribed by my colleague.
CDV: Do you remember how many intercepts you worked on?
AD: I looked after I think six intercepts, although not those from November, those that were done in March if I’m not mistaken.
CDV: Are you aware whether following your work any further investigative activity in relation to the intercepts and to the correspondence, these 600 letters, was carried out?
AD: We consigned all the material, then obviously this is not our area of expertise, it’s not up to us.
CDV: So no other activity was carried out?
AD: No, this I don’t know.
CDV: Was there correspondence between the two accused that you analysed?
AD: No, I didn’t translate anything in that regard.
CDV: Between Knox and Lumumba.
AD: Nothing.
CDV: And Knox and Guede?
AD: Nothing.
CDV: And with lawyers?
AD: No.
CDV: Not even Americans?
AD: No.
CDV: With journalists?
AD: No.
CDV: With politicians?
AD: No.
CDV: So they were family and friends?
AD: Family and friends, certainly.
GCM: Counsel this, but politicians”¦ it could be a politician who isn’t”¦ it becomes a little bit difficult for the witness if for the category of person, it would have to signify that the witness knew in which category the each visitor belonged, to avoid putting herself into difficulty.
CDV: I asked only, Mr President, because information has come out on the mass-media that was referring to presumed correspondence even with famous people, both foreign and Italian, who hold political office, in this sense I was asking she had had knowledge of them. One last question: your work, still in relation to the mass-media, have you had contacts with the mass-media?
AD: Absolutely not.
CDV: Thank you.
Defence Counsel Ghirga
LG: A question about the letters, but you translated these 600 letters, Dr Colantone translated them, you translated them”¦ translated, looked at, made a précis of because first it seemed to be an activity of the prior witness, now it seems to be by your activity. This 600-letter correspondence, it’s not a fundamental question, did you do it together, dividing the work?
AD: There are four of us interpreters at the Station and all of us worked, we all collaborated regarding this case and generally we team-work in the sense that we distribute the work, we check on the proceedings, so all of us know everything and also regarding these letters an analogous thing was done.
LG: If I show you Amanda’s 1:45 summary informations from the 6th, but I say to you there aren’t any questions, and I ask you: how come not one question was statemented on the part of”¦ not even the acronym ADR [“replies as follows”], nothing?
AD: This I don’t”¦
LG: You’ve said that there were questions, you translated them, there’s not even one.
AD: If there aren’t”¦
GCM: President: Counsel is asking how come none of the questions were reported and not even the ADR?
AD: I don’t know about this.
GM: I oppose, with the spontaneous declarations there was the interview, with questions and contestation.
LG: Meanwhile those from 1:45 are summary informations and I repeat not one question was statemented why? It can’t be clearer than this. Were there any questions or weren’t they statemented?
FM: Mr President, if it please the court, I oppose because the Doctor had not typed up the statement and so”¦
GCM: Though the witness must answer.
LG: She translated everything!
FM: But it is not her who typed up the statement, for this she cannot respond.
GCM: Although, pardon, let the question be posed. We have heard, they are the summary informations and not the spontaneous declarations for which the questions in sum”¦ Now about these summary informations, Defense is asking, the questions being put to the person who was being examined do not seem to have been reported, not even under the profile of ADR, this abbreviation, that you know.
AD: Mr President, on the merely technical and formal aspect I do not know how to respond.
LG: I was wanting to reply to the Public Prosecutor”¦
GCM: No, let’s only ask questions of the witness and leave it at that!
LG: On the spontaneous declarations I recall that they’re in the file as corpo del reato for the calunnia, and OK, these spontaneousnesses have been declared absolutely inadmissible even for clarification purposes.
GM: Questions Mr President, I oppose!
LG: No because someone has always called them”¦
GCM: Pardon, now we are examining the witness, if there are questions to be put let’s do so otherwise let’s proceed to the next step!
LG: But to also be clear. No further questions.
Defence Counsel Bongiorno
GB: Still in cross-examination in the ambit of that night which has been discussed up until now. You have mentioned replying to my colleagues that you had spoken to Amanda about the fact that you have daughters, that you were woken at night etc. to create a humane rapport. I ask you the reasons why for which your role was mere interpreter, therefore to translate, it was necessary to create a humane rapport.
AD: It was necessary Counsel, yes, because it is a thing that I do habitually and it is a fundamental thing because it also establishes a relationship of trust with the person who one has next to one. I above all am a mediator, so I am not, as you say, a simple executor and a little machine that translates words. Beside me I have a person who however finds herself in the middle of people that do not speak her language, I am her channel and I feel a duty to establish a rapport that goes a little bit beyond the exquisitely technical thing. I do it habitually with everybody, I didn’t do it only that night, I do it all the time.
GB: I ask only what does “I’m a mediator” mean? Your role mustn’t be, at the moment when a formal statement is being done, with questions and answers, a mere translator or you”¦ that is, define mediator better for me.
AD: Being a mediator means that however I am able to also, by means of personal conversation. So I also make this my duty and carry them out.
GB: So in the ambit of your role in which you were mediator you then considered it worthwhile to recount to Amanda even your personal experience relating to the leg fracture etc.
AD: Yes.
GB: In which moment did you consider it worthwhile to recount this part of your history, the leg fracture, the missing memories?
AD: This in the specifics Counsel I”¦
GB: At the beginning when you were trying to create a humane rapport you said: “I’m mentioning that I’m the mother of two daughters etc etc” or during the interview?
AD: I think that it was during the interview.
GB: In particular in which phase of the interview? Already when there had been Amanda’s shock or not?
AD: This, Counsel, I don’t remember, exactly when I said this”¦ when I told her about this thing about my life I don’t know.
GB: This episode that you recounted, was only Amanda listening to this narration or everybody that was in the room?
AD: No, no, everybody.
GB: Was this externalization of yours statemented and therefore we will find it in the documentation or not?
AD: No, no, no it wasn’t”¦ I think.
GB: You did not ask yourself the question whether in some way this species of your, personal, narration from an interpreter might taint the interview?
AD: In what way could it have tainted it?! Honestly I did not ask myself that.
CP: I oppose, Mr President.
GCM: Let us present the facts only, opposition will be”¦
GB: I have no further questions.
Prosecutor Comodi
MC: When you assisted Amanda Knox as interpreter, at the end of the interviewing did you read the statement?
AD: Yes.
MC: Amanda in some way contested the contents of the statement?
AD: Absolutely not. I even remember that she wants to see, to read the statement in Italian and follow word for word what had been written down and was asking me for amplifications if she didn’t understand.
MC: Amplifications in English?
AD: Amplifications in English definitely.
MC: Did it appear to you that Amanda Knox had asked at the beginning that even the questions be statemented?
AD: No, it didn’t.
MC: Did it appear to you that she had asked the questions and answers be statemented in her mother tongue, that is English, as well as in Italian?
AD: No it didn’t.
Judge Massei
GCM: One circumstance if you can refer to it, if you remember, you were called because the examination of Amanda Knox, her summary informations, were already under way or because they had not yet started and so you assisted up until the start of this?
AD: Nothing was said to me on the phone, simply get up and go. When I arrived I was made to enter into the room where Miss Knox already was.
GCM: And who was present together with her?
AD: Inspector Ficcara certainly, I don’t know whether at that moment there was also Assistant Zugarini, this I don’t recall well. Then certainly this SCO agent Ivano Raffo, him yes.GCM: So you entered and”¦
AD: And they were already there.
GCM: But Amanda Knox was already talking, they were already making her”¦
AD: Yes, she was answering questions, they were talking.
GCM: So they were speaking in Italian in that instant?
AD: Yes, they were speaking in Italian.
GCM: Are you able to say if when you arrived Amanda Knox’s mobile phone had already been placed at the disposition of the ones who were interviewing her, or else this was a later time period?
AD: I think it was a later time period.
GCM: Very well.
Defence Counsel Dalla Vedova
CDV: You arrived at the Station at what time exactly?
AD: I’ll tell you Counsel”¦
GCM: At 00:30, she had already mentioned it.
CDV: How can you be sure that it was 00:30?
AD: In fact I never said I was sure.
CDV: So how can you say it was 00:30?
AD: I have said that I have considered that I had received the phone call around about 23:30”“23:40, considering that I spent about half an hour at my house, considering that I also had to get ready I made a calculation, I left immediately and I would have arrived around about that time.
CDV: How come you knew that it was eleven forty-five when they called you?
AD: Because I had just”¦ it was only a little while that I had gone to sleep and generally I go to bed more or less around eleven thirty, eleven twenty.
CDV: But did you look at a clock?
AD: I was not sleeping yet though, so I was in bed.
CDV: Did you look at a clock?
AD: No, I didn’t look at a clock.
CDV: And when you left the Station on the morning of the 6th?
AD: I left at eight, I waited for my colleague Colantone to arrive.
Judge Massei
GCM: On this”¦ only on the questions that were put. I wanted to ask is there a time-recorder at the Station?
AD: Yes, yes.
GCM: But you inserted the time-recorder?
AD: No, there’s an out-of-hours pass.
GCM: And you inserted it?
AD: Yes, yes.
GCM: So then it can show at what time you arrived?
AD: Yes.
GCM: Very well, you may go.
5. Relevant Testimony Of Officer Edgardo Giobbi
ZiaK’s full translation of Dr Giobbi’s testimony can be found on McCall’s Wiki.
Prosecutor Dr Mignini
GM: Do you recall that night of 5 to 6 November, what the various passages/phases were, without entering into the merit of the declarations, but what were the developments, and what then led to the arrest?
EG: Above all, we began ““ as judiciary police ““ with witness summaries/recaps [NdT: “sommarie informazioni]. These summaries/recaps were carried out at the same time in two different rooms by two different teams of investigators. I and Profazio did not participate, but we remained, shall we say, like a sort of control panel in order to try and understand what the contradictions were. Because we reached [this point] also on the basis of contradictions that emerged during the course of the various witness summaries/recaps. There was this evolution. There was, shall we say, the possibility during the development of these witness recaps/summaries of asking questions to study more deeply, of putting [someone] at their ease. In short, it was a very ordinary thing, I would say, in the ordinariness of things. After which, when the declarations emerged that went against our feelings/sensations, beyond the aspect [sic: perhaps a typo, “aspetto” instead of “aspettative” = “expectations”] of our competence, thus, that they no longer seemed to us to be witnesses, but that they had a completely other position, we ““ as you well know ““ in short, we called you and you can, and then it went as “¦
GM: Do you remember what the behaviour was of the two at that moment, and afterwards?
EG: During the SIT [“sommarie informazioni testimoniali” = witness summaries/recaps], I cannot say.
GM: Outside of the minutes [sic: i.e., the witness questioning/written recording], what happened in that moment in the Questura, especially [to] Amanda?
EG: Yes, shall we say, Amanda was the one that had a little bit more of a display of behaviours, I don’t even know what terms to use. I could describe them, the displays of the two behaviours were completely different: very easy: Amanda was more emotional, she had much stronger reactions. I remember clearly great wails, great cries, great emotional howls. But this [was], then, shall we say, during the phase when she was giving Lumumba’s name above all, because I associated it to the fact that she recalled in that moment the specific episode. I should say that Raffaele Sollecito was, according to me, he had an absolutely gentlemanlike behaviour. He always replied. He was put completely at ease. We, in short, however, we did things, giving him water often. However, also he, at a certain point, the answers necessarily required closer examination because even in defence of the same witness, because if we have answers that are contradictory or answers that do not match up with our investigative acquisitions.
GCM: The behaviours.
EG: The behaviours, I’ve outlined them. Mr Sollecito was, shall we say, to my mind, because I did not participate, as I said at the beginning, I was a sort of intermediary control panel, that is to say Profazio and I, who were those who were in actual fact leading the inquiries, we got the information from the operators and investigators who were physically carrying out the summaries/recaps. However, I must say that Amanda’s howls could be heard in the corridor of the Questura, even though the room was closed. Mr Sollecito did not have the same attitude, a much more gentlemanly and calm/even-tempered manner.
GM: Going back a few days, you were present in the Questura on the evening of the 2nd, from the 2nd to the 3rd?
EG: Yes.
GM: Do you recall, because then too there was a series of interrogations, do you recall what the behaviour of the two was on the evening of the 2nd November? You spoke of the evening of the 5th to the 7th [sic].
EG: I, as far as I can recall ““ so much time has passed ““ however, it seems a little bit overstepping the lines the behaviour that Mr Sollecito had, it was only on the occasion when we were hearing/questioning Amanda Knox without his presence inside the Questura. Amanda always had the attitude that I don’t know how to define, because I am not a psychologist, however it seems to me [to be] an out of place behaviour. That is to say, [it is] not a well-situated behaviour inside [i.e. in the context/framework] of the fact.
GCM: The evaluation of the behaviour, [can] you describe it? What did it consist of?
EG: The problem is finding the correct terms, according to me. On many occasions she was casual/carefree/impish/gamine, on other occasions ““ there you go ““ for example [in] an interrogation, she was desperate, but always unusual/particular/singular sensations/feelings. The thing that really struck me was certainly the episode of the move [NdT: the “voilà !!”, hip-shaking move], because in short the move, to me, it was a bit strange in that moment.
GM: The day after, in effect.
EG: Yes.
Knox Defence Counsel Ghirga
LG: So we’re at the evening of the 5th, then the night between the 5th and the 6th. To us it appears from other points of the investigation, also from the witness [evidence], that on that evening, around 21:30 only Sollecito had been called to the Questura. You, on the contrary, said that they were both made to be questioned/heard together.
EG: No, I remember having said that they were called together on purpose.
LG: You, but [sic] to us it appears from the testimony of your colleagues that only Amanda was called, and Raffaele Sollecito insisted on coming.
EG: I gave direct orders to the investigators to take them. I, look, I remember it very well, because it was the first time that we carried out a sort [sic], of doing two SIT [recaps/summaries] in a simultaneous manner, and I said go get them. I seems to me they were in a pizzeria. I can tell you mathematical certainty. I remember perfectly well having arranged a technical tactic.
LG: You took the question out of my mouth, that of hearing/questioning them together was a choice.
EG: Absolutely, yes. I believe it was the only time that they were heard/questioned concurrently.
LG: I remember that when Amanda was taken for summary/recap, [for] the first information, by other people, you were in the control room with Profazio.
EG: I, with Profazio, was in the control room the evening of the arrests.
LG: That is to say, you were not present at the moment of the SIT, of the summaries/recaps of the witnesses.
EG: But that, the evening [sic].
LG: No, here we have arrived at the 5th, in the evening, when you called them both as a result of an investigative strategy.
EG: The 5th evening.
LG: So you were not present when Amanda gave a witness summary/recap.
EG: No.
LG: However, recall that at a certain point the PM [pubblico ministero], the Public prosecutor Dr Mignini. What happened? If you [can] recall without going into the content.
EG: I recall the passage was described to the Public Prosecutor ““ everything that had happened that according to us we could not proceed with the SIT, because to my feeling there was a different position.
LG: Of suspects, so we understand each other.
EG: Exactly. My feeling yes. I recall that I asked Dr Mignini, in short that I said “Look, I am interrupting the questioning/written record because I am not continuing, because I must stop”.
LG: Do you recall what happened then? The PM came?
EG: Yes.
LG: And the spontaneous declarations were gathered.
EG: I… the spontaneous declarations of whom?
LG: On the part of Amanda Knox.
EG: On the part of the PG [procuratore generale = Attorney General].
LG: Certainly they were taken by the Public prosecutor the spontaneous declarations by Amanda Knox, you were not present.
EG: I was present in there, however, in short, it is a detail that I maybe learned later, I learned it later.
LG: No, I’m asking you to be precise. We are at 5:45 in the morning, the Public Prosecutor has arrived, and in the case files there is, there are some spontaneous declarations in the sense of Article 350.
EG: Yes, there are.
LG: You were present in the moment when Amanda ...
EG: I was not present in the moment when the here [present] Public Prosecutor took the summaries/recaps.
LG: You were not present.
EG: I was inside the Flying Squad [offices].
LG: No, if you were there, where ...
EG: In the room, no.
Comments
Thank you so much for your commitment to Meredith and her family ZiaK. To read these translations is mind-boggling.
.” But I repeat that I held this to depend very much on the type of character that each of us has, that, in short, [we might] experience the various feelings [to a] greater or lesser [extent].”
The above is very interesting, because it shows that it WAS taken into account that different people with different natures/character will react and respond in different ways to an extraordinary event. The authorities did NOT have expectations only of a specific (cultural) response, as Knox has often claimed.
Also of interest is the way Dr Giobbi was so struck by the inappropriateness and lack of gravity in AK’s ‘Voila!’ moment - it really does give the impression that she was merely acting in a play she was scripting as she went along, with absolutely no idea that life is serious, and not a play-acting game.
Then too, her histrionics at the Patrick moment, which were audible way outside the room. This is graphic.
Hysterical behaviour is of significance in personality disturbance and disorder : Dr Giobbi says he is not a psychologist, but he is nevertheless particularly sensitive to the relevant behaviours - no doubt why he was wisely brought all the way from Rome to help.
His observations on Sollecito’s behaviour are interesting, especially with regard to the contrast with AK. He remarks more than once on his ‘gentleman-like’ behaviour; that he was calm and co-operative, that he was put at ease, but that it was still necessary to follow up contradictions.
In the light of this more moderate behaviour, Dr Giobbi does notice how forceful Sollecito was about insisting to be with Amanda when she was questioned alone. This forcefulness would have been of consequence, and was noted.
What a sensitive and intelligent face Dr Giobbi has : I would trust him.
Hi SeekingUnderstanding
Zinnia above is right, the more one reads the more boggled one’s mind becomes at the chutzpah of Amanda Knox and those illegally enabling her crime-wave.
His behavior observations are useful. He also describes other parts of the early investigation he was a party to, including sorting out the “tales” the RS and AK houses tell.
Giobbi’s testimony is frankly rather puzzling in one particular instance. He talks of blood in all the rooms (not true visually to an investigator nor in point of fact) and gives the impression that a lot of this was to be found in the boy’s flat.
I can see how this would have set the cat amongst the pigeons with the Groupies, culminating now with the suppression of evidence crap with which they have come up lately. Or is it a translation problem? Is ZiaK entirely happy with the translation of the relevant paragraph?
A delicate thing to talk about - but - a little blood from a very small wound (or nick, in a thumb, or toe for instance) can go an awfully long way, especially if there is delay in clotting, or the wound keeps open, or re-opens.
I bleed easily and am slow to clot from a condition, so I realize! If it was spread out on the surface everywhere, it might have looked ‘soaked’ when in fact it wasn’t.
Unfortunate puzzle though, as you say James, as absolutely anything can be grabbed, however absurd.
I believe Dr Giobbi does mention several times that his reporting is from his impressions and feelings/sensations (what is the Italian word(s) Ziak, please?), which were before, and therefore not clarified by, any forensic or DNA findings.
I can imagine anything out of the ordinary would have seemed alarming. E.g. Seeing the small stains on the steps outdoors - they may have been from drips of blood, or they may not, etc.
Selene Nelson has written an excellent article about the case for The Huffington Post:
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/selene-nelson/amanda-knox_b_5529905.html?utm_hp_ref=tw
Please tweet and retweet. Thanks.
Please “like”, share, and comment on Selene Nelson’s article “Why Feminists Owe Amanda Knox Nothing”
via social media thanks. It’s on the UK edition of Huffington Post but might get picked up by the US as well. A great antidote to the Lisa Marie Basile article.
Please tweet this article to every feminist who has ever written an error-ridden innocenisti article and betrayed the real victim - Meredith Kercher.
Great article. Thank you for being so forthright, Selene…
Hi Everybody,
Pete drew my attention to James’s caution that some confusion might be engineered with regard to the “blood throughout the house”, referring to the flat occupied by the young men downstairs… In Italian, the section of paragraph is as follows:
[...] Tra l’altro per quanto riguarda l’appartamento situato al piano terra, di sotto, perché in realtà è un interrato rispetto al piano che sta quasi al livello strada, lì entrando abbiamo avuto subito quelle immagini molto forti di sangue sparso in tutta la casa, che ovviamente appena arrivati a me come investigatore mi ha costretto a stabilire anche delle priorità con la Polizia scientifica, del tipo, che io dovevo sapere immediatamente se il sangue che stava sotto fosse sangue della vittima, o perché c’era tutto questo sangue, parliamo di sangue sotto che era sparso in tutte le stanze, c’erano macchie sul muro, c’era un copriletto un piumone completamente intriso, anche perché mi avrebbe fatto capire immediatamente che lo sviluppo investigativo, voglio dire un conto è che l’azione omicidiale sia avvenuta solo nell’appartamento di sopra, un altro conto ovviamente che fosse iniziata alo piano di sotto, perché mi cambiava insomma poi tutte le considerazioni, questi sono state diciamo le attività immediate, le prime attività che abbiamo posto in essere, [...]
And this was my English translation:
[…] For that matter, with regard to the apartment situated on the ground floor, below – because in reality it was a basement with regard to the storey that was almost at street-level – when we entered there we immediately had those very strong images of blood shed throughout the house, which obviously to me, just arrived as an investigator, obliged me to establish priorities with the Forensic police, of the type: that I had to know immediately if the blood that was down there was the victim’s blood, or why there was all that blood. We’re talking about blood below that was splattered in all the rooms: there were stains on the wall, there was a bed-cover, a duvet, that was completely soaked. Also because it would have led me to grasp immediately that the investigative plans [NdT: i.e. how the investigation developed] – I mean to say, one explanation is that the homicidal action took place only in the apartment above, another explanation obviously [is] that it began on the lower storey. Because this then changed, in short, all the considerations. These were, shall we say, the immediate actions, the first activities that we carried out. […]
This is not to say that I am incapable of making mistakes (I know I do…), but Giobbi does indeed talk of blood spread throughout the house “sparso in tutta la casaâ€, where “sparso†is the past participle of “spargereâ€, meaning “scattered, shed, spilled, spread, etc.…â€. He also mentions a “bedcover, a duvet, completely soaked [completamente intriso]†with blood (he seems rather given to hyperbole, to my mind).
These references didn’t strike me as being out of the ordinary, since I have also translated (as you know) large sections of Napoleoni’s testimony, Zugarini’s testimony, and am still in the process of translating Stefanoni’s testimony (it’s very long!!!). All of these witnesses mention the blood in the flat downstairs, and also mention that it comes from the cat. Zugarini (unless I’m mistaken) mentioned having taken the downstairs tenants to the flat so they could attempt to catch the cat (a semi-feral one) because it was wounded and needed treatment (I assume Meredith was also dealing with this during their absence), and Stefanoni (on page 12 of the Wiki testimony already) refers to being seriously misled, and almost made fools of, by the presence of cat blood – its provenance was only discovered on testing, of course, as there’s no way to determine this by eye, unless you happen to see it issuing from the wound itself
Stefanoni: With regard to blood and hairlike-structures which we also have in common with animals, it happens, but fairly ... let us say [12] frequently, and even hairlike-structures, because dogs and cats are the most ... let’s say that these [are] the most normal producers of evidence/exhibits of a biological nature, since animals live with man, at least in an apartment, [or] in a car. One recovers hairlike-structures [whose origin] can’t preliminarily be determined by the naked eye as being human or animal and therefore have to be analysed…
Comodi: Did that very thing happen also during this investigation?
Stefanoi: Yes, unfortunately it also happened in this case that a cat that drove us mad because initially, during the on-the-spot investigation, the investigation in the house on via della Pergola, thus the house where the body was found, unfortunately we were badly misled, almost made fools of by the fact that a cat - obviously wounded, had got into the let-us-say flat below the victim’s flat. Obviously there was glass shards, broken in short, that were produced in entering the flat because the keys couldn’t be found I know. And therefore this cat, unfortunately, was hurt and had left blood all over the place, obviously making us carry out an absolutely crazy sampling job because we thought that somebody had clearly ... in short, I don’t know, [something] linked to the crime, and therefore had lost blood. But instead, it was actually a cat.
So, yes, there was indeed blood downstairs, and this was indeed a possible issue for investigation (was in fact investigated until it was revealed to be misleading).
By the way, normally when I’m translating these testimonies, I seem to suspend any ability to form judgments/opinions that I may have (admittedly not great: I’m always astounded by what you all manage to infer and understand from the texts… I see them much more literally, I’m afraid). However, in the case of Giobbi, I got the feeling (like his own “sensazione†– that is the word in Italian, SeekingUnderstanding) that he was a rather bombastic man, rather taken with his own investigative abilities and intuitions… whereas, if I think about it, it takes very little investigative intuition to deduce that any blood at all found in the environs of a murder scene should be investigated!
I hope this clarifies things for everybody. But feel free to draw my attention to any other queries you have!
ZiaK/katsgalore
Dr Giobbi is the person whom the FOA jumped on because of his intellectual honesty.
They said that he can tell people are guilty by the way they looked, basing this on a ‘Sound bite’ from an heavily edited TV program in which the image above is a capture of.
However in the real world we can see that Dr Giobbi’s testimony in a court of law is one of pure and honest professionalism.
The thing is, now that we are getting all the detailed statements from the trial itself, it makes it even worse than it was before because the Knox entourage has always known this.
Thanks for the clarification, ZiaK.
Many FOA seem confused and unable to determine the blood traces found in the downstairs flat and upstairs, even though the same source documents (the Forensic police report) are available to them as well.
They mention blood on a light switch downstairs when the report clearly indicates it is in the upstairs flat.
From there, they leap to conspiracy theory, based on poorly extrapolated and tabulated data from the read outs, that there were ‘massive amounts’ of blood traces downstairs, but Patrizia Stefanoni “covered it up” (which all the defense experts inexplicably missed, somehow)
You can only shake your head at such nonsense, which you can see in all its glory at the fake wiki set up by Bruce Fischer.
Amanda Knox fan on IIP’s response to Selene Nelson’s article: “Hit this one hard, repeatedly’.
https://twitter.com/1Lonely_Cowboy/status/482199178085675008
They are all, sadly, tone deaf.
ZiaK
Thank you, and thanks for the ‘sensazione’. Giobbi wouldn’t be the first Italian given to hyperbole! Love it, though, - at least it shows a desire to really explain the whole picture as they experience it.
Love your translations, too, Ziak - the way they make logical sense yet retain the speech patterns and emphases given through the Italian; also your ‘in parentheses’ where and when necessary.
I’m sure it’s a great long work, to give them such detailed attention, and I know we’re all very grateful. It’s so illuminating to go to the source in this way - invaluable.
Giobbi does say how he so dislikes having to be a spokesman on TV - he must have felt awful to see the way he was so heavily edited and spliced about. Such mischief.
Thanks ZiaK. Your translations are very much appreciated. Should I ever write a book on the case and quote direct from your translations I will duly give you credit. LOL (about writing the book I mean, although you never know…. !)
Thank you for the compliment, SeekingUnderstanding - and everyone else! It’s greatly appreciated!
I admit I tend to rattle through these translations rather quickly, as I have other work to do (hence the possibilities of error entering), and I don’t try to make them into things of beauty. I have the “sensazione” that many of you, after 7 years of studying the case, have developed a fairly good level of understanding of Italian yourselves, so I have always striven to keep my English version as close as possible to the structure and wording - and even the style (like Giobbi’s hyperbole, or Zugarini’s racy slang)- of the Italian (including offering “multiple-choice” versions, where more than one meaning can apply for a particular Italian word, and giving “glosses” where I think it might help), rather than giving a translation that is more of a “personal INTERPRETATION” of the text.
I’m also motivated to do so by the suspicion that those who believe in the innocence of Knox-Sollecito might try to pick translations apart, and query or quibble various translation choices, so the closer I can keep the English to the original, the better in my mind! I think clarity and knowledge are important for all, whether you believe in guilt or in innocence.
I’m also grateful to have the opportunity, through Pete’s forum here, to do what I can to make the Italian point of view accessible to non-speakers, and hopefully to help in a small way to put an end to this demonisation of a whole country that many FOA folk seem to indulge in.
And of course, as I mentioned once before, I believe strongly that justice for Meredith includes having everyone understand the full truth of the situation so they can see for themselves the extent of Knox and Sollecito’s guilt (and Guede’s too) and not go on blindly believing the PR-spin claiming innocence, so I’m happy to do anything I can do to help spread knowledge about the case.
Thank you, SeekingUnderstanding, for your insight about Giobbi and how he did take into consideration that various personalities like Knox could react differently without necessarily being guilty of a crime.
Dr. Giobbi probably tried to weigh the fact of her youth, her unknown involvement with Sollecito and what pressure Raf might have used on her, perhaps she was terrified of Raffaele, her sense of dislocation being far from her home country, and the language barrier.
He does have a sensitive face and Dr. Giobbi has been proven accurate.
Yes, Ziak…that does come across. Clarity and knowledge ..admirable.
Raffaele Sollecito http://www.perugiatoday.it/cronaca/caso-meredith-cassazione-sollecito-nuova-versione.html may be trying an end run through the media. He aided in the clean up, but did not actually murder Meredith Kercher. He can’t remember whether Knox went out that evening.
Discounting the DNA evidence, the foot print, the kitchen knife from his flat, Curatolo’s testimony, he still should have made this plea at the Florence Court. Judge Nencini already concluded he wielded the second knife, and I don’t think the Supreme Court will look kindly at his too late desperate antics.
It looks like they’re asking for, but it’s very doubtful that they’ll send his case back for reconsideration to the Appeals court, or he’ll even get a reduced sentence.
Where next:
Click here to return to The Top Of The Front PageOr to next entry Sollecito Suddenly Remembers He Wasnt There But Cannot Speak For Knox Who (As She Said) Went Out
Or to previous entry Knox Interrogation Hoax #7: Testimony Of Witness Lorena Zugarini To Knox Conniption 5-6 Nov