Amanda Knox to make final plea of innocence

[alp227]

Source: The Guardian

Amanda Knox and her former Italian boyfriend are to make a last attempt today to persuade the court hearing their appeals that they had nothing to do with the murder of Knox's ex-flatmate, the British student Meredith Kercher.

Members of the victim's family will fly into Perugia for the keenly awaited outcome, but were expected to arrive too late to hear the final pleas of Kercher's convicted killers. Their presence, just feet away from the relatives of the two appellants, will add an extra layer of tension to a case already brimming with drama and expectation.

The Kerchers' legal representatives at the appeal have unequivocally aligned themselves with the prosecution's case that Knox slashed the British student's throat as she was held immobile by Knox's then boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, and Rudy Guede, a small-time drugs trafficker from the Ivory Coast. But the family's lawyer, Francesco Maresca, told the Guardian: "Just as they respected the verdict at the trial, so they will respect the outcome of the appeal."

Knox attended mass on Saturday in the prison near Perugia where she has been held for almost four years since her arrest. The prison chaplain, Father Saulo Scarabattoli, said she had played guitar during the service, as she did every weekend. "You can imagine how she is," he said. "But Amanda evinces great strength and hope."

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/oct/02/amanda-knox-last-plea-appeal

[pnwmom]

1. The spirit of the Salem Witch Trials is alive and well in Perugia, Italy

where Amanda Knox has been accused of being a she-devil, a Luciferina, diabolical, Satanic, and a witch who is casting spells. Raffaele, her codefendant, is the helpless male who was caught up in her black magic.

Amanda, of the "icy-blue eyes," magically left no trace of her presence at the crime scene -- easy enough, since she's a witch! And the only piece of DNA said to be Raffaele's -- a bit on the victim's bra clasp -- was completely debunked by the court-appointed experts. (One of them said there was so much contamination that she could have found anyone's profile there -- including the judge's.) So Amanda's magic was so strong she was able not only to remove every trace of her own presence in the murder room, but also of Raffaele's.

The real murderer, Rudy Guede, had no connection with the other two defendants, and he had a history of burglarizing with knives. He also left his DNA inside and on the victim's body, along with handprints, shoe prints, and dozens of other pieces of physical evidence at the murder scene. He admits being with the murder victim, but says all their contact was consensual, and that some other man killed her while he was in the toilet. He fled to Germany immediately after the murder, but when he was extradited he still had numerous cuts on his body.

Why would the prosecutor go after two innocent students when the real murderer was so clear? Because Mignini had already announced that Amanda and Raffaele were guilty before any of the results of the physical evidence came in from the crime lab. He couldn't admit he was wrong when he announced, within days after the murder, "case closed."

And because Mignini has a delusional obsession with Satanic cults, Masonic ritual, and sorcery. And the media found that much more interesting than the tired old story of a burglary gone bad.

[saras]

2. Excellent summary.

[SwissTony]

3. If you want some insight into Mignini, read

"The Monster of Florence" by Preston and Spezi. This case predates the Kercher case. The latest edition of the book does comment on the Kercher case in the last chapter but is independent of it. Mignini is a complete fruitcake.

And the descriptions of Knox as a "witch" etc are not exaggerations, courtroom rhetoric or "cultural differences". Magnini actually believes the Monster of Florence is actually evidence of an active Satanic cult. No evidence that it is, of course. But he says so...so that's enough.

The case against Knox and Sollecito is garbage.

[pnwmom]

4. Yes, I want to read that. Another book that I can recommend

is by Nina Burleigh, The Fatal Gift of Beauty. More about that book here:

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/international/she_devil_in_the_details_KT3zbCuNv6iW356MZHppZK?utm_campaign=Post10&utm_source=Post10Alpha

SNIP

The story of Amanda Knox in Italy is of media, misogyny, mistranslation, misbehavior -- but chiefly superstition. Kercher’s death was a terrible but simple act of sexual aggression against a young woman in her home. Yet while a prosecutor in the United States might see only the forensic evidence, the motives and the opportunity -- the small-town Italian prosecutor Giuliano Mignini saw something more. It was a Halloween crime, and that was one of the first clues to register with Mignini, called to the crime scene fresh from celebrating All Souls’ Day, a day when proper Italian families visit their dead.


And on scene was a pale, light-eyed 20-year-old girl who, prosecutors said in their closing arguments last week, had the look of a “she-devil.”

Mignini always included witch fear in his murder theory, and only reluctantly relinquished it. As late as October 2008, a year after the murder, he told a court that the murder “was premeditated and was in addition a ‘rite’ celebrated on the occasion of the night of Halloween. A sexual and sacrificial rite in the intention of the organizers ... should have occurred 24 hours earlier” -- on Halloween itself -- “but on account of a dinner at the house of horrors, organized by Meredith and Amanda’s Italian flatmates, it was postponed for one day.”

Eventually, Mignini’s No. 2, the chain-smoking, no-nonsense Manuela Comodi, persuaded him to drop the references to Satanism. But no one forgot about it, not the jury, not the judge, not the press, not the Perugians, not the court spectators, who could never look at Amanda without wondering whether a whiff of sulfur surrounded her.


Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/international/she_devil_in_the_details_KT3zbCuNv6iW356MZHppZK#ixzz1Zf1WVf4r

[lavenderdiva]

12. I read this book back in 2008

and was mesmerized by the case written about in the book. At some point, the 2 authors themselves were arrested and accused by Mignini of being the Monster of Florence serial killer! Mignini is a fruitcake and I can't believe no one has removed him as prosecutor after all these years and many prosecutions of completely innocent individuals based on no evidence, only his convoluted 'theories' based on cults, witchcraft, etc.

I'm hoping Amanda Knox's appeal is successful and she is allowed to return home.....

[regnaD kciN]

19. Mignini never met a case...

...he couldn't portray as a Satanic sex ritual, probably carried out by the Freemasons who secretly run Italy. :eyes:

[Demoiselle]

23. Just googled Mignini...

He was convicted of abuse of office in an unrelated trial in Florence, after the first Knox trial.
Conviction still pending, it seems.

[harmonicon]

8. Does someone pay you for this? nt.

[pnwmom]

9. No. Who pays you? I'd like to get in on it.

I know that the Knoxes have enough to do, spending over a million on costly attorney fees and travel and living costs. But if someone else is passing out money for people to write Internet posts, please let me know!

[regnaD kciN]

17. It's a standard "guilter" technique...

When someone expressed doubts about the case, accuse them of being paid-off by the Knox's supposed "PR supertanker." All I want to know is "where's my check, already???" :eyes:

[harmonicon]

20. maybe you should ask for it

Working PR for someone for free is just silly.

[ooglymoogly]

14. +1 nt

[LittleGirl]

5. I hope this is her last night in jail.

I believe the poor girl is innocent.

[Odin2005]

6. Europeans have no right to look down at us as primitive and superstitious ever again after this.

Because apparently this shit is still alive and well in Italy.

[Bodhi BloodWave]

7. could you please not broadbrush all of europe for italy's insanity please :) n/t

[pnwmom]

10. And it might just be Perugia's problem, assuming the appeals court

overturns the lower court action.

Although I think any system that routinely gets HALF of its lower court rulings overturned could be improved.

[tropicanarose]

11. I hope that tomorrow will bring good news for Amanda and Raphaele. This whole thing has been such a

tragedy.....while our justice system has its faults, seeing the Italian judicial system made me more grateful to live here.

[FourScore]

13. She and Raffaele are so inonocent.

I hope that Meredith Kercher's family begins to see the truth as well. They are still convinced Amanda and Raffaele are guilty.

[Merlot]

15. I've read that the lawyers for the Kercher family have an eye on a civil suit

Though Knox doesn't have any money, Raffaele's family is well off.

[alp227]

16. apparently the guy who really did it, Rudy Guede, will be released by 2024

"Rudy Guede, a resident of Perugia, was convicted on 28 October 2008 of the sexual assault and murder of Kercher. His fast-track conviction was upheld, and he is now serving a reduced sentence of 16 years." --Wikipedia article

[pnwmom]

18. Sooner than that, with time off for good behavior.

I've heard that it might be as little as half of that.

[harmonicon]

21. Stupid parents of a murdered child.

Of course you have a better understanding of the case than they do.

[maxsolomon]

22. Perhaps they have a more objective understanding?

The Kerchers have my empathy, and that of everyone with an opinion on the case, but if they truly believe Knox & Sollecito had anything to do with it, they're being swayed by their emotions and Mignini's bluster.

His theory of the case is so unneccessarily elaborate that it is beyond absurd. Satanism? He is irrational and superstitious.