Amanda Knox & Raffaele Sollecito
Now is not the time to present all of the evidence proving that Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito are completely innocent in the brutal murder of Meredith Kercher and that Rudy Guede is the sole killer. Now is not the time to use logic and reason to convince the “guilters.” Now is not the time to give the police, investigators, prosecutors, judges and juries the benefit of the doubt as to motives and methods. We’ve tried all of that and it hasn’t worked.
Now is the time to tell it like it is, straight and unvarnished by niceties:
The conviction of Amanda and Raffaele at their retrial in Florence is a scandalous corruption of justice that should wrap the Italian nation in shame.
This decision, overturning Judge Claudio Pratillo Hellmann’s meticulously considered and reasoned appeals court decision, has nothing to do with logic or evidence. It has nothing to do with jurisprudence or due process. It is only about covering mistakes, saving face and desperately attempting to salvage the prestige of the various officials who have perpetrated this travesty. It is about maintaining the fiction of a story that is far more enthralling and titillating than what really happened. And if you read the pronouncement of the Supreme Court of Cassation in Rome that ordered the retrial, it is essentially a roadmap to re-conviction, devoid of all facts and logic.
It is no surprise that Italy, far and away, has the most overruled supreme court in the European Union.
Largely overlooked in this entire sorry process is the fact that had Amanda not met Raffaele the week before the murder and slept at his apartment, she could very well have been the one who came home, surprised the intruder Guede, and was murdered by him. Then the tabloid media would have spent the last seven years lamenting the shocking loss of this beautiful and sensitive American girl.
I believe every American and other citizens of the civilized world should think twice before setting foot on Italian soil. I would certainly hesitate before letting any son, daughter, niece or nephew of mine study abroad in Italy. If this can happen to Amanda, it can happen to everyone.
As we said in the statement released yesterday by the authors of The Forgotten Killer: Rudy Guede and the Murder of Amanda Knox:
We will speak out against this disgraceful verdict and travesty of justice in every public arena, and at every possible opportunity. The sooner the Italian court system comes to its senses, the better for it and the public it is supposed to serve.
Hi Mark, I just wish to correct some misconceptions in your article if I may.
Knox and Sollecito were NOT retried. They were tried under judge Massei and were entitled to two automatic appeals under Italy’s three tier judicial system.
Hellman provisionally overturned their murder conviction but upheld Knox’s callunnia conviction (for falsely accusing her boss of murdering Meredith and standing by her false accusation for over two weeks, leaving him languishing in prison) and added more time onto it.
As Hellman’s provisional overturning was at a lower appellate intermediate level the prosecution were able to appeal. This does NOT equate to double jeopardy in either Italy or the US.
US prosecutors are also able to appeal appellate courts’ overturning of convictions Recently, US prosecutors plan to appeal the overturning of the so called “cannibal cop” Gilberto Valle’s conviction by an appellate court, for example.
No Satanic ritual murder was ever mooted by the prosecution at either Knox, Sollecito’s or Guede’s trial and no mention of any Satanic ritual motive exists in any of the court transcripts or judges’ motivational reports.
No sex orgy was ever mooted either, but rather that Meredith was sexually humiliated, after a row over missing rent money.
I must respectfully disagree with you regarding Hellman. Hellman made no less than 17 reversible flaws in his ruling, including manifest illogicality, misinterpretation of reasonable doubt, viewing the evidence in isolation separately from each piece and unlawful remarks his colleague Judge Zanetti made at the very start of their appeal. His ruling was in no way reasoned or logical.
With respect, I have yet to hear a single valid objection form Knox’s supporters as to how their trial was unfair or that this was a miscarriage of justice. The only objection seems to be that Knox’s supporters dislike the verdict.
I would respectfully ask you how her process was a farce, considering Knox was entitled to two automatic appeals, which she wouldn’t have gotten in either the US, UK or my country.
Again, I hope you read the primary sources for the case against Knox & Sollecito.
Cheers.
This article is long overdue. Amanda and Raffaele and their families have been put through a living hell by an unjust and corrupt legal system. The one bright light that Italians can be proud of was Judge Hellman’s decision freeing them and exonerating them. Everything else about this case has shown the utter corruption of the Italian system.
This is the work of the Italian prosecutor Mignini. The same guy who stuffed up the il mostro case, now solved by two journalists in the excellent book “The Monster of Florence”. Mignini doesn’t want to admit he was wrong TWICE. I believe he must know Knox is innocent. He is just more concerned about his reputation.
Another excellent article by a British writer:
http://www.spiked-online.com/newsite/article/amanda-knox-italian-justice-on-trial/14599#.UvGDlPldV1F
From the beginning the guilty verdicts were clearly not based on any physical evidence or any eye witnesses. There was a smear campaign levelled against Amanda Knox largely from leaks from the prosecution to the media. The original prosecutor has in the case and earlier ones been obsessed with sex and satanic ritual motives. He was charged with prosecutorial misconduct prior to this case and found guily after this case. The interrogation of Amanda Knox happened over 5 days and for as long as 8 hours all night long with no attorney present. The video tape of the interrogation which is required in Italy is somehow missing. The one clear guilty person has his sentence reduced from 30 years to 16 years and is soon eligible for parole. The indictments and convictions of these 2 innocent victims are based solely on theories with absolutely no factual basis. This is a lynching by the prosecution, judges, juries, and media sensationalism.
Well stated! Thanks.
All eyes were on Florence. This entire nightmare is a disgrace to justice. Justice has been denied. This fight isn’t over. How weak is a case when it revolves around how someone reacts emotionally? This case has never been about truth or justice. Rather, a political agenda at the cost of 2 innocent lives. The time for “trust in Italian justice” is over. They have officially failed. We will continue to fight for Amanda & Raffaele’s innocence until it is confirmed for good.
You said it, Noel!
This atrocity is reminding me of the Citizen X movie about the prolific child killer Chikatilo who was known to bureaucrats for years but whom they would not prosecute until after the USSR crumbled because of a worm can full of twisted political motivations.
Worst of all perhaps, the wrong man was executed in 1983 for one of Chikatilo’s murders. That man, Alexander Kravchenko, had a serious criminal record and was a natural suspect. Chikatilo, in contrast, was “Citizen X”, an ordinary married man. But it was only in 1985, seven years after the first murder and two years after Kravchenko’s execution, that the psychologist Alexander Bukhanovsky (Max von Sydov in the movie) came up with the murderer’s profile.
All the changing motives, MOs, and TODs by prosecutors and judges throughout the trials. What makes Prosecutor Crini’s absurd new theory about a fatal argument between Meredith and Amanda over Guede’s unflushed turd even more absurd is that the turd was in Filomena/Laura’s shared bathroom at the other end of the flat, not in Meredith/Amanda’s shared bathroom. Amanda wasn’t even home when Guede broke in and left his turd, and Meredith was about to arrive home. You can’t make this stuff up.
Judge Nencini has to write a motivation document explaining his guilty verdict. What on Earth is he going to say? Italian judges are not restricted to the evidence heard in their courtroom or to any of the prosecutor’s many theories. He can create his very own fantasy as Judge Massei did after the first conviction.
Here’s an excellent article by the Brit journalist Andrew Gumbel:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jan/31/amanda-knox-raffaele-sollecito-case-harsh-verdict-italian-justice