Meredith Kercher murdered - Amanda Knox convicted, now appeals #6

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Give people a little credit! Juries in the US are rarely sequestored anymore in spite of the rampant talking heads twisting every sordid detail of juicy crimes into something completely false. Italian jurors are as capable as anyone in terms of doing the job they are tasked with. I am confident that in Italy, like in most countries, people are able to form an opinion about guilt based on evidence presented in court and not the newspapers.

American juries get it wrong, too, and sometimes because of pre-trial publicity. See Innocence Project.
 
American juries get it wrong, too, and sometimes because of pre-trial publicity. See Innocence Project.

Withholding exculpatory evidence has indeed been a problem in some US trials, with NC being the most recent place with this problem. I don't think people are accidentally found guilty because jurors watched too much Nancy Grace.
 
Perugia Murder File - Forum Index - page 11 - today's post.

fred, I'm sorry. This is the only forum I use regularly.

I've found PMF and a page called "Board Index." But it has no page numbers, simply different rooms (like the WS main page). What am I missing?
 
Withholding exculpatory evidence has indeed been a problem in some US trials, with NC being the most recent place with this problem. I don't think people are accidentally found guilty because jurors watched too much Nancy Grace.

I don't know, otto. The juries I've been on have been pretty good, but the cases weren't high profile. One hears horror stories, however, and we know of cases where the juror misconduct was flagrant, such as the second West Memphis trial.
 
Go to Board Index, then to Meredith Kercher Murder section, then page 11 of the current Main Discussion.
 
It is striking how many of the arguments against AK come not from the trial testimony but from the "trial by media" that preceded the court case. And yet we are assured that the jury disregarded all those claims which were never raised in court by the prosecutor. I have to wonder...

This is true. Every nuance of her behavior before, during, an after the murder are pointed to as examples of her being a murderous monster. The problem, of course, is that descriptions of her behaviors vary, are incomplete at best, and fabrications at worst. We literally have almost nothing, save for one snippet of a video and an email and a document she wrote, that tells us about her.

Everything else is someone's 'impressions' or what they heard, or what they read in some article, or looking at a picture of AK and seeing someone who looks like a sociopath or looks guilty.

Interestingly none of those things educate us about the crime itself, provide any further information about the evidence in the case, and seem to do nothing other than create more vitriol.

At least in the Scott Peterson case (since this was used as a correlative case of sociopathic murderers), I could hear with my own ears his lies, I could see the lies he wrote in his emails and letters to Amber, I could see pictures of his died orange hair (he claimed chlorine in the pool did that). There was factual proof that everyone could examine without having to read about some person's impressions of what they thought he was like (though certainly there was plenty of that too, in the media).

I have no problem recognizing evil behavior and seeing a murderer where one exists, but I've got to base it on something other than someone else's thoughts and impressions.
 
I don't know, otto. The juries I've been on have been pretty good, but the cases weren't high profile. One hears horror stories, however, and we know of cases where the juror misconduct was flagrant, such as the second West Memphis trial.

Can people with 20+ years of experience working in the courtroom sit on juries? Isn't it more challenging for people that know the lawyers, prosecutors and judges to be objective ... and wouldn't prosecutors and lawyers alike disqualify someone that normally worked in the courtroom from sitting on a jury?
 
Then how would AK's father also have RS's diary? Are you saying he had access to both of them and leaked them?

It seems that the diary page about the AIDS test was released by the family to bolster the idea that Knox was treated poorly. It backfired. Knox herself claims that she was immediately told that it could be a false positive and that the test would be redone. Instead of people viewing the page as evidence that Knox was mistreated, people focused on her admission of several one night stands. It also seems that the diary was offered to some people that were following the case ... with strings attached. This comes from someone that claims to have been offered the diary, but who declined the offer because of the strings. Take it for what it's worth ... may or may not be true (personally, I think it's true).

Raffaele wrote in his diary that he pricked Meredith with a knife while she had dinner at his house. That became evidence of Sollecito's lies regarding signifcant evidence.
 
It seems that the diary page about the AIDS test was released by the family to bolster the idea that Knox was treated poorly. It backfired. Knox herself claims that she was immediately told that it could be a false positive and that the test would be redone. Instead of people viewing the page as evidence that Knox was mistreated, people focused on her admission of several one night stands. It also seems that the diary was offered to some people that were following the case ... with strings attached. This comes from someone that claims to have been offered the diary, but who declined the offer because of the strings. Take it for what it's worth ... may or may not be true (personally, I think it's true).

Raffaele wrote in his diary that he pricked Meredith with a knife while she had dinner at his house. That became evidence of Sollecito's lies regarding signifcant evidence.

my point is that BOTH diaries were leaked
 
Then how would AK's father also have RS's diary? Are you saying he had access to both of them and leaked them?

Yeah, that is what I said :pcguru: . Could you help me find it tho to quote?
 
Can people with 20+ years of experience working in the courtroom sit on juries? Isn't it more challenging for people that know the lawyers, prosecutors and judges to be objective ... and wouldn't prosecutors and lawyers alike disqualify someone that normally worked in the courtroom from sitting on a jury?

I don't understand the reasons for these questions, but in the U.S., it would depend on the case, the judge, and the attorneys.

Yes, I imagine someone who worked in that very courtroom--the bailiff, say--would be excused. But some DAs and defenders excuse lawyers and others with legal experience, some do not. The jury for a murder trial on which I served also included an actual lawyer. But I've been at voir dires where one of the attorneys excused everyone with any legal experience. I think it depends on whether the attorney fears being second-guessed on the law.

If the "20+ years of experience" is a reference to me, I should clarify that I never said I have 20+ years of courtroom experience. I spent that time working at law firms, with all sorts of lawyers. I did work several trials (including a lengthy and high-profile murder case in NJ where a corporation was accused of murder), but the corporate firms that employed me rather specialized in keeping cases out of court. And most of our clients were large corporations being sued in civil court.
 
Yeah, that is what I said :pcguru: . Could you help me find it tho to quote?

Miley has gone to great length with various links, the Italian Courts found in favour of AK, they would not of done this if it had been leaked by a family member

ETA It's where the PMF argument falls apart, there was simply too much info leaked, much of it only ILE or prison officials would have
 
I finally found the discussion at PMF. There is a post similar to otto's about the diary material being shopped around, but I don't see where anyone over there knows how the diaries were leaked to the author of the book.

The claim that the family of AK did it makes no sense to me. The diaries were in police custody. The family would have had to make copies in advance (of AK's and RS' diaries) and how would they know that material would become significant?

Am I wrong in imagining handwritten material? Because if we are talking about computer diaries, that might be a different matter. Then the availability of copies would become more probable. But even there, weren't the computers of RS and AK in LE's custody, as well? How would AK's family get that material to pass around?
 
I don't understand the reasons for these questions, but in the U.S., it would depend on the case, the judge, and the attorneys.

Yes, I imagine someone who worked in that very courtroom--the bailiff, say--would be excused. But some DAs and defenders excuse lawyers and others with legal experience, some do not. The jury for a murder trial on which I served also included an actual lawyer. But I've been at voir dires where one of the attorneys excused everyone with any legal experience. I think it depends on whether the attorney fears being second-guessed on the law.

If the "20+ years of experience" is a reference to me, I should clarify that I never said I have 20+ years of courtroom experience. I spent that time working at law firms, with all sorts of lawyers. I did work several trials (including a lengthy and high-profile murder case in NJ where a corporation was accused of murder), but the corporate firms that employed me rather specialized in keeping cases out of court. And most of our clients were large corporations being sued in civil court.

Around here, anyone with any affiliation with the courts, and people that normally work in the courts, are exempt from jury duty for life. The problem is that people that work in the courts often have a few drinks on Friday night and make light of some of the horrific situations they encounter daily, or they take their work home - even if it's only paperwork. Those conversations and exposures to trial proceedings are far more detrimental to remaining impartial on a jury than anything in the news. Furthermore, jurors are instructed not to read the news while diliberating on a jury. They are asked if they are able to manage that, and if they cannot, they are excused.
 
I finally found the discussion at PMF. There is a post similar to otto's about the diary material being shopped around, but I don't see where anyone over there knows how the diaries were leaked to the author of the book.

The claim that the family of AK did it makes no sense to me. The diaries were in police custody. The family would have had to make copies in advance (of AK's and RS' diaries) and how would they know that material would become significant?

Am I wrong in imagining handwritten material? Because if we are talking about computer diaries, that might be a different matter. Then the availability of copies would become more probable. But even there, weren't the computers of RS and AK in LE's custody, as well? How would AK's family get that material to pass around?

Yes they were, in fact they fried 3 of the 4 hard drives. In order for AK's father to of leaked this he would of had to of had access to RS, which i can guarantee his attorneys would NOT allow to happen. They quote most from AK's diaries but most forget that BOTH AK's and RS's were leaked. Chris Mellos would not of had access to them both
 
I finally found the discussion at PMF. There is a post similar to otto's about the diary material being shopped around, but I don't see where anyone over there knows how the diaries were leaked to the author of the book.

The claim that the family of AK did it makes no sense to me. The diaries were in police custody. The family would have had to make copies in advance (of AK's and RS' diaries) and how would they know that material would become significant?

Am I wrong in imagining handwritten material? Because if we are talking about computer diaries, that might be a different matter. Then the availability of copies would become more probable. But even there, weren't the computers of RS and AK in LE's custody, as well? How would AK's family get that material to pass around?

I wasn't sure if you were able to find it, so I summarized what I found.
 
I wasn't sure if you were able to find it, so I summarized what I found.

you forgot where it is stated they DOUBT it was ILE

and an impersonator they THINK might be him
 
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