Amanda And Rafaelle Retrial?

[joggerjayne]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/mar/24/amanda-cox-meredith-kercher-retrial

Decision day today in the Italian kangaroo (sorry, I meant "Supreme") courts.

Either there is to be a retrial, or the whole saga is over for good.

Watch the News today.

[beejay1124]

the link didnt work for me JJ---------
is this the famous Lacrosse matchfixing probe?

[bibblebub]

the link works for me in firefox

[joggerjayne]

That's the one, BJ x

:0)

[albaqwerty]

Beej, the first 2 paragraphs

Amanda Knoxthe US student acquitted of the murder of her British flatmate, Meredith Kercher, will on Monday learn if she and her former boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, are to face yet another trial. Italy's highest appeals court is due to rule on a prosecution application for their convictions to be reinstated.

If the court decides against them, they could face a retrial in Florence. Otherwise they will finally be in the clear, and entitled to compensation for wrongful imprisonment.

[beejay1124]

( i didnt click onto it ,tho,bibble)

[beejay1124]

thnx alba(x)

[Svejk]

Hardly a laughing matter, folks.

[emmie]

no it isn't, a young woman was brutally murdered.

[DTCwordfan]

Like she's going back for it?

[rockyracoon]

If they face a retrial, I wonder if the US authorities will comply with the extradition order.

[joggerjayne]

Back to Italy? And that corrupt criminal, Mignini?

You must be joking.

[DTCwordfan]

I am.

[joggerjayne]

I thought you might be, DT

:0)

[emmie]

all the while forgetting that someone murdered that poor young woman, i always wonder why no one seems to think of the victim.

[joggerjayne]

em ... Why do you no one thinks of the victim?

I should think that lots of people, like me, bought John Kercher's book "Meredith" in order to get a thorough perspective on the case from the Kercher family's point of view, and to find out more about Meredith herself, and how the episode has impacted on their lives.

[emmie]

you made your mind up way back when this story broke, about how you didn't believe they did it, and now regurgitate the whole thing, i wonder how the poor lasses family feel knowing this is still going on. We weren't there, nor the author of that book you mentioned. One can only hope that these two don't go back and that the matter is laid to rest, unless there is some evidence that firmly puts them in the frame. I wish that her family find peace over her dreadful death.

[joggerjayne]

1. I haven't really regurgitated the whole thing. But it is an item in today's News.

2. I didn't make my mind up early on about who did or didn't do it. I did have punts about the story that was being fed to the media, and wondered if the story would ever be backed up by real evidence (which the Appeal Court decided it wasn't).

3. Sadly for them, I don't think the Kerchers will ever really know what happened, because the case was handled by a prosecutor with criminal convictions himself for fabricating false evidence on other cases, rather than a prosecutor who would methodically sift through the actual facts.

[joggerjayne]

"punts" = "doubts"!

[emmie]

sorry but you said more or less from the start that you didn't believe that the two were guilty, and maintained that stance. Having said that it seems as though the police in the case bungled it, had this been the British police perhaps this would have been a whole different ball game, who knows. They should let this matter lie now.

[joggerjayne]

ems ...

I did have an initial gut feeling quite quickly. But ...

The name of Prosecutor Mignini was well known to Guardian readers. He was well known as an extreme right wing Catholic with a track record of satanic sex fantasies, none of which had ever been proven correct. He had also falsely arrested and interrogated a Guardian journalist, only releasing him when he found out he worked for a national newspaper, and would expose Mignini's bizarre behaviour.

So, when the case first broke, and Prosecutor Mignini was in charge, I thought ... Oh, my God!

And then when, as usual, he announced that the murder had involved a satanic sex ritual, I thought ... Oh, no, here he goes again. Sr Sex Fantasy is back.

When he gave that first Press conference, I was confident about three things:

1. There was no evidence against the two he had arrested, otherwise Mignini would have presented the evidence, rather than dreaming up yet another sex fantasy.

2. He had therefore, almost certainly, arrested yet more innocent people.

3. Mignini would betray the Kercher family, and betray the memory of the deceased Meredith, by bending over backwards to make the facts fit his theory, rather than looking at the evidence to see what really happened.

Right to the bitter end, Mignini would not let go of the hairbrained fantasy about a satanic sex game.

What he should have said was ...

Let's carefully examine the evidence, and try to find out what happened to Meredith.

What he DID say was ...

There MUST have been a sex game. My investigations ALWAYS involve a sex game. Let's try to make the evidence fit in with my sex game fantasy. I want there to be a sex game. I want there to be a sex game, I want there to be ... etc.

Even when Mignini was convicted of fabricating false evidence on another case, and professional misconduct, and was shown to have totally imagined his various sex fantasies, he was still left in charge of the case.

Be putting Giuliano "Sex Fantasist" Mignini in charge of the case, the Italian authorities betrayed an English family whose daughter had been murdered whilst in their country. And, for that, I find it slightly hard to forgive the Italian legal system.

And one thing I will never, ever be able to do, is take the Italian legal system seriously.

Did I mention the phrase Kangaroo Court? Oh, yes, I think I've done that one.

Still, after today, the whole thing may be put to bed for ever. Or we may get another year's worth of satanic sex game fantasies from that fat, dribbling, sweaty, extremist Catholic zealot who passes for a lawyer in Italy.