I was unfamiliar with the case before hearing about the verdicts on the news. I spent about 10 minutes on the Wikipedia article, then20 minutes on each of the sites you linked, and made these judgments before reading others’ comments.
Guede’s guilt seems almost beyond doubt, given the DNA evidence, his implausible story, and his flight without calling police. Regarding Knox & Sollecito, I’m convinced of the prosecution’s version of events mainly by the cell-phone record evidence and the many conflicting statements given by Knox and Sollecito over time, with variation that goes beyond my (only moderately informed) expectations for bad memory or coercive interrogation.
Meta-evidence judgments: in the pro-guilt site you linked, it took a while to find concrete info, but when I found the Prosecution’s case->Facts Presented section, I found a lot of very specific detail regarding the exact times cell phones were turned on and off and the times and durations of calls made, as well as detail regarding the forensic evidence and the credentials of the experts who testified about it. The pro-innocent site lacked such specifics and didn’t seem to account for all the damning details. Both sites seemed very distorted by affection for Kercher (pro-guilt) and Knox (pro-innocence) and their nationalities.
I read the pro-guilt site before the pro-innocent site, and I noticed this causing bias: as I read the pro-innocence site, I felt myself internally “rooting” against them, expecting that they couldn’t answer all the evidence and (maybe not surprising) finding that this was so. I tried to adjust for this in my judgments.
I have a low prior for this mix of murderers committing the crime together, and a high prior for a guilty verdict given by a jury, and feel like these two facts approximately cancel out.
After reading others’ comments, I was surprised that most others leaned toward Knox’s and Sollecito’s innocence. I would update my judgments only marginally because of this, because I read the linked sites more closely than others’ claimed to. I do however revise my estimate of agreement with komponisto down a bit to 0.6.
p.s. This is a very interesting exercise, which led me to register and comment for the first time after lurking for several months. I am very curious about your (komponisto’s) judgment and reasoning.
After reading more comments, I’ve updated my probabilities significantly. Here’s what influences me:
Different commenters focus on different subsets of evidence. This makes me suspect that my own focal subset was incidental and probably depended on what order I encountered various claims.
Many items of evidence presented as fact (and which I relied on), such as cleaning supply shopping and the contents of the washing machine, are said by others to be rumors and were never presented at trial. This undermined a lot of what I based my judgment on.
The judgment of people who have followed the case very closely (e.g. jenmarle) is that Knox and Sollecito are innocent.
Together, these things make me throw my hands up in the air. I don’t think I can clear things up without spending much more time on it, definitely not without seeking out new sources, and I don’t know where to look. I now believe: Knox: 50%, Sollecito: 50%, Guede: 99%.
The cell phone evidence and the changing stories are what gives me reason to a probability of guilty to S and K above .05. (See my comment for my probabilities). The effect of this evidence was mitigated for me by:
Their likely intoxication during this period.
Police coercion leading to confusion about the events.
It looks like a lot of what the pro-guilty site claims ended up being unproven rumors not produced in trial, this makes it very unclear to me what story S and K actually ended up giving in trial. Since the site exaggerates other claims their claims about the cell phones and the stories can’t be fully trusted.
You weren’t troubled by the lack of motive and the fact that after covering up her involvement in a crime but intentionally leaving evidence of Guede’s presence Knox went on to point the finger at someone who couldn’t have been involved after being coerced by the police? Shoot, I can’t figure out why Knox, if she was guilty, wouldn’t have just stayed at Sollecito’s until someone else discovered the body.
What I can’t understand is, if all three were in it together, given the evidence against Guede, why he didn’t rat out the other two in exchange for a reduced sentence. I’d be amazed if the Italian legal system doesn’t cut such deals, and I’d be amazed if the prosecutors didn’t try to get him to rat out the other two. If they were actually involved, the odds that he’d turn on them in that situation seem well over .9.
Hmm, thinking back, I didn’t consider motive too closely. I rather got caught up in the evidence of Amanda’s evasion. In retrospect, this would lower my probabilities.
...and the fact that after covering up her involvement in a crime but intentionally leaving evidence of Guede’s presence Knox went on to point the finger at someone who couldn’t have been involved after being coerced by the police?
I didn’t judge that evidence against Guede was left intentionally; I could easily have missed details indicating this. Knox’s fingering of Lumumba seemed to me to be a natural part of a collection of inconsistent attempts to establish an alibi and deflect suspicion.
FYI, I’ve updated in your direction since my first response. Those phone call lengths are driving me nuts.
Part of the suspicious behavior was that Knox didn’t flush the toilet (where Guede had used it) the morning she returned. Also, Knox and Sollectio’s ‘bloody’ foot prints had to be luminaled when right next to them were Guede’s visible foot prints. And over all, the shear amount of physical evidence against Guede compared to the near total lack of physical evidence against the other two suggests that if there was a clean up they really cared not at all about Guede getting caught. Which is believable, but they did too good of a job. They’re intoxicated the night of, come back a few hours later and can distinguish all of their prints from all of Guede’s? And they didn’t think he had left enough physical evidence (on the victim) that they thought they should leave the toilet unflushed? They appear to have done a really good job cleaning up and a really bad job getting their story straight- which seems inconsistent to me.
Though come to think of it I’m not really sure why the toilet wasn’t flushed at all. If Guede used the bathroom before joining Knox and Sallecito killing Kercher, why wouldn’t he flush it? Hearing the screaming is actually a plausible explanation for this. Not flushing would make sense if Guede was trying to provide evidence for the story he was planning on telling but that seems way to smart for him. I also don’t know why that would be his planned explanation if he was working with Knox and Sallecito.
Part of the problem is that the details of what happened in the room were never released in English (and that might be a good thing) so there may be good reason to think the evidence indicated three people were involved, etc.
there may be good reason to think the evidence indicated three people were involved, etc.
This seems to be a major focus of the pro-guilt site, though it isn’t really backed up at any level of detail. Were it true, it would increase the probability that K and S were involved, but still far short of beyond a reasonable doubt, I would think.
Knox guilt: 80%
Sollecito guilt: 80%
Guede guilt: 99%
prob of agreement: 0.8
I was unfamiliar with the case before hearing about the verdicts on the news. I spent about 10 minutes on the Wikipedia article, then20 minutes on each of the sites you linked, and made these judgments before reading others’ comments.
Guede’s guilt seems almost beyond doubt, given the DNA evidence, his implausible story, and his flight without calling police. Regarding Knox & Sollecito, I’m convinced of the prosecution’s version of events mainly by the cell-phone record evidence and the many conflicting statements given by Knox and Sollecito over time, with variation that goes beyond my (only moderately informed) expectations for bad memory or coercive interrogation.
Meta-evidence judgments: in the pro-guilt site you linked, it took a while to find concrete info, but when I found the Prosecution’s case->Facts Presented section, I found a lot of very specific detail regarding the exact times cell phones were turned on and off and the times and durations of calls made, as well as detail regarding the forensic evidence and the credentials of the experts who testified about it. The pro-innocent site lacked such specifics and didn’t seem to account for all the damning details. Both sites seemed very distorted by affection for Kercher (pro-guilt) and Knox (pro-innocence) and their nationalities.
I read the pro-guilt site before the pro-innocent site, and I noticed this causing bias: as I read the pro-innocence site, I felt myself internally “rooting” against them, expecting that they couldn’t answer all the evidence and (maybe not surprising) finding that this was so. I tried to adjust for this in my judgments.
I have a low prior for this mix of murderers committing the crime together, and a high prior for a guilty verdict given by a jury, and feel like these two facts approximately cancel out.
After reading others’ comments, I was surprised that most others leaned toward Knox’s and Sollecito’s innocence. I would update my judgments only marginally because of this, because I read the linked sites more closely than others’ claimed to. I do however revise my estimate of agreement with komponisto down a bit to 0.6.
p.s. This is a very interesting exercise, which led me to register and comment for the first time after lurking for several months. I am very curious about your (komponisto’s) judgment and reasoning.
After reading more comments, I’ve updated my probabilities significantly. Here’s what influences me:
Different commenters focus on different subsets of evidence. This makes me suspect that my own focal subset was incidental and probably depended on what order I encountered various claims.
Many items of evidence presented as fact (and which I relied on), such as cleaning supply shopping and the contents of the washing machine, are said by others to be rumors and were never presented at trial. This undermined a lot of what I based my judgment on.
The judgment of people who have followed the case very closely (e.g. jenmarle) is that Knox and Sollecito are innocent.
Together, these things make me throw my hands up in the air. I don’t think I can clear things up without spending much more time on it, definitely not without seeking out new sources, and I don’t know where to look. I now believe: Knox: 50%, Sollecito: 50%, Guede: 99%.
The cell phone evidence and the changing stories are what gives me reason to a probability of guilty to S and K above .05. (See my comment for my probabilities). The effect of this evidence was mitigated for me by:
Their likely intoxication during this period.
Police coercion leading to confusion about the events.
It looks like a lot of what the pro-guilty site claims ended up being unproven rumors not produced in trial, this makes it very unclear to me what story S and K actually ended up giving in trial. Since the site exaggerates other claims their claims about the cell phones and the stories can’t be fully trusted.
You weren’t troubled by the lack of motive and the fact that after covering up her involvement in a crime but intentionally leaving evidence of Guede’s presence Knox went on to point the finger at someone who couldn’t have been involved after being coerced by the police? Shoot, I can’t figure out why Knox, if she was guilty, wouldn’t have just stayed at Sollecito’s until someone else discovered the body.
What I can’t understand is, if all three were in it together, given the evidence against Guede, why he didn’t rat out the other two in exchange for a reduced sentence. I’d be amazed if the Italian legal system doesn’t cut such deals, and I’d be amazed if the prosecutors didn’t try to get him to rat out the other two. If they were actually involved, the odds that he’d turn on them in that situation seem well over .9.
Hmm, thinking back, I didn’t consider motive too closely. I rather got caught up in the evidence of Amanda’s evasion. In retrospect, this would lower my probabilities.
I didn’t judge that evidence against Guede was left intentionally; I could easily have missed details indicating this. Knox’s fingering of Lumumba seemed to me to be a natural part of a collection of inconsistent attempts to establish an alibi and deflect suspicion.
FYI, I’ve updated in your direction since my first response. Those phone call lengths are driving me nuts.
Part of the suspicious behavior was that Knox didn’t flush the toilet (where Guede had used it) the morning she returned. Also, Knox and Sollectio’s ‘bloody’ foot prints had to be luminaled when right next to them were Guede’s visible foot prints. And over all, the shear amount of physical evidence against Guede compared to the near total lack of physical evidence against the other two suggests that if there was a clean up they really cared not at all about Guede getting caught. Which is believable, but they did too good of a job. They’re intoxicated the night of, come back a few hours later and can distinguish all of their prints from all of Guede’s? And they didn’t think he had left enough physical evidence (on the victim) that they thought they should leave the toilet unflushed? They appear to have done a really good job cleaning up and a really bad job getting their story straight- which seems inconsistent to me.
Though come to think of it I’m not really sure why the toilet wasn’t flushed at all. If Guede used the bathroom before joining Knox and Sallecito killing Kercher, why wouldn’t he flush it? Hearing the screaming is actually a plausible explanation for this. Not flushing would make sense if Guede was trying to provide evidence for the story he was planning on telling but that seems way to smart for him. I also don’t know why that would be his planned explanation if he was working with Knox and Sallecito.
Part of the problem is that the details of what happened in the room were never released in English (and that might be a good thing) so there may be good reason to think the evidence indicated three people were involved, etc.
This seems to be a major focus of the pro-guilt site, though it isn’t really backed up at any level of detail. Were it true, it would increase the probability that K and S were involved, but still far short of beyond a reasonable doubt, I would think.