All Ask about Amanda

 

I have received a number of e mails asking what I think about the trial of Amanda Knox (and her boyfriend) in Perugia for the murder of her roommate. I confess that I have not followed this lengthy trial closely. When you read about it in the Italian newspapers, it is hard to extract the facts from all the rhetorical flourishes of the writing. So as a complete non expert, here are my thoughts:

 

  1. There is some substantial physical evidence tying the two to the crime, but it is not necessarily overwhelming. It is, of course, disputed by the defense.

  2. Their actions and statements after the event are at the very least suspicious.

  3. The prosecution, however, does not seem to have a strong “theory of the case” – a story that explains exactly what these two did and why. Furthermore, there is not an explanation of exactly how they worked together with the person, Rudi, already convicted as having taken part in the crime.

 

From what I know, if I were on the jury, I would vote to acquit, but this does not mean I think that they did not do it. This trial is the first of three possible stages in Italy. There can be a appeal (by either prosecution or defendants – in USA prosecution cannot appeal not guilty verdict). Furthermore, this first appeal is more like a second trial in that it can have a review of the facts, not just legal arguments. Then there can be a second appeal that, like in the USA, is an appeal only for legal mistakes in the case, not a review of the facts.

 

Why did trial take so long? Because one of the defense lawyers is a member of Parliament so that the trial dates had to be accommodated to his schedule. Welcome to the Italian justice system.

 

Talking about the Troubles of Tiger

 

When the story broke in the news about Tiger Wood’s early morning auto mishap, the first rendition was that told by Tiger and his wife to the police. Soon a more scandalous interpretation began to creep into the media. American newspapers tended to start with the story related by the family. I looked at a major Italian national paper, Corriere della Sera, that from the very beginning featured the scandalous rendition concerning a domestic spat based upon marital infidelity. This Italian paper is probably analogous to the New York Times or Washington Post in the USA. (In the USA, the New York Daily News featured the juicier story from the start, but it is a sensationalistic tabloid, not a staid mainstream paper.) This comparison illustrates a difference between American and Italian journalism. First, Italian journalism never gives much credence to the “official” account of any event. Second, Italian journalism gravitates more quickly to the sensationalistic. In making this comparison, I am not making any judgment about what actually happened in the Tiger Woods incident.

 

Pistoia in the National News

 

Pistoia was bigger in the national news this week than it has ever been in my years here. Unfortunately, the story was about a private day care center at which the teacher and director have been physically abusing the children. It is not a case of pedophilia, but a situation in which they whacked the kids, put them in the dark room, pulled their hair, etc. in order to enforce the behavior the teacher and director wanted. Some parents became suspicious of the center because of their children’s fear of going to it, and the police installed a hidden video camera. The images of the abuse captured by the camera have been all over the papers and TV. The first line of defense of the accused is that they were stressed out by their jobs.

 

Airline Scam

 

I flew back from Germany (where I had been visiting my son and his family) to Italy with my ex wife Edie on low cost airline Ryanair. At the gate they measured every carry-on bag to see if it would fit into their device testing the maximum size of a carry on. Edie’s bag was very slightly too big, even though it had been purchased as a “carry-on” bag. So she had to treat it as checked luggage and pay a 35 Euro fee. She was told to leave it at the base of the stairway entering the plane. Many others passengers were similarly paying the 35 Euro fee. At the base of the stairway to the plane, however, there was no collection of bags and nobody to take the bags as checked luggage. So she carried it on where it fit quite easily into an overhead bin. I plan to write to Ryanair with this story (with appropriate documentation) and ask for a refund of the 35 Euro since the plane ticket was paid for on my credit card. Stay tuned for the result.

 

The Disappearing Train

 

I went to catch the 10:32 train to Florence that was shown on the electronic sign to be 15 minutes late. It did not come. The next train due to go to Florence was at 11:12. At about 11:00 am, the sign announcing the next train said it would be the 11:12 train which would be 5 minutes late. What had happened to the 10:32 train which was coming from the same place as the 11:12 one? Did the 10:32 train just disappear? Soon it was apparent that the 11:12 train was more than 5 minutes late. At about 11:25 a train appeared. Now it was announced on the sign to be the 10:32 train that was coming about one hour late. I got to Florence eventually.

 

The Phantom Bus

 

I took a trip with a friend to Castiglione del Lago, a lake town in Umbria. Unfortunately the train station is about a mile or more from the town itself. I figured we might have to call a cab for the trip from the station, but when we arrived there was a big bus waiting for us at the station. I asked the driver if this bus when into the city, and he said yes. He sold us two tickets. We boarded along with a lot of students who had taken the train from a nearby city where they attend high school. I wasn’t sure where to catch the bus to go back to the station. So after we got to the town, we visited the tourist office to ask about the appropriate bus stop. I said in Italian “Where do we catch the bus back to the station”? The man said that at this time of year there was no such bus. I politely noted that I had taken such a bus a few hours earlier. He looked quite surprised. We finally settled upon the solution. The bus we took was in fact a “school bus” for the students. It was a regular city bus that served this function every day.

 

The Politician and the Video

 

The granddaughter of Benito Mussolini is a Member of Parliament. Although her last name is not legally “Mussolini”, that is the name she uses. To say she is a moron is to overestimate her intelligence. Recently some low life tried to interest the media and then tried to blackmail her directly by claiming he had a video (shot with a cell phone camera) showing her having sex with the head of a small political party in Italy. Nobody has yet seen this video and the whole thing may simply be a scam. It is interesting that the media treated the possibility of the existence of the video as at least “plausible.” That gives you some idea of the reputation of Ms. Mussolini.

 

A Small Example of Bureaucracy in Action

 

When you buy a train ticket at the automatic ticket machine and put in a bill larger than the cost of the ticket, you get change. If there is not enough change in the machine, you get a credit slip that you can use at the ticket window the next time you buy a ticket there. When you present the credit slip at the window, here is what the clerk there has to do: (1) staple the small credit slip to a larger piece of paper, (2) rubber stamp the larger piece of paper, (3) record the fact that the credit slip has been tendered on a separate form. These three steps don’t take a lot of time, but such inefficient protocols are endemic in Italy, and eventually they add up to a lot of time.

 

Silvio and the Ladies –Not in the Headlines This Week

 

Instead the big news is the testimony of a former big time Mafia member who has repented (probably to get a good deal) and claims that in the 1990s Silvio had some connection with the Mafia.