Project Willow wrote:compared2what? wrote:What is the confusion about here?
Because an intentional infliction of injury to the genitals IS A SEXUAL ASSAULT. By definition. Why are you intent on denying that?
I'm not denying it in this case, although to get self-defeatingly academic about it, I wouldn't personally make that assertion. There's no reason for all crimes of jealousy, revenge, rage or hatred that include intentional infliction of injury to the genitals to be classified as sexual assaults, imo.
I mean, would you call what Lorena Bobbitt did a sexual assault? I wouldn't.
Not that it matters. My primary point is that it's not and hasn't been established that they were intentionally inflicted. Or by whom. So it's ambiguous why.
I might try to illustrate that with an example, later.
compared2what? wrote:Neither did he find that they had been removed with a knife or bladed instrument. And neither did he characterize any of the cuts or lacerations as, for example, stab wounds.
I hope that was clear.
It's clear that you keep replacing "consistent with" with "neither, not and no", when referring to the record, over and over again. If I spend all my time refuting your distortions of the record I will never get anywhere in my own research.
The ME testified that some of the cuts appeared to have been caused by a knife or a piece of glass, and some of the cuts (on the head and other body parts) appear to have been caused by a blunt instrument such as a broom stick or a 2 by 4.
On Byers:
Davis: And there were signs of physical trauma as far as abrasions and lacerations to the buttocks area and the area immediately surrounding the anus? Is that correct?
Peretti: There's cutting wounds and abrasions, yes. And State's Exhibit 70C is a close-up of the genital mutilation. Here, we have multiple gouging type injuries where the skin has just been pulled out. The skin overlying the shaft of the penis was carved off. What you see here, the part--this red part that's in the photograph, that's the shaft of the penis after the skin has been removed and you can see above the scrotal sac and testes are all missing. The whole genital area is missing except for the internal aspects of the shaft of the penis and around this area you can see the multiple gouging type wounds, stab wounds and cutting wounds.
I overlooked that accidentally. But I was speaking of his autopsy reports anyway, since those are -- as he says in that phone call -- his entire, unvarnished professional opinion, free of the contextualizations that both direct and cross-examination might put on it.
And that does go both ways -- ie, he doesn't say what he did to Stidham on cross or what he said to Davis on direct, wrt sodomy in the reports. And I place a higher value on his expressing no opinion there than I do on his expressing either in the courtroom, wrt how reliably it represents what can or can't be said with accurate certainty.
Davis: Doctor, the gouge wounds and cutting wounds you referred to around the genital area, how did those, in your opinion, how would those wounds have been inflicted? What type of manner would those have been inflicted in?
Peretti: Well, it could be when you see these type of irregular cutting wounds, gouging wounds, not knowing the instrument, you can get these type of wounds from a knife, piece of glass, usually the knife or the object is being twisted and the victim is moving to get those irregular edges. State's Exhibit 69C is a photograph showing the legs, the area of genital mutilation and you can also see the binding injuries of the left wrist but also here, we can note in the um, on the thighs, on the top of the thighs and inner aspects of the thighs, we have multiple contusions or bruising inside the thighs and you can see that here.
I don't think it's in-bounds for you to suggest that I was paraphrasing the views he expressed in his testimony inaccurately or misleadingly out of bias there.
During the part of hist testimony that directly addresses the question of what caused those cuts, which I quoted
here, he makes much more of an explicit point of being unable to say.
That he didn't feel an equal need to do so as emphatically when describing the mechanism whereby they could have been caused intentionally strikes me as more likely to be a function of narrative speech than it does anything else. Including "an expression of his secret true opinion" and "representative of a change of mind.".
compared2what? wrote:They don't all agree with each other about everything in their reports and affidavits, most of which can be found among the exhibits submitted with Echols's second amended Habeas petition.. But every single one of them found that most of the injuries on each child were post-mortem wounds caused by animal predation.
As a number of them point out, Peretti himself said that the genital injuries were post-mortem.. .
No, he didn't. He said he couldn't determine whether SOME OF THEM were or weren't. Please stop distorting the record.
Come on.
Are you really going to call that a distortion? As if you weren't also engaging in the same non-comprehensive representation of complex issues in good faith of a necessity, because they're complex?
Do you see me saying it's misleading of you not to have quoted every damn word Peretti said about knives, or that it's a distortion for you to quote only some of them? Or saying stuff like "I'd really appreciate it if you stopped telling me that in my view, Chris Byers's injuries aren't a part of this case when I haven't said anything of the kind"?
You're a very righteous woman. You can afford to wear it loosely.
Davis Doctor, in these autopies, are you able to tell the difference between a wound that was inflicted before death and a wound that was inflicted after death?
Peretti: Some of the injuries we're able to tell.
Not to get into it in detail, but he didn't (in fact) classify most of their injuries as pre-, peri- and post-mortem and, and there's no reason on earth why he shouldn't have been able to. It's his job. And confusion or ambiguity on such points is consequential.
Davis: Okay. And could you tell, in regard to any of these three children, whether wounds were--there were some wounds that were inflicted even after death?
Peretti: There, there--some wounds have the appearance of being inflicted perimortem, around the time of death and postmortem, after death.
"Peri-mortem"? You're calling THAT a distortion?
Do you think it's more of one than -- oh, I don't know -- saying that Misskelley had knowledge of undisclosed details of the crime because he described a definitively living child getting his penis cut on while talking about a crime that included similar injuries to a dead or dying child? Without mentioning that it took three or four prompts for him even to get that wrong? While opining that he knew it because he witnessed it, there being no evidence to suggest otherwise?
Or less?
Or about the same?
compared2what? wrote: Did Stevie Branch bruise and scrape his own penis before he was murdered?
His autopsy report doesn't mention any injuries to the genital/anal area apart from "superficial scratches." And it definitely doesn't mention bruising. But presumably his injuries were incurred before, during or after the murder.
I quoted what the ME testified to, in court! Yet here you're seeking ways to deny his testimony. So because the ME testified to the injury in court rather than writing it down in the brief summary of injuries in his report, then it didn't happen? Or you're contending that when the ME reviewed and explained his findings on the injuries in court, he lied?
Neither. I'm making a non-random, non-idiosyncratic-to-me distinction between the scientific objectivity of an autopsy report and a statement made by the same scientist while testifying in court in his capacity as a member of the team the state fields for the prosecution.
Because the testimony isn't usually a huge departure from what could reasonably be said on purely professional grounds. But it is intentionally couched, phrased and framed in terms that will act on the jury with maximum allowable impact.
In this case, he is erring, one way or the other. If there were bruises, he should have noted them on autopsy or amended it. And if there weren't, he shouldn't testify that there were. Odds favor the former somewhat. But either way, it was probably just an error and not a lie.
However, that trial had plenty enough of both for my comment to stand, imo.
compared2what? wrote:
I don't know about the experts -- including Peretti, in this case -- but contusions can be post-mortem injuries. And I don't think there is a "generally" about it. It's specific to the case.
It's RARE. There's little to no blood flow postmortem, so bruising and hemorrhaging, outside of areas of lividity which is pooling of the blood, is RARE.
Per the words that appear under the heading "Post-Mortem Bruising" in
Forensic Pathology, Second Edition, by Dominick and Vincent Di Maio, which is a standard text...
....meaning -- among other things -- that its authors receive royalties likely to lessen the need to lie in exchange for high fees from Damien Echols's defense:
It's not really correct or accurate to say that in general it's RARE. Or that it's COMMON. Because it's specific to circumstances that rarely occur. Or at least that's how I understand what they're saying.
But if you have a better authority or a greater understanding, I'll bow to it. I'm not an expert. And it's not a very major point.