According to the UK Telegraph, lawyers in the United States are not too pleased about the verdict in the Amanda Knox trial. Amongst the unhappy is Harvard Professor of Law, Alan Dershowitz, a well-known advocate of unlawful-preventive-indefinite- administrative (it’s all the same anyhow) detention in the U.S and in Israel. Here’s an excerpt, with a few of the responses from bummed out lawyers in the United States:
Within minutes of the verdict on Friday, the cable news network CNN had given over its coverage to two American correspondents, both roundly condemning the trial and what they saw as a lack of evidence.
As they regularly did during the trial, the American media has been quick to wheel out domestic legal experts to rail against the iniquities of the Italian justice system.
Under the headline “An American in the Italian Wheels of Justice”, the New York Times quizzed senior academics but found none who approved of the verdict.
“I think this is a scandal of the first order,” said George Fletcher, a professor of jurisprudence at Columbia University.
Although he rejected suggestions of anti-Americanism, Prof Fletcher said the Italian judicial system has not “adapted correctly” to its US equivalent.
He condemned the prosecution’s introduction of “character evidence” such as Knox’s alleged promiscuousness, noting that it would not be permitted into a US trial unless the defence raised it.
Alan Dershowitz, a criminal defence lawyer and Harvard University law professor, said the Italian legal system “is not among Europe’s most distinguished”.
The verdict was “totally predictable” and the trial had been a “confirmation of the investigation”, he said.”
Instructive Conclusions:
1) ‘Lack of evidence’ is a problem if your name is Amanda Knox, but not if it’s Ahmed Al Darbi.
2) A ‘totally predictable’ trial is acceptable if the accused is a suspected ‘terrorist’ being tried in the United States, but it is unacceptable if the accused is an American citizen being tried for murder somewhere else.
3) “We are only falsehood, duplicity, contradiction: we both conceal and disguise ourselves from ourselves” – Blaise Pascal.
P U L S E 
Not to worry. The 2 professors are not the first nor will they be the last to sneer at systems that do not copy things American. It seems to me that while the Italian judicial system is far from perfect – but neither is the US nor many others – in the matter of capital crimes it is far more lenient than the American and most others. There can and will be appeals that are accepted automatically. Many if not most sentences end up being reduced even when the convicted remain convicted while being released.
Those who want to criticize the results of this case ought to take care to look at all the evidence and not just that part highlighted by the media. As one example, both convicted altered their evidence in fundamental ways more than once.
As for Professor Dershowitz one can only wonder how many times he expresses “expert” opinion can he be absurd before most of the public get the point. His plagiarism of bad history concerning Israel- Palestine, his role in the O.J.Simpson trial, his advocacy of torture in some cases of terrorism, and most disgustingly his vendetta against Norman Finkelstein come to mind. His audacity beggars belief!