from what I heard...that ability to do so is in the works, if it's sucessful, we can import models from other consoles...on the other hand...recreating the bones so that the model can move is extremely tricky.
Im taking a wild guess here...but it could be possible that...for some reason, the codes were loaded without Gecko...sounds crazy yes...but its possible
errr.....the strap I think is removeable, but the ESRB screen is encrypted, you can edit it...but u cant remove it (I suppose you can make it invisible but u can't remove it completly
your implying that you replaced your original selcharater with a blank one and that you still have problems. If thats the case, then whatever you put in there cause your save to crack, so if thats the case...find a new save file.