Amanda Knox went back to court in Italy Wednesday for a slander case associated to her notorious jailing, and later on acquittal, for the murder of her British roomie in 2007.
The American was just 20 when she and her Italian then-boyfriend were jailed for the ruthless killing of 21-year-old fellow trainee Meredith Kercher at the women’ shared home in Perugia.
The murder started a long legal legend where Knox was condemned, acquitted, condemned once again and lastly cleared of all charges in 2015.
However she still had an associated conviction for slander, for blaming the murder on a regional bar owner throughout preliminary questioning by cops.
In October, Italy’s greatest court tossed out that conviction on appeal and bought a retrial, which started previously this year in Florence in Knox’s lack.
However she chose to fly in for a hearing on Wednesday, at which she was set to speak in her defence — and after which legal representatives anticipate a decision.
“I wish to clear my name at last of the incorrect charges versus me. Dream me luck!,” Knox composed on X previously today.
Both celebrations will have the ability to appeal the decision.
Knox got here in court — the very same one where she was reconvicted of murder in 2014 — holding hands with her spouse, satisfied by scrum of press reporters and video camera team.
Her murder trial brought in worldwide interest, much of it salacious, concentrating on district attorneys’ claims that Kercher passed away as part of a sex video game failed.
However Italy’s greatest court, when it acquitted Knox and previous partner Raffaele Sollecito at last, stated there had actually been “significant defects” in the cops examination.
Someone stays founded guilty of Kercher’s murder — Ivorian Rudy Guede, who was connected to the scene by DNA proof.
He was sentenced in 2008 to thirty years for murder and sexual attack, his sentence later on minimized on attract 16 years.
Guede was launched early in November 2021.
– ‘Beast of Perugia’ –
Kercher’s half-naked body was discovered in a swimming pool of blood inside the roomies’ home in November 2007. Her throat had actually been slit and she had actually suffered numerous stab injuries.
Throughout cops questioning, Knox linked Congolese bar owner Patrick Lumumba, who then invested practically 2 weeks behind bars before being launched without charge.
Knox was founded guilty of slandering him in 2011 and sentenced to 3 years currently served.
However she stated she was chewed out and slapped throughout the cops examination — declares that triggered a different charge of slandering cops, of which she was cleared in 2016.
She petitioned the European Court of Person Rights, which in 2019 ruled that Knox had actually not been offered with sufficient legal representation or an expert interpreter throughout her interrogation.
That judgment — which discovered her treatment “jeopardized the fairness of the procedures as an entire” — was mentioned by Italy’s leading court in 2015 when it bought the retrial.
Knox stated last October that at the time of Kercher’s murder, Lumumba “was my buddy”.
“We are both victims of the infraction of my human rights throughout my interrogation, without which I was defenseless versus the coercive pressure of the cops,” she composed on X.
However Lumumba’s attorney, Carlo Pacelli, explained how Knox’s allegation altered his life.
“When he was implicated by Amanda he ended up being generally thought about the beast of Perugia,” he informed press reporters outside court.
“He lost his task, had his bar took for months, and needed to go back to Poland, due to the fact that his better half was Polish.”
Lumumba is not participating in the hearing.
Now 36 and with 2 children, Knox is a reporter, author and advocate for criminal justice reform.
She went back to Italy 5 years ago to resolve a conference on wrongful convictions, appearing on a panel entitled “Trial By Media”.
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