Florence, Italy — Amanda Knox, the American pupil who spent almost 4 years in an Italian jail after being convicted in 2007 of murdering her faculty roommate Meredith Kercher, will probably be again in an Italian courtroom this week in an effort to clear the final authorized stain on her identify.
“I’ll stroll into the exact same courtroom the place I used to be reconvicted of against the law I did not commit, this time to defend myself but once more,” Knox stated in a social media publish on Monday. “I hope to clear my identify as soon as and for the entire false expenses towards me. Want me luck.”
Kercher, a British pupil, was discovered lifeless in her bed room within the house she shared with Knox within the Italian metropolis of Perugia. She had been sexually assaulted and had a number of stab wounds. Knox and her then-boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito had been convicted of murdering her in a intercourse sport gone awry.
AP
In 2015, after seven years of authorized battles and flip-flop verdicts, Knox and Sollecito had been cleared of the homicide. Nonetheless, a slander conviction towards Knox, for falsely accusing a Congolese bar proprietor she labored for of being Kercher’s killer. She made that accusation throughout a grueling 53-hour police interrogation.
Very quickly after implicating the bar proprietor, nevertheless, Knox wrote a four-page assertion in English casting critical doubt on the testimony she had given to the police.
“I wish to clarify that I am very uncertain of the veritity [sic] of my statements as a result of they had been made beneath the pressures of stress, shock and excessive exhaustion. Not solely was I advised I might be arrested and put in jail for 30 years, however I used to be additionally hit within the head after I did not bear in mind a reality appropriately,” she wrote within the assertion.
Knox’s protection crew has at all times maintained that the accusation towards the bar proprietor was coerced.
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In 2019, the European Courtroom of Human Rights dominated that Italy had violated Knox’s human nights throughout police questioning. Knox stated she was interrogated and not using a lawyer or a correct translator and that she was additionally crushed by the police.
Italy’s highest courtroom ordered a retrial, and a verdict is predicted Wednesday from the courtroom in Florence the place the trial is going down.
Prosecutors have requested the courtroom to substantiate the slander conviction and impose a penalty of three years. Knox already spent virtually 4 years behind bars, beginning in 2007, so even when the conviction is upheld this week, she wouldn’t be required to spend any extra time in jail.
One other man, Rudy Guede — whose footprints and DNA had been discovered everywhere in the crime scene — was convicted of murdering Kercher in 2008 and served 13 years in jail earlier than being launched in 2021.
Amanda Knox Homicide Case
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