The Murder Of Meredith Kercher By Amanda Knox And Raffaele Sollecito: In Pictures

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1. 42 Cheryl says:
   December 8th, 2009 at 5:50 pm

   Let’s look at US vs. Italy this way. The Americans screamed and kicked and carried on when Scotland sent Megrahi back to Libya. The public people probably would have lobed a few nukes Scotland’s way if they could have. Elected officials in the beginning were talking of a Congressional Investigation. Since, not a word has been said nor printed about Scotland’s act, no Congressional Investigations have taken place and it all died a very quiet death within a month or two when the Media stopped rousing the troops with stories.

   This current situation re Italy is very volatile over here. However, I’ll be surprised if the Government gets actively involved in it, at least at the current stage as she hasn’t been through the Appeal System over there. The Senator from Washington has had her day of glory with getting her name in the news and doing what a Senator is elected to do, which is to look out for their constituents. Now, she as a US Senator has requested the Secretary of State, an political appointed official, to look into it. A political appointee does not want to PO a US Senator. Hillary Clinton may well review the case and make a few discreet calls or write a letter to Italy’s officials to ask what went on. But I honestly don’t think it will go any further than that. The smartest move my Government can make, but then it is not all that smart at times, is stay out of it until her Appeals are finished. At that point in time, if her conviction stands, the wheeling and dealing to get her over to serve her time in a US prison might start. This isn’t just a case where a student or two mistakenly crossed over another country’s border and we go to the rescue. This is a murder case and I’m not so sure our Government officials are willing to chance having egg in their face.

2. 41 CC says:
   December 8th, 2009 at 11:13 am

   Bloody Italians, eh? That’s not the American way.

   Perhaps in this case the better option would have been a Guantanamo – Ohio hybrid. Y’know, waterboard Knox till she ‘fessed up, keep her on Death Row for years to really mess with her mind, then experiment on her with an overdose of a single anaesthetic.

   God bless.

3. 40 P says:
   December 8th, 2009 at 9:40 am

   Kayla how did you work out it’s media bias that got Amanda convicted? Oh wait… was it through the media?

4. 39 Kayla says:
   December 7th, 2009 at 11:01 pm

   Did you just find 42 pictures that make the defendants look as though they’re smirking? Media bias is so obvious in this case, even after the verdict. http://www.newsy.com/videos/will_amanda_knox_s_appeal_work

5. 38 Cheryl says:
   December 7th, 2009 at 10:10 pm

   P, figured you overlooked by short note back re the US. One can’t help but feel sorry for the Knox’s. It has to be heartbreaking for them to even have to think that maybe their daughter was capable of such a heinous crime and in reality she may well have and then faced with her being locked away in a foreign prison for 26 years. As for the victim’s family what can one say? Nothing anyone can say will ever take away their pain of the loss of their daughter. They’ll live with that loss, the memories of how she died, the love they have for her and the void now in their lives for the rest of their living days. Hopefully in time to come Amanda will write them and ask for their forgiveness. Will that help them in their grief, I don’t know. But maybe it would in some small way and they could put that part of the tragedy to rest finally hearing the truth. .

6. 37 The Real Stig says:
   December 7th, 2009 at 8:30 pm

   Cheryl

   You position seems to be that only the USA has a fair or just legal system. This presupposes that there is only one way to arrive at the truth in criminal proceedings. Most of the countries of Western Europe have differing legal systems, but most of those countries are democracies. Do you not think that if the citizens of those countries thought their legal systems were unfair and weighted to the advantage of the authorities, that they would have done something about it through the political representation?

   You say she was badgered and assaulted. Knox’s own account of the terrible inhumane beating she underwent is that she was twice cuffed on the back of the head – by a police woman. Nothing like that could possibly happen in the US of course – if it happened at all.

   As for the badgering – again according to Knox herself – it seemed to consist of calling her “a stupid liar”, accusing her of trying to cover up for someone else, and threatening her with 30 years jail if she didn’t stop lying.

   Sorry Cheryl, but nothing in that has me itching to get on to Amnesty International. It hardly indicates they had it in for her from the beginning if they thought she was covering for someone else.

   Has the US media a convincing innocent explanation for the litany of lies Knox has offered in her defence?

   First off, she said Patrick Lumumba had murdered Meredith and that he had gone into her bedroom and she had then heard screams and covered her ears. She didn’t ring the Polizia though. When that pack of lies unravelled, she then said she hadn’t been anywhere near the apartment but had been bonking Sollecito in his apartment. Funny that, as Sollecito initially claimed he had spent the evening downloading a cartoon and that he had received a phone call from his father – no mention of Amanda being with him. However, his phone records and forensics on his computer, and I assume records from his ISP, indicate he hadn’t used the computer that evening and he hadn’t answered any calls. Apparently the records show the phone had rung, but had not been answered.

   Another site has documented the multiple other lies Knox has been caught out on so no point me re-inventing the wheel:

   http://truejustice.org/ee/index.php?/tjmk/comments/amanda_knox_trapped_in_her_own_words/

   Knox seems to have an interesting personality. She apparently wrote a story on a social networking site about a young girl being drugged and raped.

   That of course, taken by itself, means nothing. However, when she and Sollecito were taken to the police station to answer questions, she was said to have sat in Sollecito’s lap, done the splits and turned cartwheels. A very sombre and dignified way to react to news your flatmate had just been murdered by having her throat slit.

   The day following the murder, witnesses say she was canoodling with Sollecito and CCTV footage shows the two of them shopping for lingerie where she bought a G-string and a store clerk overheard her say ‘we’re gonna have wild sex tommorow/tonight’.

   Very strange. Another of her accounts, after the one about Lumumba was rumbled, was that she returned to the flat the following day, found the door open, the second flatmates window smashed, blood in the bathroom and Kercher’s door locked, yet she didn’t call the police!

   Have a poke around on that site where the lies are detailed, there is a timeline and a host of other stuff.

   Sorry Cheryl, with all the will in the world, I can not see Knox as an innocent abroad who has been set up by the Police.

   ****************************************************
   Some more or less random stuff I happened upon
   ****************************************************

   Tabloid interest intensified after it emerged that Knox had written a short story on a social networking site about a man who drugs and rapes a young girl.

   In it, one character remarks: “A thing you have to know about chicks is that they don’t know what they want.” news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8391199.stm

   Bar owner Patrick Lumumba was arrested at the same time as the American and Italian, after being implicated by Miss Knox’s police statement.

   She had told police she had been in the kitchen of the apartment when Mr Lumumba had gone into the Briton’s bedroom alone.

   Miss Knox said she had then heard screaming from the room, but had covered her ears to block out the noise.

   A fortnight after his arrest, Mr Lumumba was released from prison in Rome because no physical evidence had emerged to link him to the crime scene and witnesses placed him at his bar on the night of the murder.

   However, Miss Knox’s mother Edda Mellas had told reporters her daughter had not heard any screams and had, in fact, been at her boyfriend’s house on the night of the killing.

   Police disputed this, according to reports in the UK, saying Miss Knox had been caught on camera going into the house on the night in question and that her bloody fingerprint had been found on a bathroom tap.

   In the months before the case came to court, Miss Knox repeatedly told Italian media she knew nothing of the murder. Meanwhile, an Albanian witness told police she had threatened him with a knife after he had crashed his car and that she had been with the two other suspects 24 hours before the killing.

   At a pre-trial hearing, lawyers for Mr Sollecito said he could not have been involved in the murder because he was downloading a cartoon at home at the time.

   They said he was on the internet between 2100 and 2200 local time (2000 and 2100 GMT) on the day, and at about the time, Miss Kercher died.

   Speaking outside court, they also said it could not be proved that DNA found on Miss Kercher’s bra strap belonged to Mr Sollecito.

   Phone records have shown that the phone at Mr Sollecito’s house rang at about midnight that evening, but no-one answered.

   His Nike trainers were also examined as police believed they matched the bloody footprint found on the duvet in Miss Kercher’s room.
   news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7634039.stm

   Neither of their cases were helped by CCTV evidence that found its way into the Italian press, reportedly showing the pair buying sexy underwear together two days after Miss Kercher’s death.

   His defence was that on the night of the murder he was at home surfing the internet – although police say his computer records do not support this.

   news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8391174.stm

   Amanda Knox, 21, said she had been threatened by police with 30 years in jail if she continued to “lie”.

   She also denied previously meeting the man convicted in October of murder and sexual violence in the same case.

   During Saturday’s hearing, Miss Knox denied being friends with Mr Guede, but said she had met him three times.

   Questioned by Mr Sollecito’s lawyer she also said she rejected the evidence of an Albanian witness, Hekuran Kokomani, who told the court in March that he had seen Miss Knox and Mr Sollecito on an unspecified date with Mr Guede.

   When questioned about yoga and stretching exercises she did at the police station, she said: “Everyone deals with tragedy in his own way. I’m always trying to feel less stress. I know I may appear spacy, but that’s how I am.”

   Defence lawyer Carlo Dalla Vedova then asked Miss Knox about the knife which was discovered at Mr Sollecito’s flat, but belonged to the American.

   She told me she got on really well with her roommates
   Andrew Seliber
   Character witness

   Knox’s friend speaks for her

   In a recorded phone conversation with her mother, Miss Knox said she became concerned after learning about it while in custody.

   “I was worried because for me it was impossible. I didn’t know how it could be there,” she said.

   For a second time, Miss Knox, who had been on a student exchange from Seattle’s University of Washington, described how she learned Miss Kercher had died.

   “When I got home, I found it strange the door was open but I didn’t know what to think,” she said. “I called ‘Is anybody there?”‘

   She said the room of another of her housemates, Filomena Romanelli, was in “chaos”.

   “I saw clothes on the floor. I saw the window was broken. I wondered what had happened.

   “Meredith’s door was locked but this didn’t alarm me. I was only alarmed when I called her and she didn’t answer.”

   news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/8098607.stm

   Police had arrived at the house with Ms Kercher’s two mobile phones which they had recovered from a neighbour’s garden.

   When they got there they found Amanda Knox and her boyfriend.

   If I told you I was in Rome, but the records showed I was in Paris, then you might begin to ask questions
   Arturo de Felice
   Perugia’s chief of police

   Ms Knox had called her friends to report a break-in. They had returned from a night out, said the 20-year-old student, to find the door ajar. There was blood in the bathroom and Ms Kercher’s door had been locked.

   news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7083389.stm

   Sollecito has always maintained that he was home in his apartment the night of the murder and initially told police his father had called him at home around 11 p.m.

   Phone records later showed that he received no such call.

   Sollecito also said that he was on the computer all evening, but computer experts testified last week that although his computer was on all night, no had used it from 9:10 p.m. until 5:32 a.m. the next day.

   According to investigators, cell phone records for Knox and Sollecito, who claim to have spent the night of Nov. 1 together at his apartment, reveal something unusual. Police investigator Letterio Latella testified today that Knox and Sollecito’s cell phones were inactive most of the night, and activity on the cell phones stopped almost simultaneously. Sollecito’s phone was inactive from 8:42 p.m. until 6:52 a.m. the next day, while Knox’s phone was quiet from 8:35 p.m. on Nov. 1 and didn’t show any activity until 12:07 p.m. the next day, when she tried to call Kercher.

   abcnews.go.com/International/story?id=7131195&page=1

   http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/dec/04/meredith-kercher-amanda-knox-guilty

   Looks a bit like smirk to me. So does this:

   http://www.usposttoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/knox_1481157c.jpg

   To cover their tracks, they faked a break-in, turning over the bedroom of one of the two Italian flatmates, Filomena Romanelli, before going outside and hurling a stone through the window.

   But a tell-tale sign was left. Romanelli noticed that the glass was on top of her strewn clothes, not under them. This was crucial because it undermined the defence’s case that Kercher had simply been murdered by Guede after he broke into the house.

   The Italian flatmate’s testimony suggested the murderer had not climbed in through the window but had entered through the front door. Knox had a key, but Guede did not.

   Both turned off their mobile phones on the night of the murder. Knox said that, when she returned to the flat in the morning for a shower, she saw blood in the bathroom, but did not raise the alarm until noon, after going back to Sollecito’s flat for breakfast.

   Sollecito claimed to have rung the carabinieri. But telephone company records indicated he made the call after, and not before, the police turned up by purest chance and found him and his girlfriend sitting outside the house.

   Evidence was produced to suggest Sollecito’s flat had been thoroughly cleaned, but not by his cleaning lady.

   http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/dec/04/meredith-kercher-amanda-knox-guilty

   Profazio said Knox and Sollecito had a “strange attitude” when they were brought to the police station for questioning following the discovery of Kercher’s body. He said that on one occasion Knox sat on Sollecito’s lap.

   “I told them it was not appropriate,” Profazio said.

   He also recalled other officers reporting that Knox was doing cartwheels and splits in the police station.

   http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,501776,00.html

   Police beat me, Amanda Knox tells jury as she takes her turn in the witness box

   Amanda Knox, the woman accused of murdering British exchange student Meredith Kercher, told an Italian court she was hit by police and forced to make false statements ­during a late night interrogation.

   Knox, 21, who is on trial alongside her former Italian boyfriend, Raffaele ­Sollecito, 25, said she had falsely accused a local bar owner over the ­murder because she was put under ­pressure by police.

   “The police called me a stupid liar who was trying to protect someone,” she told the court in English. “I was very scared, the police were treating me badly and I didn’t know why.” Asked if she had been hit during her interrogation, she showed how she had been cuffed on the back on the head twice by a police officer. Perugia police have denied mistreating her.

   http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jun/12/amanda-knox-meredith-kercher-murder-trial

7. 36 P says:
   December 7th, 2009 at 6:33 pm

   Didn’t see you’re second statement there Cheryl, sorry for my slightly vitriolic response. My point still stands but it doesn’t change a lot. The Knoxs will prolong this case in order to get their loved one out of jail but at the cost of prolonging the suffering of the Kerchers and the rest of us who loved Mez by hearing her name and the details of her murder everytime the news comes on. I have sympathy for Amanda’s family but none for her

8. 35 P says:
   December 7th, 2009 at 6:26 pm

   “Getting back to Italy’s lack of Rights to suspects and how they handled that case from start to finish is rather a shock to us in the US considering Italy is looked upon as a civilized country and their handling of suspects and lack of Rights comes across more akin to Iran and other like countries we’d expect that from.”

   I really don’t want to be pedantic or move away from the subject at hand but I cannot ignore this statement. You are patronising the Italian legal system, suggesting it is not a civilised country due to an individual incident and that the US is superior. I’ll mention again that there are 100 or so people being held in Guantanamo Bay with no right to a trial and no legal representation. How is that different to Iran? Is it only because they’re not Christian Americans that Americans don’t care about this? Oh! and the death penalty! How civilised is that? People in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones

9. 34 Cheryl says:
   December 7th, 2009 at 5:51 pm

   P, re your remarks re Gitmo. Yes it is rather a double standard on our part but she is a citizen of the United States. We aren’t squeaky clean over here, P, we just go to great lengths to cover up the wrongs we do to some of our citizens. States convict on flawed evidence, put in prison and execute innocent people and cover it up.

10. 33 Cheryl says:
    December 7th, 2009 at 5:34 pm

    P, that is the whole issue I think over here – we know our Rights over here to a ‘t’ and the foreign country Italy’s legal system has thrown us all for a loop in the US. Yet, at some departure gates in our International Airport departures there are signs telling us we are under the country’s laws we are travelling to. Few people take heed of what that means. I really haven’t formed an opinion on whether she is guilty or not, I’m more or less playing devil’s advocate showing the other side and reasons why one could suspect she was railroaded.

    Do I think because she is a pretty young woman, from a nice family, smiles nicely then she is not capable of murder? Good grief no!! We have teens as young as 15 sitting in prison and some for life for the cold blooded murdering of parents, siblings, teachers, friends, etc.

    Getting back to Italy’s lack of Rights to suspects and how they handled that case from start to finish is rather a shock to us in the US considering Italy is looked upon as a civilized country and their handling of suspects and lack of Rights comes across more akin to Iran and other like countries we’d expect that from.

    Everyone is capable of murder, whether they believe it or not. There is a very thin line between sanity and insanity and what can push one over into insanity, even temporary insanity, may not push another.

    Anorak mentioned Knox’s appeal is coming from ‘vested interest groups’. Of course they are and one very vested interest group happens to be her family. No parent or relative wants to believe their child is capable of such a heinous crime least of be held in some foreign country’s prison. Considering the treatment she received at Italy’s hands just as a suspect one can only recoil in horror with thoughts on how they must treat their prisoners in jail.

11. 32 P says:
    December 7th, 2009 at 4:15 pm

    By another country I mean a country with a different, unfamiliar legal system

12. 31 P says:
    December 7th, 2009 at 4:11 pm

    Cheryl, to be honest I don’t really remember what was happening in the first few days afterwards, mainly because I was beside myself with grief but there was also an awful lot of confusion over who the suspects were and who had been arrested (the whole Patrick episode). I can believe that they didn’t get her a lawyer, it seems to me that in a lot of European countries the police make it up as they go along. This said this doesn’t really detract from the guilty verdict, if she had a lawyer immediately would there have been any difference in the outcome?

    There are two things that bug me. 1) Why is no one making a similar case for Sollecito? 2) The irony of Americans clamouring for the release of a murderer because of an ‘unfair’ trial (basically a trial in another country) when there are 100 people being held in Guantanamo Bay who haven’t even had access to a lawyer, let alone a trial is quite frankly a ridiculous display of double standards.. or perhaps just ignorance.

13. 30 Cheryl says:
    December 7th, 2009 at 3:30 pm

    P, what I strongly think and personally feel is the public’s reaction over here is to the lack of Rights a suspect is shown in Italy and the alleged way they treat their suspects. She didn’t have a lawyer for days and reading newspapers accounts they badgered her, threatened her, leaked information to the press, made it a slam dunk case within days of the murder and police made certain the press reported on their investigation from day one and their suspicions of her. That conduct by the Police leaves open for suspicion she was railroaded into jail in the eyes of the Americans. That seems to be the MO in how they treat their suspects in certain countries in Europe. One would expect that treatment of suspects to get a confession from countries like Iran and not a supposed civilized country.

14. 29 Anorak says:
    December 7th, 2009 at 11:58 am

    28, P – you’re right. The debate is of the media’s making and Knox’s appeal comes from vested interest groups…

15. 28 P says:
    December 7th, 2009 at 11:38 am

    As a friend of Mez and as someone who has met the other girls who lived in the flat after the murder some of the stuff I’ve read here seems surprising. It was obvious to those girls Knox was guilty, they way she acted, the things she said, her body language, the girls, even in their grief, knew her well enough to realise something wasn’t right.

    From what I can gather the majority of people here are basing their opinions on media/PR reports, what people seem to be forgetting is that the judges and jury spent almost a year in the courtroom with both Amanda and Rafaele, they have access to far more evidence than any of us and by seeing the defendants in the flesh every day they are far better placed to make a decision than any of us.

    I don’t buy the claims that the press affected the outcome either

16. 27 June says:
    December 7th, 2009 at 10:33 am

    Cheryl

    the case I was referring to was the man who had languished in a US jail for many many years, and as you say had to barter for release anyway

    Perhaps he should have smiled more on his court appearences

17. 26 Cheryl says:
    December 7th, 2009 at 8:24 am

    Jillian, Senator Cantwell (Senator from state of Washington) has already stated she plans to raise her concerns about that trial with Secretary of State Clinton. The Knox family is pushing for Government intervention. She may or may not have committed that serious crime she was convicted of. However,when she went there, as our country tells us, she was under their laws. Maybe this will wake up all Americans to make it a point to study carefully every country’s laws and one’s Rights under those laws they plan to go to. Most countries aren’t like the good old USA when you are suspected of committing a crime and you sit there and give your name and address and next words out of your mouth you say you want a lawyer and police shut their mouths until a lawyer is present.

    http://news.aol.com/article/amanda-knox-family-seeks-us-intervention/803576

18. 25 Jillian says:
    December 7th, 2009 at 4:30 am

    What a joke. There was no substantial evidence in which to blame these two. The media in Italy convicted her before she even went on trial. It is obvious that Rudy was the sole murderer of Meredith and not Amanda and Raffaele. The judicial system in Italy is pathetic and I wish that someone from our government would step in and help this poor girl and her family.

19. 24 Cheryl says:
    December 7th, 2009 at 3:49 am

    June, I’m trying to think of any cases of foreign nationals convicted over here. Well, we did have the one where the husband murdered his wife and little daughter up in New England and fled back to England. But England sent him back to us once we promised we would not put him to death for their murders. However, there was no mistrial in his trial as he was guilty as sin in killing them both and then high tailed it back to his homeland thinking he was home free. We did have someone from over there in prison for many years for allegedly killing his friend’s daughter or his step-daughter and ended up sending him back over a year or so ago. That was a miscarriage of justice, June, as he did not kill that little girl but I believe he have had to agree to some trumped up lower charge just to get out of prison and go back over there.

    You say her behaviour was contemptuous of her victim? Well, if you are talking of her smiling, June, what was she to do? She claims she is innocent even though she was found guilty. If she is indeed innocent then she had no need to act all somber, scared and nervous even walking into the court room. Lawyers tell their clients how to conduct themselves in Court. In fact, they even coach and tell their witnesses how to conduct themselves in court before the judge and jury when speaking and answering questions. Further, yes she changed her story re who did it but if you read back she claimed she was badgered, threatened, etc. and got scared. She was in a foreign country, June, which obviously does not respect the Rights of a person accused of a crime and make available a lawyer to them as soon as picked up. We all know our Rights over here and no doubt she was very scared beng exposed to such a system as they have in Italy.

    Years ago that crap went on over here where police would badger, threaten, even beat, or hide the suspect so a lawyer couldn’t find them and they’d force a confession out of them. Many cases were thrown out when it was found the person was really innocent but scared to death by their treatment and would admit to anything. That is when the Miranda Act went into effect. A person does not have to say one word without a lawyer present and the police have to read them that Right before they even talk to them.

    So, June, the very fact Italy does not grant the same Rights to a suspect as the US does and treats them as they do over there leaves open to suspect how guilty a person really is.

20. 23 eggman says:
    December 7th, 2009 at 1:58 am

    What we really need are the views of some good old British experts who could comment on this case. Someone like an ex Police Officer or a Professor of Law. Sadly, I just cannot think of anyone.

21. 22 June says:
    December 7th, 2009 at 12:44 am

    Cheryl

    It must be pointed out Italy isn’t a US State, and is not bound your legal practices.
    Has your country never convicted foreign nationals for heinous crimes that could well be seen as mistrials?

    Amanda Knox’s family are of course not going to believe she is guilty, but it does not mean she is innocent.
    She did accuse someone of the rape and murder of Meredith Kercher, because she said she witnessed him do it, then changed her statement.
    Her behaviour throughout the investigation and trial has been contemptuous of her victim to say the least.

    However, had she been found innocent , what then would have been the outcry from the US?

    Morally and ethically it should be the same as now

22. 21 Totje says:
    December 6th, 2009 at 10:04 pm

    I’m afraid I haven’t followed this case for a long while. A young girl died a horrible death, nothing can change that.
    On what evidence was this girl, Amanda, convicted?

23. 20 CC says:
    December 6th, 2009 at 9:53 pm

    Wow, Cheryl, you’ve not just swallowed the hook, line and sinker, you’ve had the entire bait box.

    Here’s comment 3 from your link:

    3. Roger Moss | 12.05.09

    Your headline is a distortion of the facts. A “US student” AND an Italian student were both found equally guilty yesterday, and an Ivory Coast national has already pleaded guilty to the same crime. The U.S.-centred bias continues throughout the way the entire piece is written, quoting exclusively from “American legal experts” in attempting to cast doubt on the verdict and on the Italian judicial process. This isn’t good enough for a supposedly “international” newspaper, and I have seen far more balanced reporting in the British press (despite this being the home country of the murder victim). I wonder, in fact, what the Monitor is doing making a sex amd drugs murder case its main news story. I thought the paper’s mission was to avoid such sensationalist reporting. But if you’re going to cover such stories, at least do so without national bias getting in the way.

    end quote

    The Knox family hired a PR team that has roped in every rent-a-gob ‘legal expert’ it can find. US TV loves these people. Their job isn’t to offer an independent or measured pov. It’s to follow a news agenda.

    Knox is a murderous liar. Her parents need a reality check.

24. 19 Cheryl says:
    December 6th, 2009 at 7:45 pm

    No, June, it is considered far from ’safe’ over here. Our TV news is still reporting about that trial and how it was handled and the so-called Justice System in Italy. Legal Analysts and lawyers are speaking out against that trial and how it was handled. Not just because she is an American but against the whole system over there and tactics used, tainted evidence, rights violated, etc. Truthfully, they would not have gone to trial over here with what little or any so-called evidence they produced over there. They can be guilty as sin but the hard irrefutable evidence wasn’t there and her rights were violated, if you sat there as a juror and listened to her story in court on how she was treated, badgered, threatened, then one could not honestly find her guilty. Thinking someone is guilty is one thing but to convict them on suspect evidence and with violation of their rights by police and prosecutorial misconduct is another matter.

    They used the same tactics in Italy that you know who used in Portugal and used in that one other case where the woman is in jail for allegedly killing her daughter. Now the outrage against Scotland was based on the deep emotions still felt over that horrible bombing and the victims killed. Then, of course, the feeling we were double crossed by Scotland since allegedly the deal was made he’d never be released from prison

25. 18 Kathi says:
    December 6th, 2009 at 6:31 pm

    They have no right to blame the Italian justice system or say that the Italians in this case of Amanda Knox are anti-American. Witch was one of the statements shown this morning that the Itanlians wearing their sashes with the Italian flag are anti-American. I am Italian American. Another comment was this would be affective not to have American visitiors visit the nice quant little Italian town. The town of Perugia and its people did not masacure the innocent British girl. It hurts me deeply, that an American brodcasting news channel would allow comments like that said on the air. Amanda Knox has this viloents in her and would have done this sooner or later, no matter where she is. She has no remorse for what she has done. With a BIG smile on her face. Instead of tears. I am upset that Hillary Clinton is looking into this case. She even wrote on her blog, about this murder. I hope she goes to the romian jail. 25 years is NOT long enough. She should be serving a life sentence. The italian jail will wipe that smile right off her face. I lived in Perusa and I never ever inconterd anybody there that was anti- American. It’s a wonderful beautiful town.

26. 17 June says:
    December 6th, 2009 at 6:09 pm

    Probably not in the US, Cheryl, no.
    But I don’t think it was anti American from the Italian point of view as two other Nationalities were convicted also who are not American.
    Does your country consider the verdicts against them as ’safe’?

    I think its very sad that a young dead girl is being totally eclipsed by a living girl, whatever their nationalities

    But there have been other nationalities legal systems condemned as as ‘incompetent’ on this very site – Portugal and very recently Scotland.

    It used to be our water was viewed with suspicions by the good citizens of the US…..

27. 16 Cheryl says:
    December 6th, 2009 at 5:27 pm

    CC, I’m not sure of what ‘comment 3′ is. She can be guilty as all get out but when one reads of the tactics used, rights violated, it leaves open for some suspicion that maybe she isn’t. I know pictures of her smiling run constantly are being used against her for the court of public opinion and I’ve looked at them carefully and I saw no smirks. A smirk is a smirk, one can’t miss a smirk. She could be totally amoral or a sociopath but that was not brought out or any evidence produced to show those characteristics in her past. Any sexual promiscuity does not mean a person can become a murderer. There was mention of marijuana use and possible alcohol. Marijuana does not bring on such frenzy. However, if they were out of their minds on alcohol then they could have gotten into such a frenzy.

    The problem is, even over here, many times evidence is ‘manufactured’ and twisted by the police and prosecution to get a conviction they want.

    Every story I’ve read is an American girl kills a British girl. Would the same vast coverage be carried and reading (if) a British girl killed a British girl?

28. 15 CC says:
    December 6th, 2009 at 4:21 pm

    Ah, the Christian Science Monitor.

    Comment 3 there has it nailed

29. 14 Cheryl says:
    December 6th, 2009 at 3:23 pm

    I understand what you are say, AGW, it is a ‘done deal’ – but in my eyes a possible ‘done deal’ European style. Note the story below of the allegedly conduct by the investigators/police – their minds were made up within days, innuendos, massive press coverage, leaks began, and allegedly bullying of the suspect by a police woman. Rather reminds me of another high profile case in a foreign country where similar tactics were used. It certainly was a ‘done deal.’

    http://features.csmonitor.com/globalnews/2009/12/04/amanda-knox-verdict-us-student-in-italy-found-guilty-of-murder-in-controversial-trial/

30. 13 shazy says:
    December 6th, 2009 at 1:13 pm

    bloody murderers! cant believe thier family still sticking up for them! look at every picture, they smirk and grin, no remorse whatsoever and if they were’nt guilty, they would look upset in the pictures for being wrongly accused!they smile because they know the verdict is right and they are proud of what they’ve done.lock the satans up and throw away the key.should have been sentenced to death.

31. 12 agw says:
    December 6th, 2009 at 7:16 am

    There should be no need to form an opinion of guilt or innocence. It’s a done deal.
    The sovereign State of Italy, it’s trial judge and a jury have taken a leisurely eight months (at an average of two sittings a week) to look at the savage murder of a young woman.
    This has nothing to do with USAphobics.

    The judicial system determined US citizen Ms Knox was guilty as charged and had stabbed 21-year-old Meredith Kercher through the neck, allegedly during voluntary group sexual activity.
    Allegedly because only those there know if it was voluntary or forced.
    Rape and murder or gang-bang and ritualistic slaughter. Both seem a tad excessive.
    I’m not aware anyone has suggested it was a self-inflicted wound. Suicidal activity perhaps.

    Amanda Knox may not be too despairing. I understand there are similar- minded inmates throughout the Italian penal structure.
    Of course, under the strict social mores of Italian jail-house female High Society she would probably have to become someone’s bitch to enjoy a fuller exotic sex life..

    Not too much of a problem for a gregarious gal, especially one who bleaches knives after use.
    Cleanliness is next to “Oh My God”-liness.

    …and in the interests of fair and balanced reporting one Raffaele Sollecito, Ms Knox’s Italian former paramour, was also found guilty of involvement in the murder.

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