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This article is a subarticle of "Murder of Meredith Kercher".

Following the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy, on November 1, 2007, the suspects Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito were tried in Perugia, from January to December 2009. The trial resulted in convictions for both, on several charges, and they were sentenced to 26 and 25 years, although Italy typically allows an automatic appeal, as a form of retrial with new evidence. A separate trial, in Italy, of the third suspect, Rudy Hermann Guédé, beginning on 16 October 2008, had led to a sentence of 30 years for sexual assault and conspiracy to murder.

The event involved several controversies, including: alleged sexual occult torture, prosecutor under indictment, claims of police brutality, lack of mobile phone evidence, lack of DNA evidence, and the Italian media supporting innocence (each linked to details below).

Events of the trial

The trial of Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito began on 16 January 2009, with much attention from the media. Both Knox's and Sollecito's lawyers used the occasion to proclaim their client's innocence. Guédé declined to testify in the trial. During the first session, judge Giancarlo Massei rejected a request by the Kercher family to hold the trial behind closed doors. He ruled that the trial would be public, but with closed sessions to be decided on a case-by-case basis.

Knox testified for the first time on 12 June 2009, pleading her innocence. She told the court that she had been with Sollecito in his apartment on the night of the murder. She also alleged that the police had intimidated and beaten her, causing her to give false testimony and to falsely accuse Patrick Lumumba.

On 4 December 2009, Knox was found guilty of all six charges (excluding theft), which include civil as well as criminal charges, and sentenced to 26 years in jail. Sollecito was found guilty of all five charges attributed to him and was sentenced to 25 years in prison. The decision was delivered by the presiding judge at around 11:45 pm local time, following 13 hours of deliberation.

Civil actions

Running concurrently with the criminal trial are two civil trials. The family of Kercher has filed a civil suit for US$33 million (approximately £20 million or €22 million) against anyone found guilty of the murder. Patrick Lumumba, the man Knox originally accused of murdering Kercher, is suing Knox for more than $500,000 (approximately £300,000 or €330,000) in damages.

Prosecutor Giuliano Mignini

Guiliano Mignini is the Pubblico Ministero (public prosecutor) of Perugia. He led the interrogation of Amanda Knox in which she implicated Patrick Lumumba.

Defendants

The three convicted killers in the case are currently being held in separate Italian jails. Amanda Knox, an American student, is being held in Capanne prison near Perugia; Raffaele Sollecito, an Italian student and Knox's former boyfriend, is being held in Terni; and Rudy Guédé, an Ivory Coast native found guilty of the murder in October 2008, is being held in Viterbo.

Amanda Knox

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Amanda Marie Knox, was, at the time of Kercher's killing, a 20-year-old University of Washington language student from Seattle, Washington, USA. She was studying in Perugia at the University for Foreigners. Her parents, Kurt Knox and Edda Mellas, had divorced when she was two. Knox was arrested on the morning of 6 November 2007 when, after police questioning on 5-6 November, she signed a statement that she had been in the house when the murder took place and had "heard the screams." During the police interview, which Knox has since claimed to have lasted 14 hours she reportedly gave several different versions of the events of the night of the murder, saying her memory was clouded because she had smoked hashish. The Prosecution has never admitted to the existence of tapes of the initial interrogation in November 2007, and there was no defence lawyer present, although there was at subsequent interrogations in January 2008. In at least one of the variations she claimed to be at the home of her then boyfriend and co-defendant Raffaele Sollecito on the morning of the murder until 10 am that morning when she left to go home.

In one of her earlier statements to the police, Knox implicated Patrick Diya Lumumba (the owner of the bar she worked part time) in the murder, saying:

I don't remember if my friend Meredith was already there or whether she came later. What I can say is that the two of them (Meredith and Patrick) went off together... Patrick and Meredith went off together into Meredith's room while I think I stayed in the kitchen. I can't remember how long they were in the bedroom together, I can only say that at a certain point I heard Meredith screaming and I was so frightened I put my fingers in my ears. I don't remember anything after that, my head is really confused. I don’t remember if Meredith called out or if I heard thuds because I was upset, but I can imagine what was happening...I'm not sure whether Raffaele was there too that evening but I do remember waking up at his house in his bed and that in the morning I went back to where I lived, where I found the door open.

Knox later claimed to have been made this statement under duress, because the police believed a text message from her to Lumumba had incriminated him. The exchange, which seemed to be an employer telling his worker she didn't need to come in (while the employee replied "See you later") has been maintained by the defense to have been a simple acknowledgment, rather than a plan to meet later.

Knox appeared before a magistrate on the morning of 9 November and was ordered to be held, along with Sollecito and Lumumba, for up to one year while the police continued their investigation. In a leaked report published by The Times, investigating judge Claudia Matteini suggested that Knox and Sollecito had been seeking to "experience extreme sensations, intense sexual relations which break up the monotony of everyday life," and had attempted to persuade Kercher to participate in a sexual encounter. The report continued:

They went together to the apartment on Via della Pergola 7, to which Amanda had the only key. It was roughly at this time that both Sollecito and Knox switched off their mobile phones until the following morning.

After Knox's arrest, certain aspects of her behaviour were subject to media scrutiny. Knox's demeanour during police questioning, and the trial, had been questioned as being odd by some, and lacking in decorum fit for a murder case - for instance, she was witnessed cartwheeling and laughing during police questioning. Knox said that she was doing yoga postures to relieve the tension, and that these had been misinterpeted. For some of the trial photos she appeared smiling. The media also focused on the fact that Knox had earlier written a story, and posted it online, about the drugging and rape of a young woman.

Part of her media appeal was, in the Italian press's words, "the face of an angel - but the eyes of a killer". The BBC reported, "The only explanation, according to prosecutors and feverish media coverage, was that Knox was that most-loved of villains - the middle-class monster whose white-bread exterior hides a diabolical soul."

Knox's parents visited her frequently during her pre-trial detention and steadfastly maintain her innocence. Knox's parents, supporters and lawyers point to the complete absence of forensic evidence indicating that she was in the bedroom where Meredith Kercher was murdered. They contend that it would have been impossible for Knox to have engaged in the alleged attempted sex orgy, and to have participated in the crime while leaving no trace of her DNA, hair or fibre in the bedroom. It has also been noted that the alleged murder weapon, a 6.5 inch knife, did not match two out of three of the wounds on Kercher's body which were made by a 3 to 3.5 inch knife. Knox was represented in Italy by attorneys Luciano Ghirga and Carlo Dalla Vedova.

On 4 December 2009, Knox was convicted by the Corte d'Assise of Perugia of all counts except theft against Kercher and was sentenced to 26 years in prison.

Raffaele Sollecito

Raffaele Sollecito, from Giovinazzo, Bari, was 23 years old and nearing the completion of a degree in Engineering at the University of Perugia at the time of the murder. He had known Knox for two weeks when Kercher was murdered, though they were already lovers. He is from an affluent family, the son of a urologist from Bari.

Sollecito says that he returned to his flat and spent the evening surfing the Internet on the night of the murder. Detectives have said that his alibi is not substantiated by records of his internet service provider, though a private detective working for Sollecito disputed this. Like Knox, he admits to having smoked marijuana on the day of the murder.

His DNA was found on a bra clasp (fastener) lying on the floor of Kercher's room for at least a month. Also, a footprint claimed to match Sollecito's Nike shoes was found in blood in Kercher's room; however, Giovanni Arcudi, a second expert set to argue on behalf of Sollecito, stated, "That footprint does not possess clear and definite characteristics."

On 4 December 2009, Raffaele Sollecito was found guilty on all counts except theft and sentenced to 25 years in prison. He is expected to appeal the ruling.

Rudy Guédé

Rudy Hermann Guédé, then aged 20, originally from Côte d'Ivoire, was arrested on 20 November 2007 for suspected involvement in the Kercher killing. He was subsequently convicted of conspiracy to murder and sentenced to 30 years, on 28 October 2008. The ruling has already been appealed, to be re-tried with potential new evidence.

Guédé came to Perugia at the age of five with his father, Pacome Roger Guédé. His father left Italy when Guédé was 16, and he was informally adopted by the family of a wealthy local businessman, Paolo Caporali. Caporali stated that he had been disappointed by Guédé's behaviour, describing him as a "tremendous liar", skipping school and being reluctant to do any work. Guédé played basketball for the local team which Caporali sponsored.

DNA tests indicate that Guédé had sex with Kercher before her murder, and that faeces found in the toilet were his. DNA tests showed the presence of his DNA on and inside Kercher's body, and his palm print in Kercher's blood was found nearby, on one of her bed linens. His DNA was found mixed with Kercher's blood at the crime scene.

Guédé has been described as an alleged drug dealer and thief.

Guédé's account of the evening was that he and the victim had consensual sex, after which he became sick from a bad kebab and left the room to use the toilet. He claimed to be listening to music on his iPod while using the facilities and thus did not hear the killer enter the house. He did, however, hear Kercher scream, and emerged to see the murderer, a man whom he did not know, stabbing Kercher. Guédé claimed the man escaped, saying, "You're in trouble, you black bastard", after which Guédé claims to have held the dying Meredith as she uttered a final "A-F" which he wrote on the wall. Without calling police, he fled the scene and made his way to Germany. The investigators stated that Guédé's version of events was "a highly improbable fantasy."

Various controversies

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Sexual occult torture

Although the event initially appeared to be a somewhat routine case of a one-man rape/murder (with the man claiming he saw Meredith dying and whisper the letters "AF"), the prosecution treated the event as an unusual occult ritual, occurring on the night after Halloween, and also as a sex-game of sexual torture. The prosecution claimed that 2 knives were used as weapons against the victim, with one knife blade used to threaten her, while another knife was used to cut her throat.

Prosecutor under indictment

The head prosecutor, Giuliano Mignini, was under indictment, during the trial, for prosecutorial misconduct in a prior trial, with sanctions against him delayed until after the trial, with a ruling expected in January 2010.

Claims of police brutality

Amanda Knox was held for questioning overnight, (consisting of two interviews) nearly 14 hours, was allegedly insulted by being called a "stupid liar", and claimed that she was hit on the head to force her signature on a pre-written confession (actually her own hand-written voluntary statement). The highest court in Italy ruled, due to lack of an attorney and interpreter during initial questioning, that her remarks during that questioning were inadmissible for the trial; however, due to the fact that it was admissible in the concurrent action against Knox for falsely accusing Lumumba, her questioning and remarks were available to the panel of judges during the trial.

Mobile phone evidence

Although the prosecution alleged that Knox and Sollecito had pre-planned the event with Rudy Guede, who had admitted he saw Meredith Kercher die, none of their mobile-phone records in 2007 showed any calls between them. However, phone records of Amanda Knox revealed calls on the day of the killing between her and Diya "Patrick" Lumumba (age 38), her manager at the nightclub Le Chic, which were discussed during her interrogation as possible evidence of a pre-planned rendezvous. The lack of phone-contact evidence with Guede was a major point of controversy.

DNA evidence

A 6.5-inch kitchen knife (17 cm) found in Sollecito's apartment, which the prosecution claimed was used to stab Meredith Kercher, contained so little DNA on the blade, that there were insufficient DNA samples to allow a re-test, or allow independent laboratory testing by the defence.

Italian media sentiment

For months, Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito had been vilified in the popular media as a cold-blooded duo, or sexual sadists. However, in the last days of the trial it is reported that media sentiment in Italy shifted in favour of the defendants.

Notes

1. ^ "Amanda Knox guilty of Meredith Kercher murder", John Hooper in Perugia, The Guardian, Saturday 5 December 2009, www.guardian.co.uk, webpage: Guard-D5.
2. Ann Wise (2009-04-04). "Convict Opts for Silence in Knox Trial". ABC News. Retrieved 2009-04-04.
3. "We are innocent lovebirds not Meredith Kercher's murderers, trial told". Times Online. 2009-01-17. Retrieved 2009-01-19.
4. "Kercher police beat me, Knox says". BBC Online. 2009-06-12. Retrieved 2009-06-12.
5. "Caso Meredith, Amanda in aula "La polizia mi ha maltrattata"". Repubblica Online. 2009-06-12. Retrieved 2009-06-12.
6. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8394750.stm. {{cite news}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
7. "Amanda Knox guilty of Meredith Kercher murder". BBC Online. 2009-12-05. Retrieved 2009-12-05.
8. ^ Nadeau, Barbie (September 10, 2009). "Nuclear-Family Fallout". Newsweek. Retrieved Oct. 20, 2009. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
9. http://cpj.org/2006/04/crime-journalists-imprisonment-raises-alarm.php
10. ^ Cohen, Stephanie (7 February 2009) "US Gal at Center of Italy Sex Murder May Go Free", The New York Post (New York)
11. Pisa, Nick (2008-12-25). "Murder suspect 'Foxy Knoxy' spends Christmas in an Italian jail 'singing carols and watching Kung Fu Panda film'". Daily Mail. Retrieved 2008-12-29.
12. Squires, Nick (2009-12-02), Amanda Knox Italian murder trial nears verdict, Christian Science Monitor, retrieved 2009-12-07 {{citation}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
13. Nadeau, Barbie (2008-07-14), The Many Faces of Amanda, Newsweek, retrieved 2008-07-15 {{citation}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
14. Amanda Knox, the 'shy' former Jesuit school girl
15. ^ "Excerpts from the witness statements". The Times. 2007-11-06. Retrieved 2007-11-07.
16. Vanessa Ho (2007-11-07). "Seattle woman heard fatal attack unfold in Italy". Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Retrieved 2007-11-07.
17. Richard Owen (2007-11-06). "Woman 'confesses role' in British student's murder in Perugia". The Times. Retrieved 2007-11-06.
18. "Exclusive: Amanda Knox Statement". Knox's statement includes her claim that physical abuse during the 14-hour interrogation led to her false confession.
19. "Computer and crucifix: Amanda Knox's guilt will be judged in a system that is a mix of old and new". {{cite news}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |1= (help)
20. "Student from Seattle to remain in jail in Italian death probe". The Seattle Times. 2007-11-09. Retrieved 2007-11-09.
21. Richard Owen (2007-11-09). "Judge says Meredith Kercher was murdered for resisting brutal sex game". The Times. Retrieved 2007-11-09.
22. ^ "Meredith Kercher: Judge's report". The Times. 2007-11-09. Retrieved 2007-11-09.
23. Amanda Knox did cartwheels and splits at police station after Meredith Kercher murder, By Nick Squires, In Perugia Published: 3:55PM GMT 27 Feb 2009, Daily Telegraph.
24. Marta Falconi (2009-04-03). "Amanda Knox's court demeanor in the spotlight". The Seattle Times. Retrieved 2009-07-07.
25. Amanda Knox wrote stories about rape, Aislinn Simpson, Published: 11:01AM GMT 07 Nov 2007, Daily Telegraph.
26. Who was the real 'Foxy Knoxy'
27. "Exclusive: Amanda Knox's Parents End Their Silence".
28. Disputed evidence in spotlight as Amanda Knox trial nears end
29. Amanda Knox: 'She Devil' or Victim of Anti-Americanism?
30. US Senator Maria Cantwell's Statement on Amanda Knox Guilty Verdict
31. "Amanda Knox: the first in-depth interview with her parents"
32. Amanda Knox trial: the unanswered questions
33. Meredith Kercher murder: Coroner says alleged weapon does not match wounds
34. Two deny murder as Meredith trial opens
35. Lawyer Says Amanda Knox Prosecutor Switched Motives
36. Amanda Knox sobs as guilty verdict read
37. "Amanda Knox Sends Co-Accused Raffaele Sollecito A Birthday Card". Sky News. Retrieved 2009-03-27.
38. ^ "Grisly Murder Case Intrigues Italian University City". The New York Times. 2007-11-13. Retrieved 2007-11-13.
39. Will Knox find justice in Perugia? The Independent
40. ^ "Kercher police find 'DNA match'". BBC News. 2008-01-10. Retrieved 2008-01-11.
41. ^ "Knox 'has no contact with reality'". The Guardian. 2007-11-25. Retrieved 2008-01-18.
42. Malcolm Moore (2009-12-10). "Knox 'has no contact with reality'". Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 2008-01-18.
43. Amanda Knox guilty of Meredith Kercher murder
44. "Rudy, il barone con la passione del basket" (in Italian). Quotidiano.net. 2007-11-20. Retrieved 2009-03-31.
45. ^ "Fourth Meredith suspect arrested in Germany". The Times. 2007-11-20. Retrieved 2007-11-20.
46. Rudy Guédé profile
47. John Follain (2007-11-25). "Dying Meredith Kercher 'whispered initials of killer'". The Sunday Times. Retrieved 2007-11-28.
48. "Drug dealer is fourth suspect in Meredith murder investigation". The Times. 2007-11-20. Retrieved 2007-12-26.
49. Rudy Guede; engaging drifter who boasted 'I will drink your blood'
50. ^ "Two more sought over 'sex and drugs' party on night Meredith Kercher died". The Times. 2007-11-26. Retrieved 2007-12-07.
51. "Meredith Kercher suspects 'flirted and shopped for lingerie' after murder". The Times. 2007-11-23. Retrieved 2007-12-07.
52. ^ "Knox 'a fantasist', says Meredith suspect", Malcolm Moore, Perugia, Italy, 24 November 2007, webpage: T389.
53. ^ "Disputed evidence in spotlight as Amanda Knox trial nears end", Mallory Simon, CNN, 4 November 2009, CNN.com webpage: CNN4.

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• 2009 in Italy
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• Deaths by stabbing
• Murder in Italy