Kercher Murder Trial Update: Defendants make final pleas

December 3, 2009 By
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Victim, Meredith Kercher

Mered­ith Kercher

Break­ing  from Sky News:  Amanda Knox has made her final state­ment in the Mered­ith Kercher mur­der trial.  Speak­ing in a trem­bling voice and in Ital­ian, Amanda said she feared ”hav­ing the mask of a killer forced onto my skin”.

She also said she was con­fi­dent her con­science was clean, and thanked the pros­e­cu­tion for the job they’re doing. “I want to thank the accusers because they are only try­ing to do their job even if they don’t under­stand,” Knox said.

Maria del Grosso, Knox’s defense attor­ney, said, “This the­ory of sex­ual vio­lence demands strong evi­dence and what does the pros­e­cu­tor bring? That Amanda mur­dered because Mered­ith didn’t like the fact she did not flush the toi­let and that Amanda was an adulteress.” 

“Amanda has been described as punc­tual, a good stu­dent, extro­vert, sup­port­ive, some­one who enjoyed music and sport, yoga and many other interests.”

Ear­lier, Raf­faele Sol­lecito tes­ti­fied in his defense that he was not a vio­lent per­son and never had been.  He said, “Why would I want to com­mit some­thing so hor­ri­ble as mur­der?  I want to under­stand why I would par­tic­i­pate in this mur­der for no motive. I am not a dog on a lead and I am not depen­dent on Amanda as the pros­e­cu­tion say.”

Knox, 21, and Sol­lecito, 25, have been charged with mur­der and sex­ual assault.  The pros­e­cu­tion is ask­ing for life sen­tences for both defendants.

It’s really sad that some­one so promis­ing as Ms. Kercher was taken from this world at such a young age and in such a bru­tal man­ner.  My heart and prayers go out to her fam­ily.  I’m also pray­ing for jus­tice to be done in this case.  I would hate to see Knox and Sol­lecito, if they truly are inno­cent, to wind up with a life sen­tence in jail.  How­ever, I would equally hate to see mur­der­ers go free.  I’m pray­ing the jury in this case will weigh all the evi­dence and ren­der a just verdict.

The jury has retired to delib­er­ate the case, and a ver­dict is expected within the next 48 hours.

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Is Amanda Knox innocent?

December 3, 2009 By
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On Novem­ber 2, 2007, Mered­ith Kercher, a British stu­dent from the Uni­ver­sity of Leeds study­ing abroad in Peru­gia, Italy, was found stabbed to death in a shared apart­ment.  For two years, the pros­e­cu­tion has been try­ing to tie two other stu­dents — Amanda Knox from Seat­tle, Wash­ing­ton, and Raf­faele Sol­lecito from Giov­inazzo, Bari, Italy — to the mur­der.  Rudy Guede, 20, from the Ivory Coast,  was arrested after flee­ing to Ger­many and has been found guilty in the mur­der of Kercher.

The trial for Knox and Sol­lecito started on 16 Jan­u­ary 2009.  Rudy Guede, who was a close friend of Knox and Sol­lecito, declined to tes­tify in the trial.   Knox tes­ti­fied for the first time in June, say­ing that she was inno­cent and was at Sollecito’s flat on the night of the mur­der.  For a more exten­sive his­tory on the trial, see this Wikipedia arti­cle.

Accord­ing to the pros­e­cu­tion, Knox and Sollecito’s modus operandi was a sex game turned deadly.  Accord­ing to Speigel Online, Kercher was upset that Knox had brought home the two men — Guede and Sol­lecito — some­thing Knox had appar­ently done before.  An argu­ment broke out between the two women over the dif­fer­ences in lifestyle.  (Kercher is described as an “inno­cent angel”, one that wasn’t prone to bring home strange men and be promiscuous).

This is how the prosecutor’s ani­mated film depicts the mur­der: Kercher falls to the floor and the three oth­ers begin to undress her. Kercher strug­gles, Sol­lecito pulls out his pock­etknife and Knox gets a knife from the kitchen. Guede tries to rape Kercher, Sol­lecito injures her and Knox finally kills her by slit­ting her throat. The three flee the apart­ment. Later, Knox and Sol­lecito return to clum­sily stage a bur­glary and wipe away their fingerprints.

The indict­ment against the two is based on cir­cum­stan­tial evi­dence and very lit­tle, if any, wit­ness tes­ti­mony.  The defense is argu­ing that there is no clear proof, no con­fes­sion, and no motive.  The ver­dict is sup­posed to be announced at the end of this week.

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