Washington’s Amanda Knox to go on trial again in Italy
Oct 13, 2023, 4:40 PM | Updated: 6:31 pm
American Amanda Knox delivers a speech during a panel session entitled "Trial by Media" during the first edition of the Criminal Justice Festival, an event organized by The Italy Innocence Project and the local association of barristers, on June 15, 2019 in Modena, Italy. (Photo: Emanuele Cremaschi, Getty Images)
(Photo: Emanuele Cremaschi, Getty Images)
Italy’s highest court overturned Seattle native Amanda Knox’s slander conviction Friday, ordering a new trial in the city of Florence.
Knox is in favor of the ruling.
“I’m on trial in Italy again…and this is a good thing,” Knox wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, Friday.
As part of a thread she authored, she noted she ended up exonerated in the 2007 killing of her British roommate Meredith Kercher, but one conviction remained on her record.
“(Italy’s Supreme Court of Cassations) sentenced me to time served for the slander charge, which meant that according to the state of Italy, three of my four years of imprisonment were rightfully served,” Knox wrote on X. “Though I was exonerated for murder, I remained wrongly convicted of slander.”
I’m on trial in Italy again…and this is a good thing.
As everyone knows, on March 27th, 2015, the Court of Cassation definitively acquitted me and Raffaele Sollecito of the murder of Meredith Kercher, per non aver commesso il fatto—for not having committed the act.
/thread
— Amanda Knox (@amandaknox) October 13, 2023
Knox’s ordeal in Italy began in 2007
Knox, who was an exchange student, was accused with her then-boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, and Rudy Guede of killing her British roommate, Meredith Kercher in November 2007, in the university town of Perugia. Kercher was found nude and stabbed dozens of times. There also was evidence she was sexually assaulted.
The trials of Knox and Sollecito drew international media attention, with early allegations appearing in Italian media that apparently affected their initial verdicts.
From 2022: KIRO Newsradio’s Gee Scott interviews Amanda Knox
Knox, initially, was found guilty and ended up serving nearly four years in prison for Kercher’s murder.
After multiple rulings, an appeals court acquitted Knox in 2011 and Italy’s highest court definitively acquitted Knox and Sollecito in 2015. Judges in that final ruling cited flaws in the investigation and said there was a lack of evidence to prove the defendants’ wrongdoing beyond reasonable doubt, including a lack of “biological traces” connecting them to the crime.
Guede, who was the only person convicted in the murder of Kercher, was released from prison in 2021 after serving nearly all of his 16-year sentence.
Knox’s slander conviction
Contributing: The Associated Press; KIRO 7
