Amanda Knox, an American who was convicted after which exonerated of murdering her housemate whereas they have been finding out in Italy, on Wednesday misplaced one other trial in an Italian courtroom towards slander expenses associated to the 2007 killing.
Ms. Knox was convicted by a courtroom in Florence on expenses that she had slandered a person who ran a bar the place she labored by unjustly accusing him of killing her housemate, the 21-year-old Meredith Kercher, in 2007. Ms. Knox was sentenced by the courtroom to 3 years in jail, time she has already served.
Ms. Knox was initially discovered responsible of slandering the person, Diya Lumumba, also referred to as Patrick, in 2009, a conviction that was upheld by varied Italian courts. On the time of the killing, Mr. Lumumba ran a bar known as Le Stylish the place Ms. Knox labored half time.
Talking to a courtroom full of journalists earlier than the ruling on Wednesday, Ms. Knox, referring to her feedback about Mr. Lumumba in 2007, described “the worst evening of my life,” and stated that she had been bullied by the police into accusing an harmless man of homicide.
“I used to be a 20-year-old who had been tricked and was psychologically destabilized,” Ms. Knox informed the courtroom in Italian, her voice cracking at occasions. She stated she couldn’t perceive why the police, “who I had been raised to belief,” have been pressuring her to confess to one thing that was not true and to signal a doc that was little extra “than a mixture of incoherent reminiscences.”
The listening to on Wednesday is the newest flip in a authorized journey whose echoes proceed to reverberate almost 17 years after the homicide of Ms. Kercher, a British scholar, elicited headlines all over the world and turned Ms. Knox right into a tabloid staple.
A European courtroom ruling and a change in Italian legislation allowed a brand new attraction by Ms. Knox over the slander expenses, and Italy’s highest courtroom in October ordered a retrial, which started in April.
Ms. Knox turned a family identify in 2007 when she was arrested along with her boyfriend on the time, Raffaele Sollecito, then 23, for the homicide of Ms. Kercher throughout what prosecutors described as a intercourse recreation gone unsuitable. All three have been finding out within the picturesque central Italian metropolis of Perugia.
Ms. Knox was convicted in 2009 of the killing by an Italian courtroom however acquitted on attraction. She returned to the US in 2011 whereas her case bounced between varied courts till she and Mr. Sollecito have been exonerated by Italy’s highest courtroom in 2015.
Ms. Knox, arriving early on the courthouse on Wednesday along with her husband, Christopher Robinson, needed to navigate a crowd of digital camera operators ready for her to seem. Considered one of her legal professionals stated that she had been inadvertently struck within the brow by a digital camera.
Talking to the courtroom, recalling the occasions that led her to accuse Mr. Lumumba, Ms. Knox stated that Ms. Kercher had been the “sufferer of horrible violence.” Within the days after Ms. Kercher’s demise, Ms. Knox stated that she had been “beneath shock and exhausted” and had by no means felt “so susceptible in my life.”
It was at that time, she stated, that the police pressured her into naming Mr. Lumumba, with whom she had exchanged some textual content messages that evening. She stated one officer had slapped her.
In a handwritten assertion the morning after the interrogation, she recanted her statements and wrote of her confusion: “I wish to clarify that I’m very uncertain of the verity of my statements as a result of they have been made beneath the pressures of stress, shock and excessive exhaustion.”
Mr. Lumumba, who now lives in Krakow, Poland, didn’t attend Wednesday’s listening to and has not responded to requests for remark.
Since returning to the US, Ms. Knox, now 36 and a mom of two, has change into an advocate for individuals incarcercerated for crimes they didn’t commit and a campaigner for felony justice reform.
Rudy Guede, a Perugia resident with a police historical past of break-ins, was tried individually and convicted within the homicide case. He served 13 years of a 16-year-sentence and was launched in 2021, lately making headlines after a former girlfriend accused him of bodily abusing her. His lawyer stated this week that the case involving the previous girlfriend was nonetheless being investigated.
Though Ms. Knox recanted her statements accusing Mr. Lumumba, he was arrested, held in jail for 2 weeks and launched solely after one among his purchasers offered an alibi.
Mr. Lumumba sued for slander, and Ms. Knox was discovered responsible and sentenced to 3 years, which she served throughout her 4 years in jail.
In a December 2023 episode of “Labyrinths,” the podcast she hosts along with her husband, Ms. Knox stated the slander conviction nonetheless disturbed her.
For some, she stated, it was “proof that I’m a liar and I’m an unsavory particular person and that I’ve one thing to cover and I’ve by no means informed the complete fact about what occurred to Meredith and solely any individual who was concerned within the crime would ever even make statements that implicated themselves and others.”
There aren’t any recordings of the interrogations that evening, and Italian law enforcement officials sued Ms. Knox for slander for her depiction of the interrogation. She was tried and acquitted on these expenses in 2016.
In 2019, Europe’s prime human rights courtroom dominated that Ms. Knox had been disadvantaged of sufficient authorized help whereas being interrogated, violating her proper to a good trial, and ordered Italy to pay her 18,400 euros, or about $21,000 on the time, in damages, prices and bills. The courtroom additionally raised questions concerning the position of Ms. Knox’s interpreter, and stated that Ms. Knox’s statements in the course of the interrogation “had been taken in an environment of intense psychological stress.”
On the April listening to associated to the slander case, the Italian prosecutor and Carlo Pacelli, Mr. Lumumba’s lawyer, argued that Ms. Knox had knowingly accused the bar supervisor to deflect consideration from herself and derail the investigation.
Ms. Knox had been ordered to pay damages to Mr. Lumumba, however Mr. Pacelli stated she had by no means given any cash to his shopper. Due to the accusation, Mr. Lumumba misplaced his enterprise, and he left Italy along with his household.
“I’m sorry I used to be not sturdy sufficient to withstand the stress of the police and that he suffered,” Ms. Knox stated.
