Amanda Knox faces another trial for slander this week in Italy in a case that could remove the last legal stain against her, nine years after Italy’s highest court threw out her conviction for the murder of her 21-year-old British roommate.

Knox, who was a 20-year-old student when she was accused along with her then-boyfriend of murdering Meredith Kercher in 2007, has built a life back in the United States as an advocate, writer, podcaster and producer — with much of her work drawing on her experience.

Despite a definitive ruling by Italy’s Cassation Court in 2015 that Knox and then-boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito did not commit the crime, and the conviction of another man whose DNA was at the scene, doubts persist about Knox’s role with the victim’s family and the man she wrongly accused.

  • TheFonz@lemmy.world
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    7 months ago

    Ok, when you said this:

    I’m offering the kindest explanation for Knox falsely accusing a Black man.

    I assumed we were talking about Rudy, because we hadn’t brought up Lumumba yet.

      • TheFonz@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        Yes. I did. I missed this from your earlier comment (or i read it quickly):

        she falsely accused the one who wasn’t there

        So I misread your comment and for some reason my mind was fixated on Rudy --sorry about that! Yes, you are correct. The police used her initial confession to indict Lumumba. Lucky for me (I speak Italian) and had a chance to review her initial confession (granted it was a while back) and I recall:

          1. She didn’t speak fluent Italian at the time. She had mentioned his name in passing and never directly involved him in the killing. She only mentioned that mayme Lumumba and Meredith had a fling if I recall? I might be misremembering --it was a while back. But I do remember she never outright accused him.
          1. The cops took that and ran with it. Just like they did with everything else in this case. They built every indictment out of the flimsiest evidence. It seems the police were in a big rush to close this case as quickly as possible and bring it to trial.
        • JoBo@feddit.uk
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          7 months ago

          She may well have ‘retrieved’ a false memory because the police were haranguing her about some texts with Lumumba but it was a lot more than her mentioning his name in passing. She signed two confessions saying that she had been in another room of the house while Lumumba murdered Meredith. Those confessions are considered inadmissible. This trial is about whether she did, in fact, slander him or whether it was entirely due to police pressure.

          • TheFonz@lemmy.world
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            7 months ago

            If I recall, the first confession wasn’t even written by her. She just signed it. Either way, the whole investigation was so shoddy we may never know the full truth.

            • JoBo@feddit.uk
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              7 months ago

              It’s always the police who write up what you say, then they ask you to sign it. They wrote up what she said and she signed it. The following day she wrote a long letter saying that she didn’t think it was true because she’s been under duress. That is why the conviction for slander has been quoshed and this new trial is now happening.

              • TheFonz@lemmy.world
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                7 months ago

                Listen, as an Italian my recommendation for anyone: don’t speak to police until a lawyer is present. Just don’t.

                • JoBo@feddit.uk
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                  7 months ago

                  You don’t have to be an Italian for that advice to be good.