‘I’m paying with my life for something I didn’t do’ – Knox
Amanda Knox and her former boyfriend make a final plea of innocence over the murder of British student Meredith Kercher, before the court in Italy makes its judgement.
In an impassioned plea, Amanda Knox protested her innocence in fluent Italian.
“I had to face charges that were totally unfair without any basis. And I’m paying with my life for something that I haven’t done,” she said.
“I insist on my innocence, our innocence, after four desperate years. I want to go back home.”
Ms Knox and her Italian former boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, were found guilty of murdering Meredith Kercher in December 2009 after a trial which lasted almost a year.
Ms Knox was sentenced to 26 years in prison and Mr Sollecito to 25, but they launched an appeal which has lasted 11 months.
If I had been there that night, I would have been dead. Amanda Knox
Speaking today on the last day of the appeal hearing in Perguia, she said: “I am not what they say I am: the perversion, the violence. I respect life and people.
“I haven’t done the things they’re suggesting I have done. I haven’t murdered, I haven’t raped, I haven’t stolen. I wasn’t present at that crime.”
Ms Knox told a packed courtroom how scared she was after the murder of her flatmate in Perugia in 2007: “She had her bedroom next to mine. If I had been there that night, I would have been dead.
“But I wasn’t there. I was at Raffaele’s,” she said.
Friendship with Meredith
Despite allegations that Ms Knox had fallen out with her flatmate Meredith Kercher, Ms Knox insisted that they were good friends.
“I had good relationships with everybody who was living in my flat,” she told the jury. “I was untidy, careless, but we did have good relationships.
I insist on my innocence, after four desperate years. Amanda Knox
“I shared my life, particularly with Meredith. She was always very kind towards me. Meredith was killed and I have always wanted justice for her.”
In a dramatic, emotionally-charged speech, Ms Knox told the jury how much she had changed since the incident and subsequent allegations of murder: “I have lost a friend in the most brutal way, in an unexplained manner.
“Four years ago, I was also fundamentally younger, because I had never suffered in my life. I didn’t know about tragedy. It was something that happened on TV.”
Betrayed by authorities
Ms Knox also said her faith in the authorities had been shaken: “I trusted the authorities blindly [in 2007]. Absolutely. I put myself at their disposal completely on those days.
“My trust in the authorities and the police has been damaged.”
Choking back sobs, she said she had been betrayed on the night she gave her statement to police. “I was manipulated,” she said. “I did not do the things that have been attributed to me.”
‘Like a nightmare’
In his statement, Raffaele Sollecito appeared nervous, saying it was a “critical time” before pausing to drink from a glass of water.
He told the jury that the past four years have been “like a nightmare,” and that the claims against him are “totally untrue.”
Mr Sollecito, 27, also said that the night of murder was a happy, almost idyllic night for him – he was about to hand in his PhD and had just met a “beautiful girl”.
In his closing statement, the judge berated prosecutors for focusing excessively on sex in the case and said: “We have to remember that a beautiful girl has died in a horrible way.”
Ms Knox and Mr Sollecito will learn this week whether they will be freed from jail. Rudy Guede, an Ivorian drifter with a criminal record, is also serving time for taking part in Kercher’s murder. He has also protested his innocence.