If Knox is innocent, then who is the killer?

Perugia. A charming medieval town that, if Amanda Knox is right, hides a heinous secret.

If she didn’t slit the throat of English student Meredith Kercher in Nov 2007, then who did? Kercher’s parents have asked the appeal jury not to forget their grief, for they have endured unimaginable emotional suffering.

And in that reminder there is another, for there are arguably so many losers here:

– Kercher. Murdered inthe most awful way; her lawyers argue after some kind of bedroom game of dares went terribly wrong.

– Kercher’s family.

– The Congolese bar owner initially accused by Amanda Knox (she claims because of police intimidation) and held in prison for two weeks

– Rafaello Sollecito, Knox’s then boyfriend, convicted of her murder alongside her but protesting his innocence from the start.

– Of course there’s Amanda Knox, who’s been cast as a lascivious she-devil unable to control her lust or rage.

Horrific drama

But what of Knox’s family, who’ve moved their lives to Italy for four years in the hope of bringing their daughter home a free woman?

The night Knox was convicted two years ago, her parents were subjected to the most unedifying of scenes.

While the Kerchers were rightly chaperoned through a secret entrance into Perugia’s tiny subterranean courtroom, the Italian authorities had made no provision for the parents of the accused.

They had to fight to get through the hundreds of journalists and camera crews waiting outside to see their daughter sent to jail for 26 years. Whatever their daughter’s guilt, they are surely innocent.

Monday’s appeal judgement may provide a fresh start for the Knoxes. But if so, where does that leave the Kerchers?

The only other convicted player in this horrific drama is the local small-time drug dealer. Rudy Guede was tried separately after his bloody handprint was found on Kercher’s pillow.

Since his incarceration he has both allegedly told a cell-mate Knox and Sollecito didn’t do it, and then come to court to accuse Knox and Sollecito.

Knox’s and Sollecito’s case rests on forensic revelations that claim the DNA linking them to the crime – which was thin anyway – is in fact so weak as to be inadmissable.

If the jury agrees, we are left with a bigger question. Who really killed Meredith Kercher?

Fact Box
* Dirty gloves used to collect evidence
* Bra clasp – with Sollecito’s DNA – not examined for six weeks and could have been contaminated
* Knife found in Sollecito’s kitchen had no traces of blood. DNA claimed to be Kercher’s was too tiny to mean anything. It could have got there naturally.
* Knox’s footprint outside Kercher’s room could have been bleach, not blood
* Knox says her initial “confession” and statements were made under duress and she had been hit and denied water