It’s a story that seems handcrafted for media consumption and obsession: a pretty, young American student, swept up in a whirlwind romance while studying abroad, is accused, jailed and — just this past weekend – convicted of killing her British roommate. The ongoing trial has thrust both the Italian judicial system and what some are calling its anti-American sentiments into the international spotlight.
In a fairly conservative country rooted in a fairly conservative religion (Catholicism), it’s unsurprising that soon the press was sparking a puritanical witch hunt that painted the carefree Knox as “Foxy Knoxy,” a “she-devil” who had harnessed her sexual powers to manipulate the two young men into sexually assaulting and eventually killing her prim, studious roommate. Once this narrative had been unleashed on the press and public, forensic evidence found afterward that implicated Rudy Guede–a man with little connection to Knox or Sollecito–could not dismantle the harsh criticisms lobbed at her. Instead of acquitting Knox and backtracking on their initial condemnation of her, the prosecutors scored a 30-year sentence for Guede in a fast track trial, and got to work trying to fit Knox and Sollecito into the crime along with Guede.
It’s understandable that prosecutors would initially believe Knox was involved–if she’s innocent, which I believe she is, she couldn’t have acted guiltier. But the circumstantial evidence against her does not make up for the lack of forensic data and motive that are integral to proving “beyond a reasonable doubt” that she is guilty. Unfortunately, it seems Italian courts work the opposite way: a suspect is guilty until proven innocent.
I’ve been following the news that continues to surface in the trial’s aftermath with more than the usual dose of morbid fascination. There is something compelling about its incongruous pieces, but there is one particular thing that haunts me: while in prison awaiting trial, Knox was told she was HIV positive and asked to give a list of names of her sexual partners. This list of seven men was then used as evidence against her in court, evidence that she was wild and uncouth and slutty. Evidence that she was unconscionably manipulative, a man-eater who sleeps around and is incapable of understanding remorse. This kind of slut shaming would never stand in an American court, but in Italy it worked: the narrative the press had run with about her coquettish behavior seemed to be confirmed by this “long” list of sexual partners. And of course, as it turns out, she was never HIV positive.
By all accounts, Knox seems to fit a very typical narrative of the American student abroad. She encompasses a very distinct feeling that emerges when you are young studying in a foreign country: above all things, nothing you do abroad seems to count. It’s as if you’re living a life that’s not your own. It’s part of what makes going abroad such an incredible experience for students, and such a nightmare for the locals whose towns are consistently swarmed with drunk Americans.
For me, this case seems to boil down to an age-old culture clash. The fact that Knox never cried in public could very easily be viewed as the behavior of a troubled and terrified young woman struggling to find an appropriate way to grieve. Her sexual experiences are not particularly different from your average young American woman. But in a place where premarital sex is largely frowned uponand emotions run high, it was all too easy for Knox to be punished for the simple fact that she was young, careless, and in the wrong place at the wrong time. While her lack of respect in the face of her roommate’s murder is troubling and even callous, it should take a lot more than medieval moral outrage to convict her.
@Jessica: thanks a lot for your time. My intention is not to convince any of you that Amanda Knox is guilty, I just hope people could make their own opinion based on as much information as possible.
Sad to see so many people surfing the “Anti-Americanism” wave and throwing extremely offensive insults at Italy and Italians…happy to see nobody did it in this blog (so far so good, at least).
This has been a horrible and convoluted case all along. I completely agree that sexual narrative the case took on regarding Knox’s so-called promiscuity was absolutely ridiculous,especially the claims of a “satanic sex orgy gone wrong.” But, implying that the Italian justice system viewed her differently because she was American is equally ridiculous. Sollecitio, her very wealthy, very connected, ITALIAN ex was also found guilty based on the same evidence.
I’m really bothered by the rhetoric many Americans are using to refer to foreign judicial systems. It’s almost like there’s this smug understanding that the US judicial system is the best in the world and all other systems are somehow prejudiced and ineffective. Even the “best” court systems have made wrongful appreciations of evidence and fact. That is for the appeals courts to decide. And the fact that the Italian appeals system works like it does means that Knox will have at least 2 more chances to defend herself. That does not seem to me like a court system that is any worse than the United States’. In fact, at least in Italy she’s not exposed to the death penalty.
What’s really unfortunate about this case is that the hideous ,senseless murder of Meredith Kercher seems to have been lost in the coverage and the trial itself.
From the UK press:
Amanda Knox: Fury in Italy as America ‘questions Foxy Knoxy verdict’
By Nick Pisa
Last updated at 6:20 PM on 07th December 2009
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Italy reacted with anger today as a transatlantic war of words broke out with the United States over the Amanda Knox murder trial.
Prosecutors involved in the case were outraged that their handling and the Italian judicial system had been called into question, while newspapers published front page editorials saying they would not take ‘lessons from America.’
It came as it emerged US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton had said she would look into Knox’s case after Marie Cantwell, a senator in the jailed student’s home state of Washington, said she was ‘concerned’ about the trial.
Knox, 22, was jailed for 26 years last week after being found guilty of the brutal sex murder of British student Meredith Kercher, 21, who was found semi-naked and with her throat slashed.
Knox’s former boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito, 25, was also found guilty and given 25 years, while a third suspect, Ivory Coast drifter Rudy Guede, was sentenced to 30 years after a fast track trial in October 2008.
In a front page editorial headlined ‘Passport and Justice’ Corriere Della Sera stormed: ‘Once again here we have rule number one for an American accused of a crime abroad – it doesn’t matter if they are innocent or guilty all that counts is their passport.’
Inside it continued under the heading: ‘When an American passport is as valuable as an alibi,’ and recalled an infamous incident in 1998 when a US pilot escaped justice, despite flying through a cable sending a ski gondola crashing into a mountain and killing 20 people at Cermis in the Italian Alps.
It added: ‘Amanda was tried abroad so her defence campaign have enlisted the help of the State Department. This same administration can’t close Guantanamo but it can find the time to attack the sentence in Perugia.’
Its story on Mrs Clinton’s involvement added America had been reacting as if Knox had ‘ended up in the hands of some despotic regime,’ and said: ‘America is just waiting to send a platoon of Marines over to rescue the poor girl.’
Il Messaggero also ran an editorial on its front page under the headline ‘Unacceptable Lessons’ and also compared it to the Cermis incident.
It wrote: ‘If there is any ground upon which our country will not be taught lessons on civility and respect from anyone, the United States included, then it is the penal process.
‘The United States allows the death penalty for minors in some states, as does countries where the high level of civic justice found in Italy is unheard of, such as Iran, Iraq, Nigeria, Pakistan and Yemen.
‘If Hilary Clinton wants to meet these “doubters” then maybe she can also find the time to look into the cases of numerous Italians held in American prisons for non existent motives and crimes they have not committed.’
There was also criticism of Senator Cantwell’s suggestions the trial was anti-American as many pointed out that ‘an Italian Raffaele Sollecito, was also jailed.’
La Stampa was the only Italian newspaper which questioned the verdict under the headline: ‘Doubts and Uncertainties’, and pondered why the trial had left a ‘bitter taste of doubt in the mouth.’
Knox prosecutor Giuliano Mignini, also hit out at the criticism and said: ‘I am happy. In my conscience I know I have done my duty. It is never easy to ask for a life sentence.
‘That’s especially true in this case where the accused were in their twenties. I have three children who are more or less the same age. Asking for life was the right punishment for the crime.
‘I am not prepared to take criticism from the Americans on how the prosecution and investigators carried out their work.
‘The case went before 19 judges in the end at various levels from a preliminary hearing, through to three levels of re-examination (bail hearings) and all found in the prosecution’s favour.’
Judge Giancarlo Massei’s said he was giving Knox 26 years and Sollecito 25 years instead of life because of their ‘young age and clean records.’
Guede was given four years more than Knox despite the court hearing how she had ‘dealt the fatal blow’ to Meredith’s throat – a point picked up on by his solicitor Nicodemo Gentile.
He said: ‘Rudy has no previous convictions and he was not said to have killed Meredith and he gets four years more – I don’t see the logic in that. He is clean and is also young. Why the difference ?’
Meredith, from Coulsdon, Surrey, was a Leeds University student and in Perugia as part of her European Studies degree and had only been in Italy for two months before she was murdered in November 2007.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1233908/Amanda-Knox-Fury-Italy-America-questions-Foxy-Knoxy-verdict.html#ixzz0Z2Sr9BNx
Fun fact: pointing out inadequacies in America’s justice system doesn’t excuse Italy’s. e.g. “Look, over there!” isn’t a response.
This is also a story that seems like it was written by the CSI people.
This is so pathetic it is so obvious that Rudy Guede killed Meredith Kercher. Raffaele and Amanda are innocent and should be set free. I have never heard of a western country convicting two innocent people without proper DNA or other incriminating evidence. Over Zealous Proscetor who is known for UNETHICAL convictions, he himself is being investigated. I wouldn’t doubt if he bribed the jury.
This thread is so tl;dr.
Alberto, it’s also important to remember who exactly Mignini is and what he alleged during the case. You decided to leave that out while copying and pasting from a site run by the victim’s family, who obviously have their own agenda/biases towards this case.
The prosecution claimed that the vampire manga in Sollecito’s house inspired this sex/murder fantasy, which seems farfetched by any standard. Additionally, as documented in “The Monster of Florence”, Mignini is quite unhinged and obsessed with sex and the occult, hardly the balanced prosecutor that you might want on a case like this – he even had the authors of the aforementioned book (by an Italian AND an America before you start foaming at the mouth) interrogated and threatened.
This is what Mignini’s explanation for a spate of horrific murders seemingly committed by a single person was: “But this is too simple for Mignini. He believes the Monster killings were the work not of a lone killer but a satanic sect dating back to the Middle Ages. His theory, based on nonexistent evidence, supposition and conspiracy logic, was that this sect was operating in high places in government and they needed female body parts to perform Black Masses.” Occam’s razor would really help on this one.
http://blog.seattlepi.com/dempsey/archives/131443.asp
I like how the narrative discrepancies in Sollecito’s and Knox’s account are call for alarm, but does anyone honestly believe Rudy Guede was listening to MUSIC while in the bathroom? Who does that? He finds her body, and then skips town. As Preston alludes in the above link, the simplest explanation is often the best one: Guede raped and murdered the victim and FLED.
Read the link that I included for sensible refutations of what the prosecution alleges. I have nothing against Italy, I spent four months studying abroad there and love the people and the language. I will be the LAST person on earth to hold up America’s justice system and say it is anything close to “just”, but that doesn’t detract from how botched this case was.
@Jessica.. After reading the information provided to you by Alberto what is your conclusion? I agree with you in thinking that Amanda and Raffaele are innocent, but for me it is really difficult to understand the Italian judicial system. I’m not saying its bad, but there are flaws as there is in the United State’s judicial system.
Beyond the fact that I don’t think there is evidence tying them to the actual murder, (they can’t just clean with bleach evidence against them and leave evidence against Guede) I don’t see the motive. I’m a 24 year old college graduate who studied abroad and I see so much of myself in Amanda (of course I don’t know her personally). I had different roommates every year in college and didn’t get along with many of them. There were points that we didn’t even speak and if their door was locked, even if it normally wasn’t, I wouldn’t think anything of it at all. I outspokenly had issues with some of my roommates behaviors in and out of the apartment. Some of them I also outspokenly strongly did not like. This is NOT a motive for murder. That’s not to say it is impossible, but there has to be other factors in proving her guilty in this situation. Young college girls can have crazy mood swings and be extremely petty. Above that there is so much competition between young girls today. The so called fact that these two girls didn’t get along, or Amanda didn’t think anything of the fact that Meredith’s door was locked even though it normally wasn’t, doesn’t lead me to believe that Amanda murdered her with no solid forensic evidence to back it up besides a knife with so little DNA that it isn’t conclusive as to who’s it is.