Amanda Knox is set to return to an Italian courtroom this week, where she will defend herself against a 16-year-old slander conviction. She is determined to finally clear her name of this allegation once and for all.
In November 2007, her British roommate was murdered and during the investigation, Italy violated her human rights by questioning her for a long night. However, her chance for justice was finally made possible when a European court ruled in her favor.
Despite being cleared of the brutal murder of her roommate, 21-year-old Meredith Kercher, in the apartment they shared in the idyllic central Italian university town of Perugia, Amanda Knox was convicted of slander for accusing a Congolese bar owner of the crime. It is the only charge against Knox that has withstood five court rulings.
On Wednesday, Italy’s highest court is expected to give a verdict in the retrial of the slander case, marking Knox’s first appearance in an Italian court in over 12 and a half years.
During the early hours of November 6, 2007, Amanda Knox was questioned by Italian police without a lawyer or a competent translator present. Under this extended questioning, Knox signed two statements that were later used as the basis for the slander charge against her. However, the European Court of Human Rights found that the conditions under which these statements were obtained violated Knox’s human rights.
The heinous murder of Kercher gained global attention with Knox, who was only 20 years old at the time, and her Italian boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, who had been in a relationship with her for just a week, coming under suspicion.
In 2015, Italy’s highest court exonerated Knox and Sollecito after a series of flip-flop verdicts that followed their conviction in the first trial. Knox, who returned to the United States in October 2011 following her first acquittal, is now a mother of two small children. Along with her husband, she hosts a podcast and campaigns against wrongful convictions.
Despite the conviction of Rudy Hermann Guede, a man from Ivory Coast whose DNA was found at the crime scene, Knox’s slander conviction remained and continued to fuel doubts about her involvement in the killing, especially in Italy.
Under Italian law, Guede was sentenced to 16 years in prison, but served 13 years due to the fast-track trial system, which often results in reduced sentences.
Last November, Italy’s highest court dismissed Knox’s slander conviction following a ruling by the European court. The court deemed the two statements typed by the police inadmissible and instructed for a new trial. The Florence court was directed to only consider a handwritten statement that Knox had written in English several hours later.
She clarified her doubts about the authenticity of her statements that were made under the immense pressure of stress, shock, and exhaustion. Her statement read, “In regards to this ‘confession’ that I made last night, I want to make it clear that I’m very doubtful of the verity of my statements.”
According to Sal Kassin, a trailblazer in the field of false confessions, the signed statements made by Knox adhere to a pattern commonly seen in false confessions.
Psychologist Saul Kassin from John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York stated in his book “Duped,” which explores the subject of false confessions, that accurate information not yet made public and “false-fed facts” consistent with the police’s theory of the crime are often present in most false confessions. These facts are later discovered to be untrue, highlighting the empirical evidence surrounding the issue.
According to Kassin, Knox’s confession was “contaminated” by the police, who were trying to support their theory at the time.
He wrote that it is absurd to hold her responsible for a statement in which she also incriminated herself.