Breann Cooper
Not the movie featuring Ashley Judd and Tommy Lee Jones, the right to not face charges for the same or similar crime after a legitimate acquittal or conviction. Amanda Knox, the American college student studying abroad in Italy convicted and then later acquitted for the murder of Meredith Kercher, faces the possibility of extradition for retrial in Italy.
March 26 of this year an Italian appellate court ruled to retry Knox as Italy does not have a double jeopardy law. Knox will not have to appear before the courts in the retrial that will take place in Florence, Italy and will not face possible extradition unless the trial court finds her guilty and that guilty verdict is upheld by the Italian Supreme Court. If both courts find her guilty she would then only face possible extradition because the United States decides whether or not to extradite citizens case by case.
Knox was accused of killing housemate Meredith Kercher who was murdered November 1, 2007. Arrested on November 6, 2007, Knox spent the next four years in an Italian prison pleading her innocence. Kercher, a college student from London, was found naked and stabbed multiple times in the throat. Knox, her boyfriend of seven days Raffaele Sollecite, and Rudy Guede an aquatintents of the young men that lived below the flat Knox, Kercher and two other women shared. Guede’s DNA and fingerprints were found all over Kercher’s bedroom, clothing, and body. His size 10 shoe print was found in her blood. Guede had a criminal background that fit the MO of the murder having broken in to a nursery by throwing a rock through the window and found with a stolen knife, laptop, cell phone and cash. Yet Knox was convicted of murdering Kercher on mishandled evidence and her broken Italian. Knox has maintained her innocence throughout the case even when her actions were not those that the world or Italy thought she should have. Italian police criticized and attacked Knox on her actions and lack of grieving for her housemate. Claiming she did a myriad of gymnastic moves and appeared not to be in distress over the murder instead continuing to kiss and cuddle with her new boyfriend. Knox denied most of the police’s statements to her behavior in an interview with Diane Sawyer which aired on ABC’s 20/20 April 30, 2013 stating “The police claimed I was doing the splits and cart wheels and all these gymnastic moves. I did the splits, that’s all one time. It was immature of me but I don’t think I understood the gravity of what was happening.”
The Knox trial lasted 318 days convicting all three defendants in the end; Guede’s sentence a mere 16 years in prison due to his cooperation with police and testifying against both Knox and Sollecite. Sollecite received 26 years for his part in the murder, never admitting to either his or Knox’s involvement in the Murder. Knox’s sentence was light compared to what the prosecuting attorney would have liked, requesting “life imprisonment with nine months in solitary confinement” according to court records. Knox was sentenced to 29 years in prison on December 9, 2009.
Knox served four years of the 29 year sentence before an Italian appellate court ruled in her favor and over turned her conviction October 3, 2011. The court stated in their official report that the guilty verdict “was not corroborated by any objective element of evidence”. Referencing that neither Knox’s or Sollecite’s DNA having been found in the room Kercher was murdered in, mishandling of evidence by leaving crucial evidence in the crime scene for 45 days before retrieving it and handling evidence with visibly dirty gloves. Also labeling the police interrogations as “obsessive duration” and any incriminating statements made by Knox during the interrogation were evidence of her confusion under “great psychological pressure.” The judge also overturned Sollecite’s sentence allowing both to return to their families.