What that girl went through was totally horrible. All that defamation and humiliation from the public and media. I would juice all the money I can get from this til the end of my life. Whole 20s was robbed away. I’m surprised she doesn’t have a TikTok account or a lifetime series like gypsy rose.

I keep hearing the same arguments back and forth about the physical evidence and which have since been proven true or false, but my question is, if they did it, what was her and/or Raff's motive to kill Meredith?

I'm a little vague since it's been a while I last looked into it, but I strongly remember the weed fueled sex cult ritual claims.

I'll be transparent, I don't believe she did it based on what I've read as an armchair detective, and I really struggle to think of a reason for "why" she would do it, if she did.

Why let Rudy rape and murder her? Did they just hang out and watch? Did Rudy ask them to let him in to commit the crime? Pretty trusting of a stranger, imo.

Obviously my examples seem absurd, so I wanted to hear a more educated motive from those that have dug deep into the case and still believe she/they are guilty.

I’m not sure if this has been discussed before and I’m not claiming to outright diagnose her for certain, but a lot of the behaviour she seemed to exhibit that rubbed people the wrong way are strong indicators to me that she may be somewhere on the autism spectrum. I say this as someone potentially on it myself (undiagnosed but strong suspicion and most of my friends are also neurodivergent). The fact she was loud at “inappropriate” moments, sometimes didn’t read social cues, and the justice sensitivity of her even now not being able to quite let go of the injustice she endured (and I do not blame her, I would probably never let that go too) and wanting desperately to be seen by a world that misunderstood her. These are not all unique to autism but experiences I personally relate to (on a far less intense and world shattering scale thankfully). Overall is mainly her “strange behaviour” that was taken to be evidence by a less understanding world of 2007 that makes me think this though.

I am currently watching the Netflix documentary and the whole investigation just seems botched from the beginning. It is giving that they were trying to prove it was her vs. actually investigating the crime. The story and motive made up in the investigator’s head does not even make sense. If Amanda Knox lives in the apartment, it makes sense that her DNA, would in fact be in the apartment. Speaking for the deceased and assuming that she was mad Amanda was bringing men over and had an argument with her regarding her morals does not even make sense, who is that concerned with their roommate’s love life? Then, Amanda and the 2 men are so upset about being lectured concerning morality that they all get up and kill her? How does this Rudy guy, get spun into being in some love triangle with Amanda and her boyfriend? Of course he is going to change his story and say that he saw Amanda because his lawyer probably advised him to do so since there was already so much public speculation around her and it is in his best interest to say it could’ve been someone else. All this talk about “sex games gone wrong” but I have yet to hear any evidence regarding that story except the semen found that belonged to Rudy! “Sex games gone wrong” also completely goes against the motive of being lectured on your morality.

If you believe anything this misogynist says after he says that then you need your head examined. Based on WHAT FACTS does he make this claim? It’s confirmation bias. He repeats it in the 2016 doco, too.

There’s still a lot of misinformation floating around about Amanda Knox, Raffaele Sollecito, and the murder of Meredith Kercher. Below are some of the most common myths, followed by the actual facts as established by independent experts, Italian courts, and international human rights organizations.

Myth 1: Amanda’s blood was mixed with Meredith’s blood. This is not normal/a smoking gun

Fact: Amanda’s blood was never found mixed with Meredith’s blood. What was detected were mixed DNA traces, not blood, and never in Meredith’s room where the murder occurred. Forensic research shows that mixed DNA is normal and expected in shared living spaces (bathrooms, common areas, etc.), since DNA can transfer through daily activities like touching the same faucet or sharing a towel. Independent experts concluded these mixed samples had no probative value whatsoever.

Myth 2: Amanda framed Patrick Lumumba and only recanted after being caught in a lie

Fact: It was the police who first introduced Patrick’s name during a coercive overnight interrogation. After hours of questioning without food, water, or legal counsel, Amanda was pressured into imagining that she “witnessed” Patrick at the scene. She retracted this statement within hours, again at a hearing three days later, and repeatedly afterward. Despite Patrick having multiple airtight alibis, he was kept in jail for nearly two weeks. Amnesty International and the European Court of Human Rights both criticized Knox’s interrogation as a violation of her human rights.

Myth 3: Amanda acted “odd” after the murder, which shows guilt.

Fact: “Odd behavior” is subjective and not evidence of guilt. Examples used against her:

Kissing Raffaele outside the cottage: footage shows a young woman in shock, leaning on someone she felt safe with.

Crying when asked to look through kitchen knives: interpreted as guilt, but equally (and more plausibly) the reaction of someone having a panic attack from stress and trauma.

Not being “inconsolable”: some expected Amanda to collapse with grief, but she had only known Meredith for about five weeks. Of course she was sad, but it wasn’t the same as losing a lifelong best friend or family member.

Nothing Amanda did matched recognized patterns of guilty behavior in criminal psychology.

Myth 4: Amanda left bloody footprints all around the house.

Fact: There were no bloody barefoot prints from Amanda. Luminol revealed footprints in the hallway and her bedroom, but luminol reacts to many substances besides blood (detergents, fruit juice, cleaning products). Follow-up testing showed they were not blood. DNA tests showed:

1) The prints in Amanda’s bedroom contained only her DNA.

2) The hallway print had DNA from both Amanda and Meredith, which is unremarkable in a shared home. This did not demonstrate blood transfer or guilt.

Myth 5: The “murder weapon” was found at Raffaele’s house with Meredith’s DNA.

Fact: The large kitchen knife seized from Raffaele’s kitchen tested negative for blood. The alleged Meredith DNA trace on the blade was tiny, low-quality, and unrepeatable, classic signs of contamination. Independent experts, Conti & Vecchiotti, concluded the test was unreliable. Amanda’s DNA on the handle was expected since she cooked at Raffaele’s apartment. No forensic link between this knife and Meredith’s wounds was ever established (it had a blade and a handle, that was about the only similarity between Raffaele’s knife and the weapon that killed Meredith).

Myth 6: Rudy Guede didn’t act alone

Fact: Every piece of physical evidence (fingerprints, palm prints, shoe prints, DNA inside Meredith, DNA on her clothing, and DNA in her bedroom) pointed to Rudy Guede alone. No trace of Amanda in Meredith’s locked room. The claim that “others must have been there” was speculation unsupported by forensics. Guede himself repeatedly changed his story, but the physical evidence never implicated anyone else.

Myth 7: Amanda Knox wasn’t really exonerated. The court just let her go because of “insufficient evidence.”

Fact: In 2015, Italy’s highest court, the Supreme Court of Cassation, fully and definitively annulled Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito’s convictions. The ruling explicitly stated there was a “stunning weakness” of evidence, a “lack of any foundation,” and serious investigative errors. In Italian law, this was not a technicality or a hung jury situation, it was a full acquittal, the strongest possible form of exoneration.

The only conviction that remained was Amanda’s calunnia (criminal slander) charge for wrongly implicating Patrick Lumumba under police pressure. That charge is legally separate from the murder case.

It's helpful to know why the DNA evidence against Knox + Sollecito was thrown out. Here's a report co-authored by Carla Vecchiotti, one of the experts who testified to the improper collection and analysis of the evidence. It's worth a read in full, but I'll highlight a few key parts:

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3770918/

Re: the knife: "the Appellate Court experts found neither traces of blood nor the presence of cellular material on the blade. The quantification analysis performed on the material collected from the blade provided a value of 5 pg/μl just in one sample, a result far below the value recommended in the technical protocols of the new generation commercial kits for STR analysis... Since the amount of extracted DNA would not allow the required repetition of amplification, the Appellate Court experts decided not to proceed with the genetic analyses on the swabs taken from the knife (Butler and Hill, 2010)."

"The knife was examined first. According to the technical report, the two samples of interest were sample A, taken from the handle, and sample B, taken from the blade. Regarding the nature of the recovered material, there was no scientifically conclusive evidence to support the possible blood nature of the sample taken from the blade (sample B) in that both the generic blood test and the human species test were negative. The conclusion that exfoliated cells were present on the sample taken from the handle (sample A) was equally lacking in scientific basis. No reliable method for quantifying the DNA was employed, and the quantification performed with the Qubit Fluorimeter™ gave the result “too low” for sample B (knife blade)... thus indicating a LT-LCN sample. Yet, none of the recommendations issued by the international scientific community and aimed at obtaining scientifically reliable results when treating this challenging kind of samples were followed. Replicate analyses could have been performed at the time, although experts' views on how to analyze LT-DNA have been evolving since then. The main issue with that type of samples is contamination: consequently, strict protocols must be applied during the inspection, collection, and sampling of such items at the crime scene (Giardina et al., 2011). The procedures recommended to reduce laboratory contamination are equally rigorous as it is well-known that contaminant DNA at low levels may derive from reagents and other laboratory consumables, from the technical staff and from cross-contamination from sample to sample. Indeed, in the context of the Kercher murder case, transfer of a suspect's DNA into a crime scene sample was of particular importance: in fact, it appears that crime scene inspection procedures destined to minimize contamination were not carried out according to international protocols (Fischer, 2003; Laboratory Division of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, 2007; ICPO-Interpol, 2009). Furthermore, it seems that no attempts were made to discover such events."

Re: the bra clasp: "As for the bra clasp, it was recovered and collected from the crime scene floor 46 days after the murder. It could not be analyzed by the Appellate Court experts as it had been stored by the scientific police in a tube containing extraction buffer, which made it completely rusty. Consequently, the Court experts proceeded to examine the above-mentioned technical report in order to evaluate the results obtained from the analysis of the two items."

"...regarding the nature of the material recovered, there was no scientific evidence supporting the notion that flaking cells were present in the sample. The hypothesis formulated by the scientific police technical consultant about the nature of the material collected from the clasp is thus arbitrary, since it was not supported by any actual findings... The DNA extracted from the bra clasp thus indicates the presence of several minor contributors, which was not disclosed by the scientific police... The genetic profile thus derived from a mixture of unidentified biological substances, whose larger component corresponded to the profile of the victim and whose smaller components suggest the contribution of several male sources." [emphasis mine]

TLDR: These are not mere technicalities that led the courts to dismiss the evidence and exonerate Knox and Sollecito. The DNA on the kitchen knife wasn't even confirmed to be blood, and the bra clasp had three other male profiles on it in addition to Sollecito, which the police never disclosed until forced to open up their files on appeal. The risk of contamination isn't an abstract when dealing with DNA in quantities this minute, which is why the standards for handling and analysis are so stringent. In the case of the bra clasp having other profiles on it, contamination even seems likely.

For all those fanatics out there who have zero doubt and are 100% convinced of her innocence - please take the time to research this effect

Giuliano Mignini makes the most outlandish accusations with stories filled with wild guesses and is so full of himself it’s borderline hilarious! Did anyone else realize this or was it just me? I feel like I’m going insane watching him talk, was this a general opinion at the time/now?

I’ve never heard of this case and I want to say RIP to Meredith. Also want to say if this is how Amanda was actually treated then that’s so sad. I couldn’t imagine being falsely imprisoned. It’s kinda like they just wanted to blame her because she was American. They’re such idiots, at least in the show. ( at the end of episode 2)

This links is specifically to a list of “The Evidence” but on the left side you will see other links on other specific topics:

https://web.archive.org/web/20161005235537/http://themurderofmeredithkercher.com/The_Evidence

As a lot of the (disputed) DNA evidence in this case related to Knox and Sollecito seems to come from the cottage floors (in addition to one bra clasp and one knife). I was searching online about DNA, forensics, and floors, and I came upon this 2019 study. I feel like it might help provide some context and alternate explanations to the DNA found on the floor and used by the prosecution (in the luminol footprints) besides those of the prosecution, but I really don’t have my head in this case enough to be sure — so I thought I’d put it out there for anyone with a firmer grasp on the details of the case who was interested to look and to express opinions or debate it etc.

Background DNA on flooring: The effect of cleaning

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1875176819300757

Discussion thread for the contents of the (index page)[https://www.reddit.com/r/amandaknox/wiki/index] and the organization of the wiki in general.

(Wiki Discussion): This thread concerns the organization of the AmandaKnox sub-Reddit wiki. On-topic comments on the organization of the wiki and the content of the index page are welcome. There is a separate post covering the implementation and management of this sub wiki. Off-topic comments will be removed. Once we figure out the basics, discussion threads for individual wiki page topics can be created, save those comments for those threads.

Note: This is an information wiki, not a Wikipedia article. We will dive deep into the case. We will include original research where it is well documented and reasoned.

Index Page

The index page is the landing page when entering the wiki. Since this is where people will start when exploring the wiki it should contain links to all the major categories which will be sub-index pages. We will be traversing this page often so it doesn’t need to contain a lot of extraneous information. 

Naming

Page titles are the file name and cannot be changed once the page is created. File names are not case sensitive so you cannot have two pages that differ only by capitalization. The capitalization used when a page is created will be preserved and cannot be changed. There should be a discussion prior to creating a page so page names can be chosen wisely.

Pages are hierarchical so pages can have sub-pages (and sub-sub-pages). There are likely limits that we will find out about.

Sidebar

A Reddit wiki has a sidebar that contains links to the individual pages. We’ll learn as we go how versatile this is. It may not be necessary to include all the primary page links in the main index page as these will already be in the sidebar.

Main wiki pages (not an exhaustive list)

• Overview (or just point to Wikipedia article)
• How to use the wiki/wiki discussion on threads
• Tools and resources
• Timeline (probably need several)
• Evidence (reference to documentation)
• People (who’s who, reference to depositions and testimony)
• Controversies (if any)

Sources

Wherever possible the source for information should be provided. Primary sources are preferred such as links to the case file archives at themurderofmeredithkercher.net, news articles and online discussions are a source for when information was first known or discussed.

ETA: There is a limited edit window for posts. I’ll roll updates from the discussion into here while I can. Go to the wiki for the most up-to-date information.

Does anyone have any knowledge or insight into how MK’s door was locked? I assume it was locked from the outside - was the key ever found?

Want to know more. I was really young when her case happened and didn’t really pay attention. Is her memoir the best place to start?

One thing I have never understood in reading this sub is beyond the motive explanation - what makes you so sure that Knox and Sollecito are guilty when they would 100% have to have done this with Rudy Guede. It's a mathematical impossibility that Rudy wasn't there, so your basic claim is then that they both conspired with some random person they served a drink once in a bar, and possibly met at a party, to murder and torture someone? Do you actually listen to what you are proposing logically? That a white American, Italian, and African would somehow become a criminal gang and plan out a crime?

Not only that, but you would assume that 3 people would be able to commit such a crime in a way that they could both cover all of each other's tracks (not have 1 of the 3 have overwhelming evidence present at the crime)? And that Rudy would be the one to do all the killing and somehow have agreed to this? And taken a dump in the toilet and left it there? No one would have told him "hey dude, not a good idea"?

There is no reasonable path to finding them guilty unless you believe they conspired with Rudy and that evidence is so incredibly thin (unless you are that commenter that somehow believes Rudy is innocent, I can't tell if its wife or mom).

What exactly is the theory on how all 3 of them did it that doesn't sound completely ridiculous?

To those who believe she’s guilty - how do you explain there being none of her DNA in the bedroom? When Rudy’s was all over?

I understand the back and forth on her behaviour etc, but how is this not categoric evidence that she didn’t do it?

Am I being daft? Is there an obvious explanation to this I’m overlooking?

I was young when it happened and live in Scotland. I don't remember much of it from the time. I have been watching "the twisted tale of Amanda Knox" and reading about the case/evidence. I plan to watch the documentary too.

I work in mental health and have done for 9 years or so. I specialise in ND and trauma. I also personally am ADHD myself with CPTSD. I see one of the main things being her "weird behaviour," but to me - if we watched anyone in traumatic circumstances, grief with a microscope we could all look "weird," or like we acted off.

Firstly - kissing her bf photos. From what I can see she looks pretty in shock/zoned out, confused as the language barrier is there too. I wasn't there nor can I say FOR SURE but she could have been dissociating and if true her bf touching her/kissing her is grounding. Not saying it's the most sensitive way but it's human. He likely was trying to comfort her as he understood more than she did and she was closer to Meredith.

Secondly, the splits - the police officer after days of sleep deprivation, in traumatic circumstances she had no time to process, very little food, isolated in a foreign country with a language barrier asked her to do so. A classic trauma response is fawn or people pleasing. Is it weird in isolation? Sure. Can we all say we haven't done something weird in loss/grief or horrible circumstances?

Thirdly - I don't know if this happened but when she put her gloves on outside the home and made a weird joke I cringed. Not because it screamed "guilty," but because I thought "that's painfully human and the sort of thing I'd do then cringe at for the rest of my life." You saw her have a panic attack, cry once she got in. Saw her panic when she realised what they were doing and her hesitation to walk into a crime scene where she lost a friend.

Lastly for now - people saying she is profiting off of it or "doesn't look upset in interviews," it is HER story. I cannot imagine how traumatic being imprisoned for a crime you didn't do in a foreign country, isolated from family/friends and unable to effectively communicate would be. From what I can tell she has limited what she says about Meredith (I may be wrong) I suspect out of respect for Meredith and her family so she focuses on her story. How many people tell their story of trauma? I experienced trauma 6 years ago and still talk about it to those close to me because it still impacts me.

And for not looking upset in interviews. She experienced prolonged exposure to traumatic circumstances, the murder itself would have been traumatic. That is a recipe for trauma or Complex PTSD. Even if she isn't publically formally diagnosed and I can't diagnose anyways. Many people with trauma can tell the story with a straight face or make jokes about it. I see it in clients all the time. I do it myself. She's been needing to repeat it over and over for years. Sometimes we fragment and separate ourselves from the events emotionally. That is a TRAUMA RESPONSE. It does not mean guilty, cold, detached or unaffected.

I just wanted to put this out there because all I see is a young girl in horrific circumstances in shock, likely traumatised being villainised. I've looked at evidence and if none of her or the boyfriends DNA was present (other than a bra clip that could have been contaminated) I don't think it's grounds to villainise her.

She will have the trauma of this probably the rest of her life. If she wishes to take the power she had stolen from her back and the narrative, that's upto her. She's villainised for not being the "perfecr grieving woman," from what I can tell.

My heart breaks for Meredith and her family too. I can't even imagine or even let myself think of the horror Meredith faced, she didn't deserve that at all.

Im enjoying the show and have a lot of empathy for what Amanda has gone through.

But I feel a bit unsettled with myself know that that Meredith Kercher’s family is against this show coming out.

It centers Amanda and not Meredith or the impacts on those who loved her.

Amanda has every right to tell her story, but the story has been told- she has a Netflix documentary and two books.

I am very fascinated by women who become the victims of public shaming and there is a lot to be learned about that. But, not sure this medium is appropriate especially with family disapproval.

Just curious to hear what others think

I’m halfway through this podcast with Amanda on the podcast Armchair Experts. Pretty good so far. Definitely recommend.

Has any member of the kercher family spoken (fairly) recently about Amanda/Raffaele’s acquittal and how they feel about it now? (It seems they were quite convinced of her guilt during the first trial, so I’m just wondering if by the second one they saw the evidence for what it was, or if perhaps it took time but now they can see what a horrendous investigation/prosecution it was, even if they didn’t initially?)

Also— WTF is wrong with mignini, and is there no precedent in the Italian court system to bring HIS suspension or any of the other batshit crazy shit he did with other cases into the trial??

For example, during OJ’s trial, proof that Mark Furhman, one of the LAPD investigators who directly handled crucial physical evidence, was objectively racist as fuck and had no qualms about carrying that personal racism into his job was brought up during the trial (as it definitely SHOULD have been)

The fact that Italian lead investigators are basically ALSO the prosecutors is a wild conflict of interest to me, but learning that this weirdo mignini opened a decades old murder case on the advice of a PSYCHIC he saw and then proceeded to accuse dozens of Italian investigators/lawmakers of being in a satanic cult that did the murders…..?? Like..WHAT??!! 🤯🤯🤯

This person needed a psych evaluation wayyy more than ANY of the actual “suspects” in the case and the fact that this hugely publicized trial was his last chance to potentially save his extremely tarnished reputation was ABSOLUTELY relevant to police procedure/bias/conflict of interest.

Were they not allowed to bring up HIS charges during either trial?? Or was is so corrupt that the defense felt it wouldn’t be in their best interest to??

Honestly, my blood is boiling with how much power this weird psychopath was given and the fact that he used it to steal four years of a young woman’s life and irreparably damage the rest of her years once finally freed.

ETA: Also—was there EVER any actual physical evidence of a rape or sexual assault??? I’m re-reading Amanda’s book now, and while Mignini is hyperfixated on the murder being a “sex game gone wrong” I’m unclear if these ever admitted to any sexual assault, and any quotes from the prosecution in the first trial basically say she was assaulted “manually or with an object” but also zero evidence of semen, vaginal tearing/bruising etc…. Like was there literally ever ANY objective physical evidence that could have suggested possible rape or possible SA in the first place??

ETA2: have either Laura or especially Filomena ever spoken out after the acquittal or especially recently??

In his motivations report Nencini claimed that the phone calls Amanda made to Meredith after talking to Filomena were 3 and 4 seconds long "perhaps not even enough time to repeat the first ring." He contrasted this with the long calls Filomena made to Amanda (36 and 65 seconds) which he claims weren't answered. This was meant to show that unlike Filomena and the others, Amanda wasn't frantic about the whole situation,

Both of these are wrong and show just how ignorant Nencini was of how phone records work. A call length in the records doesn't start with the first ring, it starts when the phone is picked up. It is trivially easy to demonstrate this by looking at all the calls Meredith made and received from Nov 1st (after coming home):

As we can see, after Meredith's death only two calls exceed 5 seconds. The automated call from First Alert - and Amanda's first attempt. Neither Filomena's call nor any of Robyn's many, increasingly frantic (as can be seen by her texts) calls ever exceed 5 seconds.

Filomena's calls to Amanda both went through. Filomena herself said in her first deposition that after the first call from Amanda "many phone calls began to follow one another between us." If Nencini is correct that means Filomena was lying, since there would only be one more call (the first when Amanda was in the cottage) at 12:34. See the logs.

This is one of many examples of Nencini's ignorance. Sadly, it didn't help that the defense had the facts on their side when the arbiter of facts is a complete dunce.