A college coed accused of murdering her roommate . Satanic ritual . Group sex sound haywire . These sound like the plot details of a flashy mush novel , but they were all factors inthe never - end saga of Amanda Knox , who was definitively acquitted of her study abroad roomie ’s 2007 slaying just last yr .
Now Netflix is telling her complete story withAmanda Knox , a documentary film about the complex causa . The investigation of Meredith Kercher ’s death and the four subsequent trial Knox stomach have generated hundreds of article , interview , and court transcripts – but with this primer , which goes over the biggest , most sensationalist beat from the case , you ’ll actually have meter left over to watch the doc yourself . Once you ’re caught up , decide for yourself if Knox truly is " Luciferina with the face of an angel . " Because , yes , someone really called her that .
Meredith Kercher was brutally murdered
In the pin of 2007 , Knox arrived in Perugia and take a room in a cottage with three roommates . Two of them were Italian women in their recent 20s who held jobs at law firms . The other wasMeredith Kercher , a college bookman like Knox . Kercher came from the University of Leeds , where she was major in European sketch . While the two pupil were n’t particularly close , they were friendly . Kercher was even with Knox when she first contact Raffaele Sollecito , her Italian ex - boyfriend , at a Schubert recital .
After the concert finish , Knox spent a square workweek with Sollecito , at his place . But then the tube in his flat leak , so she returned to the cottage to take a shower . While she was there , she noticed profligate on the sink . Kercher ’s room access was also locked . freak out out , Knox bolt from the theatre and called her other roommates . She then returned with Sollecito , who attempt to squeeze the door open . When that did n’t work , they called the carabinieri– the Italian military police .
Only the carabinieri did n’t show up . The local postal police did alternatively ( more on them in a min ) . By that point , one of the girls ' Italian roommates had evince up with her boyfriend and two friends . This integral group entered the flat with the policeman . They kick down the doorway to discover a grisly scene : bloody print all over the room , and in the middle of it , Kercher ’s body . She had been stab with a knife several times and left on the floor , partly covered by her allayer .
Netflix
Knox’s behavior raised flags
Although it appeared to take Knox – described by family and friend as " naïve " – a long prison term to realize she was a suspect in Kercher ’s murder , the law were mistrustful of her right forth . That was because they viewed her behavior in the immediate aftermath as wildly inappropriate .
As police investigate the crime conniption , Knox and Sollecito waited outside . They snog , either unaware of or unbothered by the nearby photographic camera crews , who plastered their affection across the evening news . after , when the duo went to the constabulary station to answer questions , officer say Knox did cartwheels and split – that is , when she was n’t sitting on Sollecito ’s lap .
Knox denies she ever did cartwheel in between interrogations but accommodate she could ’ve been " more tender . " Unfortunately , the investigators were n’t just suspicious of her odd behaviour , they were also unbelievably incompetent .
Netflix/Youtube
The wrong police were put on the case
The entire slaying investigation might ’ve go differently if the correct cops had arrived on the scenery . Instead , Knox and Sollecito encounter the state ’s so - called postal police , which is unremarkably assign to petty crimes like headphone theft .
Accordingly , two officers were already in the area respond to a call about an abandoned jail cell headphone , which it turned out belonged to Kercher . Knox and Sollecito claim they had already call the carabinieri when the postal police get to return Kercher ’s telephone set . The postal law take that call was made later . Regardless , Knox let them into the house to investigate .
AsRolling Stonenoted , the carabinieri surely would ’ve closed off the crime scene immediately and conducted a deliberate inspection . alternatively , the postal police force have Knox , Sollecito , Romanelli , and Romanelli ’s three associate " tramp " through the house . They also initially refused to break down Kercher ’s threshold , prioritize her privacy over her condom .
The principal forensics expert would not take Kercher ’s dead body temperature , a all-important test for settle time of end , until a full day after her body was expose . As a outcome , the test arrive back with a encompassing range of " sometime between 8 Prime Minister and 4 am . " A narrower time frame could have cleared Knox and Sollecito , as they were both check at Sollecito ’s apartment around 8:45pm , and his information processing system showed activity until 9:10pm .
One of the prosecution ’s key pieces of evidence – Kercher ’s bra clutch , which contained touch amounts of Sollecito ’s DNA – was not bag for 46 mean solar day after the murder . In that time , it had been moved and floor into a pile of dust . The other major patch of evidence was a knife , which came back with traces of Knox ’s DNA on the handle and Kercher ’s DNA on the blade . But when the knife was essay again , none of Kercher ’s DNA was found .
Knox has always maintained that her signed confession was coerced by the police force , who refused to allow her see a lawyer and pip her until she agreed to their translation of the upshot . By her account , the police first bullied Sollecito into lay claim Knox slipped out of his flat the night of Kercher ’s execution . Then they blackjack Knox into admitting she had gone back to her home that night , along with her foreman at the local legal profession Le Chic , Diya " Patrick " Lumumba , and heard Kercher scream as he stabbed her .
Whatever encounter in that question room , it ’s well-defined the police force did n’t wish her ; one policeman insisted Knox was lie about taking a cascade on the morning Kercher ’s physical structure was come across because she " smelled like sex . "
Tabloids trashed Knox
That " smelled like sex " line very much encapsulate the media ’s portrayal of Knox as a kinky seductress who killed for sport . This perception was for the most part forge by Nick Pisa , theDaily Mailreporter who gave her the inescapable moniker " Foxy Knoxy . " Pisa also bring out Knox ’s leaked prison house diaries . With those , he pounce on detail like her vexation over an STD panic and previous boyfriends ( in his words , " many lover " ) . Pisa ’s reports follow across as downright elated , and even today , he seems majestic of his opportunist coverage .
Pisa was far from the only one give Knox a hard time . Over the course of instruction of the test , she was called a " Bambi - eyed grampus , " " Luciferina with the expression of an angel , " and a " sexuality - harebrained American party girl . " And that was just the public press – some of the most barbarous nicknames come from the prosecutor trying Knox , Giuliano Mignini . He was tender of send for her a " she - devil , " since he was convinced she was in cahoots with Satan .
A prosecutor obsessed with satanism went after Knox
Mignini link defendants to devil long before the Knox test . While working on a case against the " Monster of Florence , " a consecutive killer responsible for at least 16 murders , heinexplicably lumpedthe self-destruction of Dr. Francesco Narducci in with the dupe . Narducci , Mignini claimed , belong to to a satanic cult that killed adult female for body part in occult rituals . agree to his hypothesis , the doctor was the " keeper " of those body parts , and was murdered by the secret society so he would keep quiet – because the " Monster " was n’t one person but a web of 20 conspirators in government and law enforcement who banded together to keep their devil worship under wraps .
If you think this sounds kooky , so did the evaluator who listen Mignini ’s arguments . He threw out the charge Mignini brought against the 20 suspects , and Mignini was later convicted of abuse of berth in his pursuit of the Monster of Florence .
Still , Mignini clung to eclipse theories , reason that Knox and Sollecito had kill Kercher as part ofa unholy religious rite . subsequently , he determine it wasa gender saturnalia go wrong : Kercher did n’t need to participate in their wild group sex , so they stabbed her .
Netflix
Rudy Guede was key to the satanic theory
It ’s important to note that Mignini include a third individual in all these satanic orgy theories . Rudy Guede was a small - time thief who had broken into a nursery school in Milan the hebdomad before Kercher ’s murder . He knew some of Kercher and Knox ’s neighbor , so he ’d fill the girls before . And only his DNA gibe the bloody rail left in the apartment .
When Guede was apprehended , he insisted Knox and Sollecito had nothing to do with the crime . But once he was arrested , the police did n’t spay their original story much at all , they just swapped Guede in for the third adult male Knox had in the beginning refer in her confession . ( That was her boss , Diya " Patrick " Lumumba . ) Guede was try alone andconvicted three times .
Knox was found guilty, then innocent… two times in a row
From January 16th , 2009 , all the way through March 27th , 2015 , Knox was subjected to four separate trials . In the first one , she and Sollecito were happen guilty of sexual assault and murder ; she was sentenced to 26 years in prison , while he generate 25 . Then an appeals lawcourt found them both sinless in 2011 . Knox returned to her home in Seattle , thinking the whole function was behind her . But in 2013 , Italy set up Knox and Sollecito to stand test again , which ensue in a shamefaced verdict – but Knox ’s folk importune she would not come back to Italy to assist her now-28 - and - a - half - class sentence . So the case was attract again .
Ultimately , the convictionswere give out . Since this materialise in Italy ’s high potential court , it meant Knox and Sollecito were at last loose . Knox is still in Seattle , where she pen for The West Seattle Herald ; Sollecito remained in Italy , where he has begin a lawsuit for wrongful imprisonment . Well , that , and a " societal mesh for graves . "
While her painful court battle have ended , Knox ’s life is far from normal . " For better or for forged , I have n’t sense like any - other - individual - my - age for a tenacious time , " she wrote in aHeraldop - edthis August . But she ’s working on it : " It may still be the typeface that … I ’m remind that I ’m ' That girl in Italy ? ! That Amanda Knox ? ! ' Yeah , I ’m her . I ’m also the Amanda Knox who is so excited to be live my life alongside people I enjoy and respect , lugging furniture , best cat poop , pay the bill , moving on . " For Knox ’s sake , hopefully , the documentary will help her proceed to make her manner forward .
Netflix
Sign up herefor our casual Thrillist email , and get your fix of the best in food for thought / drink / fun .