Amanda Knox: Decision Day this Week
Amanda Knox’s appeal will be decided this week–possibly as early as today. Will Amanda be set free? It sure looks that way when we listen to the American news media report on this story. Not being fluent in Italian, I have no idea how things look from their perspective.
This case has taken many twists and turns over the past few years–the biggest of which is the fact that the Italian police bungled their investigation at the crime scene and have been very unreliable in getting information to substantiate people’s involvement–most specifically Amanda Knox and her boy friend, Raffaele Sollecito.
Many people are curious about what I think so I thought I would write an update. When Amanda first gave the police her story, I immediately called out that I did not trust what she said to be true.
Back in November, 2007, Amanda Knox told police, “Patrick and Meredith were in Meredith’s room while I stayed in the kitchen. I can’t remember how long they were together in the room, but I can only say that at a certain point I heard Meredith screaming and I was scared so I covered my ears. After that, I don’t remember everything, my head is very confused.”
Which in response to the comment above, I wrote, “Several papers have printed a statement made by Knox to police, and if this statement is true, I find it quite interesting and telling that perhaps Ms. Knox is not being forthright with us….” I conclude after giving my analysis, “…a strong indication of deception. I don’t believe Knox is being honest with us ” You can read my original thoughts and analysis of Amanda Knox statement here (from 2007).
Amanda has since retracted that statement (I need to mark this on my track record as another deception called out before the truth was known — I never did!), but she has yet to give us anything viable to hang our hat on. In all of these years, she has yet to make one statement that clearly delineates what she knows is true. That troubles me.
48 Hours obtained the tape of Amanda describing to an Italian judge what happened to her that night which I believe was recorded in 2008 at Rudy Guede’s trial. Amanda asked to address the court. It was the one time where she wasn’t translating between Italian and English and where she spoke freely about what she knew that night. Amanda had an entire year to gather her thoughts at this point, too, so I expected something substantial from Amanda, but what she said was anything but substantial.
Not only did Amanda NOT give us a clear memory of what happened that night that supports the truth, she hesitated a lot, self-censored her speech tremendously and stops herself from saying complete thoughts over and over again–which are more strong indicators of deception.
From all we know about this case up to today, I find it very strange that Amanda’s first confession involves her being at the house, with Meredith in her room with a black man. What are the odds that Amanda would make up a story that comes so close to what we do know the Italian police supposedly got right — that Rudy Guede’s, a black man, had his DNA everywhere in Meredith’s room?
The odds of this happening by coincidence are exceptionally rare. While it wasn’t Patrick Lumumba who killed Meredith as Amanda first said, I don’t think many people question that Rudy was there. It points to the fact Amanda likely has more knowledge about what happened that night than what she is willing to admit.
I also find Amanda’s original statement troubling when she said she heard screams and covered her ears. No one who hears screams, without knowing the source, would cover them up (end of story)!! They would run to the source to see if someone accidentally hurt themselves, or they would flee if they felt they were in danger. At which point Amanda conveniently had no memory.
For Amanda to make this element up that she didn’t know the cause of the scream, but just stood there and covered her ears is ILLOGICAL and nuts because she would have to think illogical when she made up that lie, if she didn’t experience this–and that is ridiculous (and very,very unique!!). To me, it supports that fact that she was at the house, she did hear screams, BUT SHE KNEW who and possibly what was going on in the bedroom for her not to react. Add to that, she tells us in her first confession, it was a black man — and low and behold another black man was implicated in the murder. That’s pretty substantial for me.
So while Amanda lied in her first statement to police, I believe the truth is scattered in the middle of it and if we pay attention to her words, I believe it does reveal that Amanda had some knowledge of what happened that night.
Was she involved beyond that? I CANNOT SAY and never have…I don’t have good enough interviews of Amanda to tell you. Maybe that will change if she gets set free.
I also believe that Amanda was involved in drugs and may have a foggy memory that night as well–which causes her absolutely weird ramblings that make no sense whatsoever. I suspect she thinks back to that night, has weird dream-like visions of what happened and doesn’t dare share them because they certainly wouldn’t help her case…