To cut through the enormous wave of rubbish that swept the net for 48 hours about Amanda Knox, I wanted to publish the text of the statement she made to police trying to frame Patrick Lumumba. It is evidence of how appalling the media coverage is that I can’t track down through the gush this actual factual text, which the media plainly would want us to forget. Can anyone point me to it?
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This is the Statement sequence. The first statement was made on 2nd November and the next three on 6th November. It’s from the Kercher website linked above.
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Version 1 Witness statement given on 2 November.
Amanda Knox told the police that she spent the whole night with Raffaele Sollecito at his apartment, and she repeated this narrative in an email to family and friends on 4 November:
From the email: “…after a little while of playing guitar me and raffael went to his house to watch movies and after to eat dinner and generally spend the evening and night indoors. we didn’t go out. the next morning i woke up around 1030”
Knox indicated that she couldn’t remember much about what happened at Sollecito’s apartment that night because she was suffering from cannabis-induced amnesia. In her handwritten note to the police, she acknowledged that her inability to fully recall the events on the night of the murder did look incriminating.
“I also know that the fact that I can’t fully recall the events that I claim took place at Raffaele’s home during the time that Meredith was murdered is incriminating”.
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Version 2 Witness statement given on 6 November and ruled inadmissible
This is how the Daily Mail reported it on 13 November:
“I can’t remember if my friend Meredith was there or if she came later. We were all separate,” she said.
“He (Lumumba) wanted her (Meredith).
“Yes we were in the house. We were drunk. We asked her to join us.
“Diya wanted her. Raffaele and I went into another room and then I heard screams.
“Patrick and Meredith were in Meredith’s bedroom while I think I stayed in the kitchen.
“I can’t remember how long they were together in the bedroom but the only thing I can say is that at a certain point I remember hearing Meredith’s screams and I covered my ears.
“Then I don’t remember anything else. There is such a lot going on in my head.“
“I can’t remember if Meredith was screaming and if I heard thuds but I could imagine what was going on.’
….Later, she contradicts herself, saying: “I can’t remember if Raffaele was there that night.
“I remember waking up in his bed at his house and that I went back to my house where I found the door open.”
This inadmissible version of events is already markedly different to her first one. She seems to have admitted that she was at the cottage when Meredith was killed, but claimed that Sollecito was also there.
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Version 3 Witness statement given on 6 November and also ruled inadmissible
This is the version The London Times reported on 7 November 2007. In this version Amanda Knox is not sure whether Raffaele Sollecito was with her at the house or not.
She seems to have said that she met Mr Lumumba on the evening of November 1 after sending a text message in reply to his with the words “Let’s meet up” (“Ci vediamo”).
“We met around nine o’clock at the basketball court at Piazza Grimana and we went back to my house. I don’t remember if my friend Meredith was already there or whether she came later. What I can say is that the two of them (Meredith and Patrick) went off together.”
She seems to have said she and Mr Lumumba had told Ms Kercher they wanted to “have some fun”. “Patrick wanted her (Ms Kercher),” she said.
“Patrick and Meredith went off together into Meredith’s room while I think I stayed in the kitchen. I can’t remember how long they were in the bedroom together, I can only say that at a certain point I heard Meredith screaming and I was so frightened I put my fingers in my ears. I don’t remember anything after that, my head is really confused.”
“I don’t remember if Meredith called out or if I heard thuds because I was upset, but I can imagine what was happening.” She claimed she had had a lot to drink and had fallen asleep.
She added: “I’m not sure whether Raffaele was there too that evening but I do remember waking up at his house in his bed and that in the morning I went back to where I lived, where I found the door open.”
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Version 4 Voluntary handwritten note to police 6 November ruled acceptable by Judge Massei
In this version, which was presented in evidence, Knox claimed that she was both at Sollecito’s apartment and at Meredith’s house on the night in question.
Also for the first time Knox raises the possibility that she might have seen and heard the events at the cottage in a vision.
In my mind I saw Patrik in flashes of blurred images. I saw him near the basketball court. I saw him at my front door. I saw myself cowering in the kitchen with my hands over my ears because in my head I could hear Meredith screaming…
And she concluded the note as follows:
Everything I have said in regards to my involvement in Meredith’s death, even though it is contrasting, are the best truth that I have been able to think.
Preliminary judge Claudia Matteini observed in a statement that the court has received that Knox’s note to the police contained significant elements of truth – in other words, verifiable details:
Finally, looking at the content of the memoir itself, we must admit that its content is very careful. It is certainly not a fantastic and imaginary delirium.”
The note seems to suggest that Knox knew Meredith had been sexually assaulted: “Patrick wanted her… I don’t remember if Meredith called out or if I heard thuds because I was upset, but I can imagine what was happening”.
This seems to have been the first mention ever by anyone of a sexual assault on Meredith, and it was made before the results of Dr. Lalli’s autopsy report were presented to the court on 8 November.
It was testified that Knox also revealed other accurate details about Meredith’s murder before the results of the autopsy were made public. She told witnesses on 2 November that Meredith had died “in slow agony”.
Mr Mignini asked Knox on 17 December 2007 how she could possibly have known this if she was not actually there. Knox began to cry, and refused to answer the question.
Knox also claimed that she heard Meredith screaming, and screaming was reported by two of the witnesses, Nara Capezalli and Antonella Monacchia. Each testified that they heard a loud scream on the night Meredith was murdered.
Knox also claimed that she was in Piazza Grimana on the night of the murder. This claim is supported by Antonio Curatolo, who testified that he saw Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito in Piazza Grimana on several occasions that night.
It seems that Knox’s lawyer, Luciano Ghirga, really had no choice but to acknowledge the fact that Knox had made conflicting statements. In remarks to the press:
“All of the lawyers have imposed on Amanda the gravity of her situation, and the gravity of accusing other people. They have all told her that she needs to tell the truth because there have been differences in the statements.”
“We have asked her family to persuade her in the hope that her parents will ask her to tell the truth. There have been differing statements.”
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Version 5 Amanda Knox’s own testimony on the stand on June 12 and 13
In her testimony on the stand, Knox simply reverted to the original claim, still not supported by Sollecito, that she had been with Sollecito at his apartment all night and a part of the following morning.
This alibi is undermined by the accurate details she provided in the second alibi that no-one not present could have known (see above), by Sollecito’s own denial that this is what happened, and by mobile-phone records, by eyewitness accounts, and by the forensic evidence at Meredith’s house.
Just a though RE: Amanda Knox.
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Money CAN buy a freedom. Whether guilty or innocent BUT having money and BEING able to hire expensive and professional layers gradually IMPROVES ones chances of being freed even when found guilty and put into prison for 26 years. I only wonder if the only one who remains in prison for this horrible murder has had the same amount of money and the same citizenship, would he has been freed? Any idea?
Last night Sky said she owed her lawyers 750,000 Euros.
Mary, but she’ll easily get that back through book sales and film rights. And her lawyers will have a big input in how her story is presented
Uzbek in the UK. It’s true what you say. The rich get lawyers who can win for them even when they are guilty, backhanders take place and it’s a different world from ours. Can you imagine the Murdochs rotting in prison? And look at their crimes.
Is it worth asking you for some idea of what is in the particular statement from memory which you are so eager to re-locate? Is there to date any songle volume about the case that gives a reasonable account of the case. I do not mean a volume that resolves every dot and comma – I simply mean one that provides as useful rather than a sensationalist or exagerated overview?
I didn’t even finish my sentence about the lawyers’ input to Amanda Knox’s publication- and film-rights, but I meant to add that they will have to scrutinise everything very closely to protect her from confession.
Larry L. Nobody has said she is not innocent (since the court that convicted her). But she’s a liar. She’s a fantasist. She has little compassion except for Amanda Knox. Her diaries show it. Her duplicitous statements show it. How will anybody ever know the truth? Especially in the safe haven of America – safe unless you’re Mexican.
That’s all very well, but would you? That hint of danger and deviant sex…
Amanda Knox changed her story. Yet none of us know the line of police questioning while she was in custody – she could have been put under a lot of pressure, that’s a characteristic of miscarriages of justice.
Hopefully she’ll give a rational account of what happened in inteviews in the US. Until then, all this speculation is meaningless
Craig, I understand you’ve decided you don’t like Knox, and that you would rather she be imprisoned for 26 years for something that hasn’t been proved, but for me that doesn’t seem like a rational position. Nobody deserves that, regardless of their character.
the media described Knox as brilliant? in what way is she brilliant?
Knox’s brilliance or lack of does not have any relevance in determining whether she should spend time in prison for something she didn’t do.
There’s another Fox up to tricks.
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Liam Fox ties to ‘best man’ under scrutiny
Liam Fox: “I have asked the permanent secretary to look into these wild allegations”
Defence Secretary Liam Fox has ordered an investigation into whether he broke the ministerial code over his working relationship with a close friend.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-15209146
As I understand things Ms Knox is a convicted felon still, with the charge reference the false accusation against Mr Lumumba.
Does this mean that Ms Knox will not be allowed into the UK as other convicted felons are barred, so in theory we should not see her publicising her book/film on This Morning etc.
Or have I missed something?
It has been mentioned that the American media fought hard for their countryman (woman) but why is this one a special case? I can not believe that there are not other Americans in foreign jails for crimes they didn’t commit and we don’t hear about them. The American legal system in some states still imposes the death penalty for murder and generally the American media are not campaigning against this with any great fervour.
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It seems very likely from what I read, the Italian police were heavy handed in their interrogations and extremely incompetent in their handling of vital evidence. Essentially they did not impose any kind of rigour in their investigation which would stand up to thorough questioning in court by lawyers used to more modern methods.
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The oddest thing in the images of the court shown in the media, apart from the cage to hold the accused, was the prominent positioning of a large crucifix in the centre of the court. It sent the message to me that it was the rule of Christianity applying rather than the rule of Law. Any system which applies that crazy logic in the twenty-first century has to be suspect.
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So regardless of the guilt of otherwise of the suspects, there is no doubt the Italian police and legal system have been shown to be not fit for purpose.
[…] Crucifixes are not mandatory but customary in Italy’s public buildings.
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Catholicism is not Italy’s state religion and the separation of Church and State is set down by the postwar Constitution and mandated by a 1984 Concordat that ended most of the Catholic Church’s privileges.
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In practice, with Catholicism being such a part of Italy’s cultural identity, local bodies decide whether they want crosses in the courthouse.
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Similar arrangements are in place in other public buildings – most notably schools, where there have been a raft of polemics.
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Enough to give you the creeps. Do they also have some garlic and a wooden stake handy? One Judge was suspended was refusing to have crucifixes in his courtroom. Shows the power of Benedict and the oddities who inhabit the Vatican. Remember Banco Ambrosiano, Roberto Calvi and Blackfriars Bridge?
http://www.italymag.co.uk/italy/anti-crucifix-judge-adamant
Enough to give you the creeps. Do they also have some garlic and a wooden stake handy?
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Is this an oblique way of saying that all religion is rubbish? Or, let me guess, you’re saying that Catholicism is rubbish?
Yes as are all religions especially when they are used to cloak the war mongers’ obscenities. There was Bush with his membership of the Episcopalian church and the Catholic church that took in the likes of Tony Blair, the war criminal, was guilty of the worst kind of hypocrisy. They should both be damned into an icy oblivion.
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http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_qyhZ9_eXCHM/TA7lbuGFVII/AAAAAAAAFXM/LWo9Q_vjFmM/s400/Steve-Bell-cartoon-001.jpg
Mary:
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PJP2 and the Vatican were both opposed to the first and second Iraq war. Even the horribly conservative Benedict XVI is against the Iraq war. I think you could probably make an argument that PJP2 was the most senior public figure in the world to oppose the most recent Iraq war. For all the catholic churches faults, I don’t think you can list cloaking the war as one of them.
That is as maybe but they still admitted Bliar to the fold Cheeba Cow and also Ann Widdecombe who ‘voted strongly for the Iraq war’. She converted to Catholicism ten years earlier.
Mary I’m sure there are many terrible people who are Catholics, but you can’t say all their actions were sanctioned by the church. Just because someone joins the Catholic church it doesn’t mean the church sanctions all their behaviour (especially if the highest authority has already explicitly and publicly stated they don’t). You just have to be baptised and rock up to church to be a Catholic, hardly a process designed to weed out any “undesirables”. Not sure about your logic regarding Widdecombe…. Was the church supposed to stop her from joining based on what she would do 10 years into the future?
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Do you want the Catholic church to eject all members who don’t agree 100% with their doctrines and official pronouncements? Would that make it a better organisation better able to fulfil its spiritual goals? If that were the case, I’d argue that the church would lose all its best priests.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2047234/Amanda-Knox-fantastic-actress-says-Patrick-Lumumba-accused-murder.html
Exchange with Peter Popham re acquittal of Knox and Sollecito
http://members5.boardhost.com/medialens/msg/1318447907.html
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Referring to Popham’s article in the Independent 4 Oct 2011
{http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/amanda-knox-lucrative-but-dubious-fame-of-interviews-and-memoirs-beckons-2365248.html}
I thought the killing method was a bit odd… a burglar doesn’t normally slit someones throat do they? I’d have thought a frenzied knife attack, or lethal “plunge” would have been the usual…? Throat slitting is usually revenge, or power.. too much can go wrong with this technique.
Not much has been said regarding the man currently being held, I have yet to see his testimoney. Many of the witness statements about Guede are after the fact, one man claims he remembers seeing the guy months ago breaking into his flat! Surely not a credible witness? I think this “witness” also had his mobile and laptop stolen from his office, but didn’t report it for weeks/months. How could anyone not know their laptop and mobile had been stolen? Hmmm… Where there’s a smell of bullshit you’ll normally find a pat…