'Group Attack' Led to Meredith Slaying: Judge

An Italian judge yesterday upheld a decision to detain the three suspects in the murder of Meredith Kercher, saying that "none of them can be said to have played a passive role." The Times of London reports that the court in Perugia has seen evidence suggesting that Kercher's roommate Amanda Knox, her Italian boyfriend, and a third suspect all participated in a "group attack" on the British exchange student.

Knox has given several conflicting statements of their whereabouts on the night before Kercher was found dead, her throat slashed: in her most recent contradiction, she claimed to have read a Harry Potter book at her boyfriend's apartment, when in fact the book was at her and Kercher's home. Italy's La Stampa called the revelation "another blow to the credibility of their alibi." (More Meredith Kercher stories.)