Italian judges yesterday explained why they reinstated Amanda Knox's guilty verdict, and this latest document is a "new low" in what has already been a judicial farce, writes Andrew Gumbel in the Guardian. In seven years, we've had three trials, six judges, two hearings at Italy's high court with another on the way, a conviction, an acquittal, another conviction, forensic evidence that has been dismissed as worthless only to be "mystifyingly" reinstated, and, of course, ever-shifting theories of how and why Meredith Kercher was murdered. In the latest, Knox herself struck the fatal blow with a knife after a quarrel over money, so forget all that other stuff about a sex game gone awry. In his reasoning, Judge Alessandro Nencini "stated things as fact that are manifestly and provably wrong," writes Gumbel. (He runs through some examples, including a shoe print attributed to Knox, one that was previously proven to have belonged to Rudy Guede.)
Reading the report is like entering "a kind of alternate reality, where concrete facts appear ignored and alternate facts are seemingly plucked from the air." But all this might actually be good news for Knox and ex-boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito, writes Gumbel (who has co-authored the latter's memoir). The errors "give the Italian high court an opening—should the justices choose to take it—to overturn the latest conviction, and either dismiss the case, send it back to get the mistakes fixed, or order yet another trial in another court." Maybe this will finally be the moment when Italy's justice system "exonerates Knox and Sollecito, as it should have done years ago." Click for his full column. (More Amanda Knox stories.)
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