Amanda Knox's Conviction Overturned by Italy's Highest Court - East Idaho News
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Amanda Knox’s Conviction Overturned by Italy’s Highest Court

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AMANDAKNOX022514?  SQUARESPACE CACHEVERSION=1427493489670ABC(ROME) — Italy’s highest court decided Friday to overturn Amanda Knox’s reconviction in connection with her roommate’s slaying, meaning that she will not be sent back to prison.

Knox’s mother confirmed to ABC News that her daughter’s conviction has been annulled.

Knox was initially convicted by an Italian court of killing British student Meredith Kercher in 2007, but that decision was overturned on appeal in October 2011 after she had spent four years in prison.

She was then reconvicted last year and an appeal of the reconviction began this month. There is no possibility of further appeals after Friday’s ruling.

Knox said in a statement that she is “tremendously relieved and grateful for the deicison of the Supreme Court of Italy.”

“The knowledge of my innocence has given me strength in the darkest times of this ordeal,” Knox says. Her family also released a statement saying they were “thrilled with” and “grateful for” Friday’s decision.

“This is a big mistake that has to be rectified,” Knox’s defense attorney Carlo Dalla Vedova told ABC News before this latest appeal case began. “It has been done before.”

Knox has previously told ABC News that while she maintains her innocence, she will not be traveling to Italy for the new appeal because if found guilty, she would then be sent back to jail for up to 28 years.

“I did not expect this to happen,” Knox told ABC News in January 2014. “I really expected so much better from the Italian justice system. They found me innocent once before.”

Knox has rebuilt her life in her hometown of Seattle, writing freelance theater reviews for a local paper and working at a bookstore. In February, her family confirmed that she is now engaged to Colin Sutherland, a friend whom she has known since middle school.

Her ex-boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito is facing the same appeal and while he has been present in the Rome court throughout the week, Knox has remained in America.

“I will never go willingly back,” she said in January 2014.


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