Amanda Knox spoke out this week in an emotional interview attempting to prove her innocence in the 2007 murder of flatmate Meredith Kercher, saying with conviction "I did not kill my friend."
Knox, 26, sat down Thursday with CNN's Chris Cuomo to address the Italian court's recently released 300-page report that claims Knox and ex-boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito brutally killed Kercher after the girls had an argument about money.
"I did not kill my friend. I did not wield a knife. I had no reason to," a visibly emotional Knox said. "In the month that we that we were living together, we were becoming friends. A week before the murder occurred, we went out to a classical music concert together . . . We had never fought."
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Knox pointed at the lack of physical evidence in the case as proof of her innocence.
"If I were there, I would have traces of Meredith's broken body on me. And I would have left traces of myself around — around Meredith's corpse," she said. "And I — I am not there. And that proves my innocence."
Knox has been stuck in legal limbo ever since 2007 when she and Sollecito were accused of murdering Kercher, Knox's roommate in Perugia, where she was studying abroad.
The University of Washington student was convicted and sentenced to 26 years in prison. Sollecito was sentenced to 25 years. Rudy Guede, an Ivory Coast drifter, was also convicted in the murder and is currently serving a 16-year prison term.
Then, in 2011, an Italian appeals court threw out Knox and Sollecito's convictions and harshly criticized the prosecution's handling of evidence. The pair was free after serving four years in an Italian prison.
But in March 2013, Italy's highest court overturned the acquittals and ordered a new trial to begin within the year in Florence. Knox, who had resumed her studies at UW in her hometown of Seattle, did not travel to Italy for the proceedings.
Her worst nightmare came true in January, though, when she was again found guilty and sentenced to 28 and a half years in prison. Sollecito was given 25 years. It's not yet clear whether the U.S. will ever extradite Knox to Italy to serve out her punishment.
"From this whole experience, especially in prison where you have to take everything day by day, right now I'm having to take everything step by step," Knox told Cuomo. "And if I think about everything that I could possibly be facing, it's way too overwhelming for me to even conceive . . . I truly believe that it is possible to win this, and to bring an end to all of the speculation and the nonsensical theories, and really bring peace to everyone who has suffered."
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