Weeping Amanda Knox says ‘I’m a victim’ after being found GUILTY in Meredith Kercher murder slander case after retrial

A WEEPING Amanda Knox insisted she is "a victim" after being found guilty of slander during the Meredith Kercher murder case.

A teary-eyed Knox, 36, lost her bid to overturn the conviction in Italy this week as the legal saga that has taken years to resolve took another turn.

A court in Florence on Wednesday found the American had wrongly accused an innocent man, Patrick Lumumba, of Ms Kercher's brutal killing in the town of Perugia in 2007.

The Briton, 21, had been found in her bedroom in the town of Perugia with 47 stab wounds and a cut throat.

Lumumba had been the Congolese owner of the bar where Knox, then a 20-year-old university student, had worked part-time.

Days after Kercher's death, Knox signed a statement implicating Lumumba committed the murder, although both of them, along with her former Italian boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito, were arrested.

Lumumba was released just two weeks later, before Knox and Sollecito were eventually found guilty of murder in December 2009.

Knox went down for 26 years while Sollecito received 25 years, although both were acquitted in 2011 and then fully exonerated by Italy's highest court in 2015.

The American activist, 36, still spent nearly four years behind bars in Italy, however.

Following her re-conviction of slander, Knox, from Seattle, called Wednesday's court's verdict "unfair" and "not correct" as she vowed to appeal to Italy's supreme court.

Fighting back tears, she told : "I didn't slander Patrick; I didn't kill my friend [Meredith]. I will come back here as many times as I have to fight against this injustice".

She added that she had been "unjustly accused" for her "entire adult life".

During her initial police questioning over the killing in 2007, Knox claims she was "psychologically tortured, abused and mistreated" by officers.

"It was the worst experience of my life. They made me think I was crazy," she said.

Knox had accused Lumumba of Ms Kercher's murder during an interrogation, for which the former bar owner spent two weeks behind bars.

However, Knox argued in court in Florence this week that her slander conviction should be overturned because of her treatment by officers.

In 2016, the European Court of Human Rights ruled the interrogation violated Knox's rights because she was questioned without a lawyer or official translator.

It prompted Italy's top court to throw out the slander conviction and ordered a retrial last November.

"I've had to spend my whole life fighting and defending myself," Knox said.

She added: "Sometimes I think there's nothing I can do but I'll try forever."

MEREDITH KERCHER

Meredith Kercher was born in Southwark, South London, on December 28, 1985.

The 21-year-old's body was found in a pool of blood in her bedroom on November 2, 2007.

An autopsy conducted on her body found that her throat had been cut and she had been stabbed almost 50 times.

It also found that she had 16 bruises, including on her nose and mouth, and suffered injuries related to sexual assault.

In 2007, fingerprints at the scene were found to belong to Rudy Guede, who was later charged and sentenced for the brutal murder.

He was granted early release in November 2021.

The case attracted global media interest, with Knox at the centre.