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Unanswered Questions Concerning the Amanda Knox Case
The defence teams representing Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito have always maintained that Rudy Guede had acted alone in the murder of Meredith Kercher on 1 November 2007. He had a past history of burglary and of carrying a knife. The crime occurred on the day of the month when students gathered their funds together to pay their landlords, so it would have been highly likely that any prospective burglar would have found sums of money at the villa. At the time Rudy Guede did not have a regular source of income and had been getting by through petty crime which had included drug dealing. However Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito had no such financial worries and both had sums of money in the bank and Knox was also earning extra income through her part time work at a local bar. Also the couple were highly regular individuals who did not have a past history with the police.
At the time Rudy Guede very much had the profile of someone with a guilty conscience. He changed his story of what had happened that night at the villa a number of times (seattle pi - Rudy Guede: Amanda Knox was not there). Originally he stated that Amanda Knox had not been present at the crime scene at all but then later claimed she had. The evidence that Guede himself had been at the crime scene was irrefutable but Guede claimed he had only been an accomplice in the murder. By arguing this his defence lawyers helped Guede to eventually receive a far more lenient sentence. His original sentence of 30 years was reduced to 16 on appeal and he most likely won’t serve the whole of this term. He has already qualified for work release as of February 2014 and is currently studying for a history degree (Mirror - Meredith Kercher killer Rudy Guede FREED on day release to study history degree), and ironically news of this came only days after the reconviction of Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito.
Rudy Guede appearing in court.
What makes the case so much more controversial is that it has been revealed that Rudy Guede had committed no less than six separate crimes within the space of a little more than month before the murder of Meredith Kercher. Apparently these crimes were completely ignored by the Italian authorities who refused to charge him (Express - Killer of Meredith Kercher's crimes were ignored). If the authorities had actually charged Guede as they should have done it is an undeniable fact that Meredith Kercher would never have lost her life on the night of 1 November 2007.
For example on 27 October 2007, just five days before the murder, Rudy Guede had broken into a nursery school in Milan. The police were called and when they searched Guede’s backpack they found a knife with a 40cm blade he had stolen from the kitchen. He was also carrying a computer he had recently taken from a legal office in Perugia (Wikispaces - Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito). However Guede was never formally charged by the authorities of Milan who merely sent him back to Perugia. The behaviour of the authorities in Perugia was also just as lax. Guede was allowed to return the stolen computer to the law office it had been taken from in Perugia accompanied by the apology that Guede had bought it quite legally and hadn’t realised it had been stolen.
A crime scene photo from the villa where Meredith Kercher and Amanda Knox had been living showing the broken window and the rock on the floor.
The legal office in Perugia in question had been broken into on the night of 13 October 2007 and Guede had apparently used the exact same method of breaking a window with a rock that had been used to break into the student’s villa in Perugia on the night of 1 November (True Justice for Meredith Kercher - The Timeline for Events). A computer, a mobile phone and an electric printer had been taken.
But why could it have been that the authorities had treated Guede so leniently as this? It has been suggested that Guede at the time may have been working as a police informer and this had been the reason why the authorities were so reluctant in charging him (Express - Killer of Meredith Kercher's crimes were ignored). Eye witnesses had been willing to come to court to testify to the fact that they had seen Guede stealing property from their premises and yet the police still had failed to bring the appropriate charges against him (examiner.com - Details the public may not know about Rudy Guede (Part 2)).
Amanda Knox tweets after her reconviction. The Italian words reads, "We are innocent."
It also appears that Guede had psychological issues. It has been stated by the authorities that Guede suffers from a Fugue State, a psychogenic dissociative condition akin to multiple personality disorder (Raffaele Sollecito.org - The Known Story of Rudy Guede author Patrick King). People suffering from the Fugue State may temporarily develop an alternate persona and wander around for hours or even days and weeks on end and have absolutely no memory of what they had been doing during this interval when they eventually return to normal (Wikipedia - Fugue state). Apparently Guede was even known have episodes where he would crawl around on all fours and bark like a dog. It is considered that Fugue State is almost always the result of childhood physical or sexual abuse.
Guede was also known to have a problem with sleep walking. He frequently slept on the floor of his friends’ apartment and his friends quickly became aware of his night time wanderings. During the middle of the night he would be seen giving imaginary tutorials while using a wooden dresser as a blackboard and during these lessons he would spontaneously change between the Italian and English languages. While at home Guede would always hide his keys from himself to avoid wandering the streets at night and awakening miles from his home.
The student villa where Meredith Kercher and Amanda Knox had been living.
Another peculiar twist in the story of Rudy Guede is that for a time he became the adopted son of one of the wealthiest families in Perugia (Raffaele Sollecito.org - The Known Story of Rudy Guede author Patrick King) . While playing basketball he became friendly with the son of Paolo Caporali, the owner of Liomatic Vending Company, and Guede eventually became quite friendly with the whole of the family. Caporali’s children persuaded their father to adopt and look after Guede until he became 18. At the time he was 16 and his circumstances weren’t as good as they could have been. Guede was treated just like another member of the family and was even driven to school by a chauffeur. However Guede never did very well at school and the job Caporali got him as a gardener also proved a failure. Further complaints about Guede’s behaviour eventually led to Caporali turning his back on him for good and he was forced to leave the household.
In addition to the lenient manner in which the authorities had handled Rudy Guede, the case is also highly controversial as a result of the extremely rough treatment handed out to Raffaele Sollecito and Amanda Knox. Allegations have been made by Sollecito that the police had attempted to bribe him to give false evidence against Knox (Express - Raffaele Sollecito asked 'to frame Amanda Knox' and feared she would do the same). Apparently he had been approached by members of his own family, fellow inmates and by a prison guard who had attempted to pressurize him into taking up the deal. Allegedly the police told Sollecito he would be released if he agreed to testify falsely against Knox but if he refused he would spend the rest of his life in jail. They suggested to Sollecito that he create a completely false story that he was actually asleep at the time the crime took place so the authorities could solely blame Knox for what happened. The father of Sollecito has supported his son’s allegations that such approaches were made.
Amanda Knox's autobiography, 'Waiting to be Heard' details some of the unfair treatment she received at the hands of the authorties.
Amanda Knox has also suffered rough treatment at the hands of the authorities while in prison. In an apparent ploy to obtain more information from Knox, the authorities created the false story that she was HIV positive (metro - Amanda Knox was told she had HIV, feared she would die in jail). Knox completely believed the story at the time and thought that she would end up dying in prison. Her lawyers hold the authorities had used this as a method to obtain a complete list of all her past sexual contacts. However such information wasn’t really of a direct relevance to the case and of course the method used was completely cynical.
It is also an unfortunate fact that even more unanswered questions can be found in the forensic case presented by the prosecution. Each of the key forensic points raised in the persecution’s case can be shown to be either completely erroneous or misleading. It leaves you with the overwhelming impression that this must surely go beyond just pure incompetence? Unfortunately it is beyond the scope of this present article to discuss each of these issues and I can only recommend the reader look at the website Injustice in Perugia. This website is very good at addressing each of the key forensic points in the prosecution’s case, is authored by fully qualified persons and is accompanied by colour photographs where relevant taken from inside of the villa.