Amanda Knox appeals conviction for accusing innocent barman of murder

Amanda Knox appeals Italian conviction for defaming innocent barman who she falsely accused of murdering Brit student Meredith Kercher in 2007

• Knox’s claims led to the innocent father-of-two being arrested and held by police

Amanda Knox has appealed her conviction for defaming a barman who she falsely accused of murdering a British student.

Knox, 36, initially told investigators innocent barman Patrick Lumumba had killed Meredith Kercher, 21, by slitting her throat and leaving her bleeding to death.

She had claimed she had seen the Congolese barman at the house she shared with Meredith, 21, in the Italian hilltop town of Perugia in November 2007.

It led to the innocent father-of-two being arrested and held by police for two weeks before being released without charge.

Key to his freedom was testimony from a Swiss lecturer who had visited his Le Chic bar the night of the murder, and who had kept a receipt showing Lumumba was working at the time.

Amanda Knox (pictured at her parents’ home in Seattle in 2015) has appealed her conviction for defaming a barman who she falsely accused of murdering a British student

The innocent father-of-two was arrested and held by police for two weeks before being released without charge

Knox has filed the appeal to definitively annul the sentence on the basis of a European Court of Human Rights ruling that her defence rights were violated during the initial investigation, judicial sources said.

The American was initially convicted of murdering Meredith and served three years with her then boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito before their convictions were quashed.

However, her conviction for slander was not dismissed and she was given an additional year taking the sentence to three years, but she was released for time served.

She said she had made the statement implicating Lumumba – who was the manager of a bar where she worked at the time of the murder because she was ‘stressed and agitated’ during police questioning.

She had wrongly told detectives that she had ‘covered’ her ears to drown out Meredith’s screams while he murdered her.

British student Meredith Kercher was in Italy as part of her Univeristy of Leeds degree course and had only been in the country for less than two months before she was murdered

Lumumba, who has since moved to Krakow in Poland with his wife and two children, has filed to oppose the suit from Seattle-born and based Knox, who recently got pregnant with her second child.

Speaking from there he said:’Through my legal team I will be opposing Amanda Knox’s request because I wish to respect truth and justice and the memory of Meredith Kercher.’

The case is due to be heard in chambers by Italy’s Court of Cassation in Rome later this year and Knox is not expected to attend as she is pregnant.

Ivory Coast drifter Rudy Guede was recently released from prison after serving 16 years for murder but has continued to protest his innocence.

Meredith, from Coulsdon, south London, was in Italy as part of her Univeristy of Leeds degree course and had only been in the country for less than two months before she was murdered.

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