Slog News & Arts

Line Out

Music & Nightlife

« Pot: Good for Teenagers | Nepotism Watch »

Wednesday, November 7, 2007

The Realm of the Senseless

posted by on November 7 at 10:42 AM

Bad news from Perugia, Italy:

Student Meredith Kercher was killed for refusing violent group sex with her female flatmate and two male friends, Italian detectives said yesterday.

Her American pal Amanda Knox, 20, allegedly broke down and confessed after she, boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito and Congolese bar owner Patrick Lumumba Diya were dramatically arrested.

Amanda Knox?

Meredith was studying at university and there was a university atmosphere, free and open. Lots of people came and went through her house and she was unfortunately at the crossroads when this group came together.” Yesterday it emerged that Knox, of Seattle, Washington, had penned sick stories about sexual violence on the MySpace website. One, posted last December and entitled Baby Brother, graphically describes a rape. Another tells of a model being ravaged by a man with “big rough hands”.

The end?

“In the end she just collapsed. What she told us helped bring the case to a close, but it was only a matter of time.” Knox, Sollecito and married dad-of-one Diya—Knox’s boss—were all led away from a police station in handcuffs.

Question of the day?

Does anyone know Amanda Knox? What is her story? As for Patrice Lumumba, a progressive African leader who was murdered by one of the worst dictators of the 20th century…

lumumba-1.jpg

…his name is cursed.

RSS icon Comments

1

Knox, not Cox.

Posted by Carollani | November 7, 2007 11:01 AM
2

She's a murdering bitch. That's all I care to know. She can rot.

Posted by Mr. Poe | November 7, 2007 11:03 AM
3

Poe, when you murder someone I'm going to be just as mean to you as you are to Amanda Knox.

Posted by Carollani | November 7, 2007 11:05 AM
4

Didn't she post on the Stranger ads?

Posted by Will in Seattle | November 7, 2007 11:07 AM
5

@4 old meme. think of a new one.

Posted by seattle98104 | November 7, 2007 11:12 AM
6

cox? interesting typo (now corrected).

Posted by infrequent | November 7, 2007 11:17 AM
7

Oh please, Carollani. Replace Amanda with a guy and you'd be saying how disgusting they all are. But since she's a cute 20-year-old girl, you're defending her innocence until she's proven guilty.

Posted by Mr. Poe | November 7, 2007 11:19 AM
8

@7,

I'm not. Fry her.

Posted by keshmeshi | November 7, 2007 11:23 AM
9

She's got a facebook page with a link to her myspace page. Not that it matters. But it's up there for the morbidly curious. The British press, especially the tabloids, have been all over them already, re-publishing videos and photos she put up online.

Posted by Trevor | November 7, 2007 11:29 AM
10

All serial killers are entitled to a presumption of innocence.

At least until they Kill Again.....

Posted by NapoleonXIV | November 7, 2007 11:32 AM
11

I'll defend her. We don't know the whole story yet, or exactly what her involvement was, and I'm highly skeptical of early media reports. And I'd have exactly the same skepticism if she was a man.

Posted by tsm | November 7, 2007 11:37 AM
12

Typical American girl next door goes off to college in Italy, gets involved in violent group sex, kills her roommate. Anyone getting turned on by this?

Posted by rotten666 | November 7, 2007 11:39 AM
13

Besides me, that is.

Posted by Rotten666 | November 7, 2007 11:40 AM
14

sounds like a few good spankings might help straighten her out.

Posted by Mr. Pink | November 7, 2007 11:42 AM
15
Posted by Rose Red | November 7, 2007 12:00 PM
16

Her story is less shocking than it is overwrought teenage "art".

Posted by jewritto | November 7, 2007 12:05 PM
17

She served me chai lattes a couple times at World Cup. I thought she was pretty. She never tried to kill me.

Posted by pox | November 7, 2007 12:06 PM
19

Charles,
Your effort to remember Lumumba here seem to be falling on deaf ears. We really should have remember Lumumba day to remind us what is and what could perhaps have been.

Posted by mirror | November 7, 2007 12:32 PM
20

"violent group sex"? as in, the roommate assented to group sex, but drew the line at the violence?

particulars, please.

Posted by max solomon | November 7, 2007 12:55 PM
21

i smell sensational media bullshit.

its like HOSTEL but in REAL LIFE!

smell it?

Posted by Cale | November 7, 2007 1:08 PM
22

Does that mean she didn't consent to having her throat cut?

Posted by pox | November 7, 2007 1:10 PM
23

I know Amanda, albeit not particularly well. I know her mother quite well; I worked with her for several years. This whole thing doesn't add up to me. Amanda's an absolutely ordinary college kid, a little brighter than most, a little better student than most. She wrote a couple of mildly racy stories on her Myspace page. my god, the horror, burn her at the stake.

No, this smells to me, it really does. It smells like a frame job. The Italian cops were desperate to put a "case closed" on this file (because it's a high-profile case internationally, due to the sex-murder-American connection), and they found some inconsistencies in what the three people said, and badgered Amanda and frightened her until she basically admitted that she heard scary things happening when Lumumba - who is not related to Patrice Lumumba, by the way - was in Meredith's room. If she did, indeed, hear scary things and not contact the police, then she may be an accessory, but she is not a "murdering bitch" as one person put it. That I firmly believe.

Man, trial by tabloid. Guilty until proven innocent. Puke.

Something stinks in Perugia.

Posted by I know Amanda | November 7, 2007 1:44 PM
24

I knew Amanda, too.

Posted by then she slit my fucking throat | November 7, 2007 1:59 PM
25

I went to middle school with Amanda. I am extremely shocked by these allegations. Amanda was easily one of the sweetest girls in her class, very smart and athletic as well. I was a year behind her and looked up to her as a role model. I believe that Amanda has been scared into making a false confession. There is no way this girl could have possibly committed murder.

Posted by friend | November 7, 2007 2:33 PM
26

my brother's best friend dated her, I met her once. Seemed nice enough. Its big talk for junction area west Seattle families. Her family is known around here.

Posted by mac j | November 7, 2007 2:38 PM
27

I was just reading her myspace, and as I was on there it was signed into. Then the blog was deleted, then her friends, then some of her information, then it was made private.

Posted by D | November 7, 2007 2:52 PM
28

She was just so nice!! How could a girl like that ever possibly take part in something this horrendous?!!

Posted by everybody always says that | November 7, 2007 4:23 PM
29

Posted by *YAWN* | November 7, 2007 4:24 PM
30

yeah i knew her. Had coffee with her a couple years ago. Nice. She almost broke my friends ankle playing soccer last year. Not nice. Murderer? No. Liar to eager Italian police? Probably.

Guess? boyfriend with axe and mummy costume—and she's covering up, or refusing to believe it.

Either way, yikes.

Posted by knewher | November 7, 2007 4:47 PM
31

p.s. I really hope POE gets pwned on this one.

Posted by knewher | November 7, 2007 4:51 PM
32

-@ 9, tried to find her on facebook, but it may well be that they have made her profile private as was done w/ myspace.

-public appearances are just that.

-but yeah, i do agree, something doesn't seem right.

Posted by from east of miss | November 7, 2007 4:58 PM
33

Lumumba how we missed you, The Congo just went downhill after they got you

Posted by vooodooo84 | November 7, 2007 5:24 PM
34

Knox was an intern here at our office in Berlin (at the German parliament...) for some weeks. Seemed to be a rather disorganised, friendly in a shallow way (hmmm yeah, as most Americans seem to be from a German perspective, to be honest) and called in sick (read: hungover) quite a number of times.

Posted by Suryo | November 8, 2007 12:38 AM
35

My very close friend is all broken up about this (close friend of a close friend of Knox; my friend was even called by UK papers- thanks Facebook). I've met Amanda a few times, but I've met a few other people who've ended up doing terrible things and being the victim of terrible things.

My own misgivings about this entire situation are how dramatic they are, how much they play out like an episode of SVU. The Italian authorities (and major news distributors) are trying really, really hard to connect sexual tastes to this crime. I wonder how quickly I could be wrapped up into a murder of jealousy because I'm not monogamous. Maybe a gay man will murder a straight man who doesn't want to have sex with him (or somehow visa versa? whaaa?) To play these absurd personal theoretical dramas in real life oversimplify the motivations of murder.

On the other hand it is because I know someone who knows her that I try to rationalize the murder. I imagine various cable news networks feel the same way when they find a "shocking" report on how another innocent person disappeared in wherever. They just happen to be white women. A lot. Or college students, valiant businessmen, etc etc etc etc etc etc. I could go on for days. I somehow doubt my friends in other parts of the country will even register this story.

I aspire to one day have my life reduced to and judged as such.

(Mr. Poe, you keep democracy and freedom alive, keep on truckin'!)

Posted by cooks | November 8, 2007 1:00 AM
36

It sounds to me like she was less a willing participant and more a passive party that stood by and did nothing during the attack and perhaps helped cover it up afterwards.

Doesn't excuse her behavior, if fact you have to wonder about the humanity of a person who sits there and does nothing while her friend and roommate is being attacked and murdered in the next room.

Posted by bob | November 8, 2007 1:19 AM
37

The fact is she was a participant in the unsavoury act that eventually resulted in the death of beautiful English girl meredith.

The reason police took her in was due to DNA evidence: Long hair, similiar to amandas found in the hands and fingernails of the dead girl, blood stain shoe prints, matching amandas. Police took her in and she cracked, now she is lying to cover her back.

She alongside the others detained are pure evil. She is as guilty as hell.

A non guilty person does not have inconsistencies in their information. Amandas information to the police kept changing like the British weather. Guilty, Guilty Guilty.

Posted by Mary | November 8, 2007 8:33 AM
38

@37, I've seen the media fuck up the details of crime cases enough to not trust the initial reports. And that goes double for anything coming from the British media.

Posted by tsm | November 8, 2007 10:01 AM
39

Fair point 38. The media, from whatever country can sensationalise a story but they cannot create or make one. To do so would could lead to allegations of slander or defamation. The media cannot just randomly create a story from nothing. An individual/s need to have created the story for which the media will then bump up and sensatinalise.

Secondly you cannnot dismiss DNA. Amanda will have to explain how her hair and skin sample came to be under the fingernails of Merdiths in the same way the men involved will have to explain how their seman came to be on her body parts.

Finally, Amanda, was not the only flat mate or friend known to Meridith yet her story was the only inconsistent one out of the others. Go figure! Do you see any of Meridiths other friends or flat mates in custody, I dont!

Evil comes in many shapes and sizes. Do not be fooled.

Posted by Mary | November 8, 2007 1:26 PM
40

Open Forum for the friends and family of Amanda Knox

If you feel like the media has portrayed Amanda unfairly and you want to defend her, Northwest Afternoon is offering a platform on Monday morning for Amanda’s friends and family to say whatever they’d like to defend her. If you’re interested please call or email right away. The segment will be taped from 9:30-11 AM.

Thank you,

Jillian Derpack
Northwest Afternoon
140 4th Avenue N.
Seattle, WA 98109
tel: 206.404.4309
jderpack@komotv.com

Posted by Northwest Afternoon | November 8, 2007 1:42 PM
41

news coming in says the American bitch held Meredith down -fingerprints in blood were found on her wrists matching DNA.
The case is open and Knox is far from innocent.

Posted by rollocks | November 8, 2007 3:28 PM
42

RIP Meredith -a beautiful English Rose may all those responsible get their just deserves.

Posted by rollocks | November 8, 2007 3:37 PM
43

This makes me go cold every time I read about it or hear about it. I cant even imagine what this poor girl went through before she died, RIP Meredith. Rotten666 you are sick, this is turning you on?? I think maybe you should be arrested, it sounds like you are capable of something like this, freak!

Posted by gavman | November 9, 2007 6:31 AM
44

Heh Mac J,

Or anyone else on here for that matter.
Would your friend who dated Amanda consider speaking with a member of the British press about their experiences.
Anyone who would like to talk further please e-mail steve.hay@hotmail.co.uk

Posted by Steve | November 9, 2007 9:14 AM
45

more details are coming out -she took part in over a two hour torture and rape of Meredith.Stop defending Knox she has the hallmark of a Psychotic killer who takes sadistic joy in manipulation of other people.
Shame she will be tried in Italy -she deserves the chair.

Posted by rollocks | November 10, 2007 11:16 AM
46

I couldnt agree with you more rollocks. However, I feel the chair would be to good for her, it would be over and done with. Why not throw her in jail and throw away the key. Let her suffer each day reflecting on her evil actions.

Posted by Mary | November 10, 2007 2:33 PM
47

The presumption and misplaced self-importance of someone who feels qualified, based on facts presented by the media, to seriously condemn Amanda Knox as a killer utterly confuses me. I realize that this is an anonymous forum for criticism of news-related issues, but the passion and strange certainty with which some of the comments accredit this murder to Amanda Knox seems bizarre and reprehensible.

Posted by shame on you | November 10, 2007 9:12 PM
48

More pointedly to Mary:
There some glaring flaws in your reasoning in comment #39. There is a difference between finding long strands of hair at the scene of a crime, and having hard DNA evidence. Additionally, different countries have different laws. What counts as slander and defamation here in America does not necessarily apply internationally.

I realize that by going through the trouble of replying to you at all I am being a jerk. I feel a little sorry; maybe you don't realize that you are being a creep. I just want you to realize that the certainty you publicly place in your understanding of events that occurred across the world from you is, in fact, creepy.

Posted by shame on you | November 10, 2007 9:28 PM
49

burn in hell Amanda.

Posted by rollocks | November 11, 2007 6:14 AM
50

burn in hell Amanda.

Posted by rollocks | November 11, 2007 6:14 AM
51

SHAME ON YOU -Is the right name for you.
Mary was just putting her point of view and you attack her with immature and childish jibes.
The facts are now emerging and we can clearly see that Amanda was involved in this gastly murder to satify her perverted sexual mind.Her blog stories were fantasy that she could not control and wanted to explore.Pyshotic killers start with such fantasies as do other people it might be said but the difference being with most they remain just that -perverted fantasy.
Amanda's DNA has been found all over the murder scene -Meredith's face to name just one.
Her boyfriends shoes prints in bllod on the floor and bed next to the victim's body.
There has been no evidence found of the African's DNA found at the scene -is he a victim of a frame-up?
But, one thing is almost sure is Amanda is involved.

Posted by rollocks | November 11, 2007 7:36 AM
52

if the press and police leaks are to be believed surely the fact amanda and boyfriend
were drinking and doped may help to explain how this once sweet girl has had a character transformation like the manson family followers

Posted by mister t | November 11, 2007 3:00 PM
53

On her MySpace site Knox claims to be a “Nazi on the inside and her stories said to be simply "racy" above were about violent rape fantasies. Hardly a "once sweet" girl.

Posted by mark | November 12, 2007 6:12 AM
54

Well said Mark.

There is nothing "sweet" about her.

Posted by rollocks | November 12, 2007 11:17 AM
55

I don't get, Rollocks. What is your investment in this story? An employee of the stranger paid to provoke discussion and increase returning viewers to the site?

Posted by shame on you | November 12, 2007 12:02 PM
56

shame on you : no I am nothing to do with the site whatso ever.
I came on as I came across the site and did not like the comments being made.Evidence already leaked shows that Amanda is not innocent and now it is a case of finding out how much and the degree she was involved.
An innocent girl was killed that night, and it is everyone's interest that the culprit -or more likely the culprits are convicted.I believe they have in this case been caught but it is just a case of proving it in court.

Posted by rollocks | November 12, 2007 1:30 PM
57

News out over weekend says that CCTV pictures show Knox going into Meredith's apartment on the day of the killing.The significance being, that Knox claimed she did not go anywhere near there that day as she was at her boyfriends.

Posted by rollocks | November 12, 2007 1:51 PM
58

Who knows what really happened that night. The Italian police will probably say more once the DNA test results are in. Amanda Knox certainly has lost all credibility by changing her stories many times, with the third version being conflicted by CCTV pictures showing she was at the house around the time of the crime. In her MySpace blog, she said she "freaked out and cried" when she thought her uncle Uve in Hamburg would be mad at her for leaving the Bundestag internship on a whim after he had gone through so much trouble to set it up for her. Later she wrote that "fortunately", he's a "nice uncle" and everything was fine again. She comes across as a shallow, immature and emotionally weak college girl who wants the world to see her as a sexy, strong diva. Walking away from a Bundestag assignment is like walking away from a White House internship. So many hardworking and ambitious students would drool over the opportunity to work with politicians at that high of a level, yet Amanda writes about the Bundestag as if it was an item on the menu that she can order any day and send back to the kitchen because it didn't please her palette. This is an insult to the German government. What a stupid career move and such ingratitude to her uncle! Maybe she really couldn't put the pieces together to see that she was hanging out with the wrong crowd or maybe she thought it was cool to be flirting with danger. This is the typical distasteful American behavior that Europeans have come to expect. There won't be a second chance for her now.

Posted by Soccer Fan | November 12, 2007 6:47 PM
59

Rollocks

It's so not worth trying to explain yourself to some of these hard headed 'Free Amanda Fanatics'.

Having said that, we do not have to do anything, I'm just sitting back and watching Amanda and her continued lies unfolding. I hear even her own Lawyer is getting frustrated.

You are right, CCTV, have put her in the frame, she says she was not even there, that is before saying she was and had covered her ears.. It's all so boring!!!!

My thoughts are rightly with the dead girl. Meridith, for those Hard Core 'Free Amanda fanatics' - Remember her?

Yep, she's definately involved! Key, Throw, far far away!!!!!!

Oh and Shame on You, if you are not happy with whats being said, you really do not have to return to this blog. Honest.

Posted by Mary | November 12, 2007 10:45 PM
60

oh Mary, I don't mind explaining myself -it was a valid question that I may be a provocateur -but I am not.Just like to see justice done.I can understand the "our girl" would never do such a thing brigade as they think they are being loyal to a local girl.But, evidence is stacking against such blind loyalty. From my end, it seems to me that they should be grieving for the world's loss of a beautiful intelligent girl in Meredith,she already had a degree and was trying to better herself even more.Bless her I hope her killer or killers are convicted quickly.

Posted by rollocks | November 13, 2007 12:16 PM
61

Amanda's DNA has been found on the bleached blade of the suspected knife that killed Meredith

Posted by rollocks | November 16, 2007 2:05 PM
62

I watched an Italian talk show last night on the case. The only person anyone dared to badmouth on the show was Amanda because she's the rich white American girl. She was the only one referred to as a pathological liar though her Italian boyfriend also changed his story a few times and Lumumba's alibi was not all that credible either. An Italian psychiatrist
said Amanda was a typical 'psychopath' and joked how it contrasted with the image of Americans in "Vacanze Romane'.
If he had made a comment like that about the Italin defendant he would never be able to work on Italian television again. If he made the same type of comment about Lumumba, he would be ostracized for appearing as a racist and we all know that there is no racism in Italy. (The Italian psychiatrist said so on an earlier show I saw)
Lumumba (he may very well be innocent- I don't know) had a group of backers claiming his innocenece. (It reminded me of a soccer match with people rooting on their co-nationals). One
Congolese diplomat got up and said that Amanda accused Patrik (Lumumba) because in America white girls always accuse black guys. (Maybe she was trying to get revenge for the OJ Simpson verdict).
Another Italian lady noted how cold Amanda was because she appeared serene in jail. Her Italian boyfriend was also serene but in his case that meant that he was innocent.
I'm not writing this to declare anyone's guilt or innocence and a lot of people have a tendency to protect one's own (family, country etc). But to achieve justice, I hope people manage to put aside their innate prejudices.

Posted by johnny | November 20, 2007 5:41 AM
63

Johnny I hear what you say, and of course everyone is innocent until proven guilty, but the problem is there is quite a lot of evidence against Amanda and her boyfriend.
I hear today (20/11/07) that Lumumba has been released as lack of evidence against him.A nigerian/Italian duel citizenship male has been arrested in Germany, by their police tipped off by Italian Police as he is belived to be the owner of the fingerprint found on a pillow.
So there you go they are still holding the Italian and now another black man with Italian citizenship -hardly seems racist or predjudist to me.
Amanda has been shown to be a liar (said she was not at the apartment of Meredith -when she was proven to be seen entering on the night of the killing by CCTV camera.) her DNA has been found on the suspected knife belonging to her boyfriend used in the killing.She had a blog story telling of the raping of a girl by two men -her boyfriend has comics depicting a girl on a bed stabbed with a knife.....
her boyfrinds shoe print is belived to have been found in the blood on the floor and next to the body on the bed.....
Come on, the evidence is stacking up against her and her boyfriend.The best outcome would be that the perpertrators of this grisly rape and murder are brought to book and Meredith's memory at least gets justice.

Posted by Johnny | November 20, 2007 3:14 PM

Comments Closed

In order to combat spam, we are no longer accepting comments on this post (or any post more than 14 days old).