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For Amanda Knox, freedom comes at hefty cost
Amanda Knox left Seattle as an anonymous junior attending Washington's flagship public university, and on Tuesday she returned as someone whose release from an Italian jail made her internationally recognizable.
But her freedom came with a price, CBS News correspondent Hattie Kauffman reports.
The 24-year-old's life turned around dramatically Monday when an Italian appeals court threw out her conviction in the sexual assault and fatal stabbing of her British roommate. On Tuesday, photos of Amanda Knox crying in the courtroom after the verdict was read appeared on the front pages of newspapers in Italy, the U.S., Britain and around the world.
Special Section: The Appeal Trial of Amanda Knox
Amanda Knox: I'm overwhelmed right now
Amanda Knox's alleged accomplice wants retrial
Knox's first challenge will be repaying the more than $1 million in legal debts her family piled up in the past two years.
Amanda Knox comes home to America
Her parents each took out second mortgages and drained retirement accounts to pay for her lawyers. Elizabeth Huff, Knox's grandmother, took out a $250,000 loan to help pay bills, a burden she welcomed.
"We are happy; we are elated," Huff said. "I can't tell you how happy we are."
With the international media frenzy that surrounded Knox's trial continuing on the journey home -- from her flight out of Rome to her landing in Seattle -- there's no sign the interest in Knox or her story will let up soon. That could open up an avenue for the family to pay off those debts.
Amanda Knox not guilty of murder
Sources close to Knox tell CBS News that she began to write a memoir while in prison. That could be worth millions to publishers eager to profit on one of the most sensational international legal cases in memory.
On CBS' "The Early Show" Wednesday, Knox's U.S. attorney, Theodore Simon, said her writings weren't discussed during her reunion with family and friends Tuesday night.(Watch at left)
"I'm sure there's going to be a lot more to come, but I can tell you very candidly none of those things were discussed last night in any way," Simon told "Early Show" co-anchor Erica Hill. "In fact, Amanda is much more about asking people how they are as opposed to explaining herself, and it was only after much time and some curiosity where others started asking some questions about her prison experience, and when everyone hears about all of those I think they are really going to be really amazed."
As for Knox's future, her father, Curt Knox, said she would like to return to the University of Washington at some point to finish her degree.
For now, he's apprehensive about what four years in prison may have done to his daughter, though there are no immediate plans for her to get counseling. "What's the trauma ... and when will it show up, if it even shows up?" he told The Associated Press. "She's a very strong girl, but it's been a tough time for her."
For now, Knox has just one priority.
"My family's the most important thing to me right now, and I just want to go be with them," Knox told reporters Tuesday night. "Thank you for being there for me."
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Amanda you have been through alot for one lifetime, now it seems you have a new chance at life.
Even though your defense has cost lots of money, you will have to take advantage of your fame to help pay for the costs it has drained your family and friends of.
In order to do that, you need to write a book, with oversight to recuperate the losses, It would be an honor to have you sign it at a bookstore should you undertake this venture.....look for you in San Francisco....dont forget to wear a flower in your hair.
Your sycophantic drool concerns a convicted murderer. Rather than coming out with your ridiculously embarrassing gush, educate yourself and read the following court report:
http://truejustice.org/ee/documents/perugia/TheMasseiReport.pdf
There is a reason the American journalists that attended court every day of the trial came to the conclusion Knox was guilty and had received a fair trial. They had the benefit of knowing the full facts; American papers have been intentionally misleading.
I truly believe there are Americans that would still profess Knox's innocence even if there were video evidence clearly showing her commit the murder of poor Meredith Kercher (the ONLY victim here).
I'm curious what, if anything, she plans to do about what Patrick Lumumba's losses. We don't really know whether Amanda was involved in what happened to Meredith, or to what extent. What the verdict says is that there's reasonable doubt, not that she was completely uninvolved.
Lumumba, however, is totally innocent. He has a wife and family; he spent time in jail & lost his business thanks to the false accusations of this "sweet, lovely" young girl.
We can just be glad the Italian police and prosecutors eventually realized that Lumumba had nothing to
do with it. It would have been so easy to lay it all on "the black guy." Who's to say that in the US that's not exactly what would have happened, if he had been accused by a "sweet, lovely" young (white) girl.
Amanda herself can be grateful to the Italian judicial system, which accorded her leeway in her
appeal that no U.S. judicial system would do.
It's ironic that so many Americans took it on themselves to bash the Italian legal system over the Knox
case. American appellate courts don't review the evidentiary issues from the trial court, or allow defendants to present new evidentiary material. American appellate courts look at the lower court transcript to see if there were any procedural errors. Amanda is damn luck this all happened in Italy, not the US.
1. Ms Knox was not on trial for acting irresponsibly as a college student;
2. She was not on trial for premarital sex or promiscuity;
3. She was not on trial for being drunk or high at the time of the murder;
4. She was not on trial for how she appeared to behave after the loss of her roommate;
5. She was not on trial for shopping for lingerie;
6. She was not on trial for dating a rich Italian boy;
7. She was not on trial for the feelings of the Kercher family as they dealt with the horrible loss of their daughter who was raped and killed by Rudy (again Rudy's guilt proven by uncontested PCR and physical bloody pawprints under the body);
8. She was not on trial for being an American during the Bush presidency;
9. She was not on trial for her skin color or ethnicity;
10. Ms Knox was on trial for murder and conspiracy to murder but there was not a shred, not a single solitary shred, of robust physical or testimony evidence that she committed either crime. In fact, it remains unclear after a bumbling police investigation whether she was in her apartment that night at all.
Let us hypothesize (in the absence of evidence) that she was actually present at the apartment that night, for example sleeping off a stupor in her own room, when Rudy killed Ms Kercher. Even this extreme hypothetical case would be insufficient to convict Ms Knox for homicide in a rational courtroom. To convict of a crime there must be some evidence that one committed the crime and, ideally, some plausible motive. But in kangaroni court, we get convictions based on the size of a half-footprint or leaving too much of your own DNA in your own bathroom.... or because the prosecutor wants to convict you for political gain...
Please dear readers, leave Ms Knox in peace and carefully reconsider your plans to visit Italy alone (especially if you don't speak the language fluently).
I know your news is warped in her favour but investigate the facts properly and it is clear that she is guilty as sin. The one piece of good news, as I said, is that she is no longer infecting beautiful Italy with her stench.
Meredith's murder is one crime. What was done to Amanda and Rafaelle is a separate second crime.
The only good thing to come from the perverted over-throwing of the original, and sound, verdict, is that she is no longer infecting Italian soil. Let the Americans have the filthy, disgusting, evil C**T back again. A leopard cannot change its' spots, she can go for a nice Amercian girl the next time around. Her crime was driven by seething jealousy, I am certain there are plenty of American girls vastly more attractive than her (I for one find her plain at the very best) for her to be jealous of.
May God bless the Kercher family;
And God Damn the National and Local Corporate fictitious and Greedy Media, who only care about Profits and repeat readership, not the truth.
Amanda is a Murdering ****, and anyone who really looks into this case will come to the same conclusion; but never the sheep who want so desperately to believe that people are inherently good, and practically incapable of Murder-Pathetic.
Please take a look at an authentic innocent victim of the totally corrupt United States Judicial System, Virginia Soentgen, on YouTube, via the YouTube video:
THE LYNCHING OF VIRGINIA SOENTGEN:
before you ever critizie Italian Justice again. All lawyers, Judges and cops are corrupt, that's reality, wake up, but that doesn't mean that everyone is innocent.
Or check out our Photobucket.com presentation at:
www.Photobucket.com/albums/a288/Psoentgen/
Very truly yours,
Paul J. Soentgen, III.
Psoentgen@aol.com
Knox is as guilty as sin. The only people who believe the **** storm her parents created are those who are mentally impaired, yourself included.
However, it must be a massive relief for the Italians that the creature is no longer in their midst, infected and stinking. Knox may even lend you her filthy vibrator, the one she happily left lying around in the communal parts of the cottage, the disgusting **** that she is.
Against Amanda: a partial bloody footprint that is "too small to fit a man"; vague, self-conflicting testimony from the one person who clearly was in the room when victim died (Rudy)
Perugia, Italy Justice: Loss of four years of a promising young life. Loss to her family of four years and over a million dollars that must be repaid by selling her name and personal experiences to the mass media mills. International embarrassment from sensational release of personal information (smear campaign). The actual murderer (Rudy) is given a reduced and pathetic sentence by the local legal system to justify its continued harassment of the Knox family. The state prosecutor (a known criminal) tries to bring charges against Amanda's family for supporting her too vigorously.
Conclusions: 1. The book of Italian police work is as thin as the history book of Italian military victories; 2. Don't visit Italy alone if you are thinking about a vacation for your children; and 3. Thank goodness for the polymerase chain reaction.
Carry on thinking you are the centre of everything; Knox is only back at home because Americans are tasteless bullies who cannot accept the truth. In fact, stay away from Europe in its entirety - you will NOT be missed.
Moreover Amanda Knox barely knew Rudy Guede. They wer not friends, bare acquaintances at most. Raffaele Sollecito never met Guede.
The bottom line fact is this case is a Mignini fabricated frame up. Amanda and Raffaele are innocent.