“48 HOURS MYSTERY” LAUNCHES ITS OWN INVESTIGATION INTO THE CASE AGAINST AMANDA KNOX FOR THE MURDER OF HER PERUGIA ROOMMATE MEREDITH KERCHER
“THIS IS A RAILROAD JOB FROM HELL. THERE’S NOT A SHRED OF EVIDENCE PUTTING THIS GIRL AT THAT MURDER SCENE…[BUT] THEY’VE GOTTA CONVICT HER NOW OR THEY LOOK LIKE FOOLS,” SAYS PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR ON "48 HOURS MYSTERY" – SATURDAY, APRIL 12, 2008
Although she has not officially been charged, 20 year-old Amanda Knox sits in a maximum security Italian prison, a suspect at the center of an Italian murder and sex mystery. Knox was enrolled for a year of study at the University for Foreigners in Perugia, Italy, a picturesque town north of Rome. Now, the University of Washington honor student, along with her Italian boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito, 24, and former student Rudy Guede, is being held for the slaying of her English roommate, Meredith Kercher. But a 48 HOURS MYSTERY investigation raises serious doubts about Knox’s involvement. “This is a railroad job from hell. There’s not a shred of evidence putting this girl at the murder scene,” says Chicago private investigator Paul Ciolino, who 48 HOURS MYSTERY took to Italy.
On November 2, 2007 Kercher was found in her bedroom, semi-naked with her throat slashed. Knox initially told police that she arrived home that morning to find the front door open, blood on the floor and no answer from Kercher’s locked room. But within days Knox went from being a witness to a murder suspect. At the end of a 14-hour police interrogation Knox said that she and a local bar owner went to the apartment that night. The bar owner had sex with Kercher and then murdered her, a story that later proved false.
Knox’s story has spread around the world, first dubbed a tale of kinky sex and drugs and now a case of robbery gone wrong. Ciolino and 48 HOURS unearthed a number of inconsistencies that raise questions about the accuracy of the police theory of what happened that night. Ciolino even goes so far as to call it “a police generated fairy tale.”
“They’re so desperate to make a case against this kid that they’ll do anything,” says Ciolino. “They’ve put so much into Amanda Knox, they’ve gotta convict her now or they look like fools.”
While Meredith Kercher’s death was a violent tragedy, skepticism surrounds the case against Amanda Knox, who may also be an innocent victim in this crime.
Peter Van Sant reports on 48 HOURS MYSTERY: "A Long Way From Home," on Saturday, April 12 (10:00-11:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network. This broadcast is produced by Joe Halderman Douglas Longhini and Chris Young. Peter Schweitzer is the senior producer and Al Briganti is the executive editor. Susan Zirinsky is the executive producer.
Editors' Note: Click here to watch a preview of the broadcast. CBS News 48 HOURS MYSTERY broadcasts are now available on iTunes.com.
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