- Knox and Raffaele Sollecito resentenced in the Meredith Kercher murder case
- Kercher was found stabbed in 2007 in a villa she rented with Knox in Perugia, Italy
- Knox and Sollecito’s 2009 murder convictions were overturned on appeal in 2011
- Legal expert tells CNN that it is unlikely the U.S. would allow Knox to be extradited to Italy
(CNN) — U.S. student Amanda Knox and her former Italian boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito have had their sentences in the murder case of British student Meredith Kercher upheld by an Italian court.
Knox, who is currently living in the United States, had her sentence increased to 28 years and six months. Sollecito, who returned to Italy during the trial, was sentenced to 25 years.
Why were Knox and Sollecito back on trial?
In 2009, they were convicted of killing Kercher, 21, who was found stabbed in November 2007 in the villa that she and Knox rented in the central Italian university town of Perugia.
Prosecutors say she was held down and stabbed after she rejected attempts by Knox, Sollecito and another man, Ivory Coast-born Rudy Guede, to involve her in a sex game. Guede is the only person still in jail for the murder, and many aspects of the case remained unexplained.
The convictions of Knox, from Seattle, and Sollecito were overturned in 2011 for “lack of evidence.” But Italy’s Supreme Court decided in March 2013 to retry the case, saying the jury that acquitted them didn’t consider all the evidence and discrepancies in testimony needed to be answered.
What was different about this trial?
Despite the ruling of the Supreme Court, there was little difference in the evidence or details of the case, and prior to Thursday’s verdict it was unclear how presiding judge Alessandra Nencini would rule.
The retrial in Florence has renewed questions about the effectiveness of Italy’s justice system, given doubts about the handling of the investigation and key pieces of evidence. When Knox was first convicted of murder, there was outcry in the U.S. that she was wrongfully convicted, based on shoddy evidence. When she was acquitted, there was nearly as much of an outcry in Italy that the courts had succumbed to American pressure.
Timeline: Kercher murder case
Did the defendants attend the retrial?
The retrial began on September 30 without either of them in court. Sollecito was in the Dominican Republic at the start of the retrial but returned to Italy.
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