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Oct

The Forgotten Victims #Knox Case

Written by Satish Sekar

Tragedies – the Primary Victims
There are no winners – just tragedies and several of them arising out of the appalling events that took place in Perugia on November 1st 2007. 21 year-old University of Leeds student Meredith Kercher fell in love with the scenic Italian city. Kercher was sexually assaulted, repeatedly stabbed and robbed that night. The precise time of death would become a contentious issue – one of many in this especially vexed case. It soon became a very high profile murder inquiry – one that put police under great pressure.

#Kercher's family lost her far too soon and in an extremely callous manner. Nobody deserved what happened to them, but they were to be cheated of justice as well, because this investigation did not reach the standard society has a right to expect and demand. Kercher will always be the primary and most important victim of this tragedy, but her fate and the ordeal her family has suffered has been pushed aside as the focus shifted to and then remained on her flatmate, 20 year-old American student Amanda Knox.

The original verdict and sentence of 26 years on Knox and 25 on her then boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito was welcomed by Kercher's family. They cannot understand how it could have been overturned earlier this week. Knox and Sollecito had long argued that the DNA evidence was unreliable – they were proved right. They also argued that the evidence against Ivorian-born Rudy Guede was compelling and that Guede alone was responsible, yet Guede's trial, which may have provided answers occurred behind closed doors – an absurd decision given the level of interest in Kercher's murder.

No Winners
Following her successful appeal, Knox returned to the USA, where public opinion is largely on her side. While some view her as murderess, most American pundits believe that she was a victim of a gross miscarriage of justice. She is already a celebrity and will remain one whether she likes it or not. There will be book offers, film deals and a frenzied bidding war for her story. Despite appealing for privacy while she readjusts to freedom, she's hardly likely to get that, but she at least will get a largely sympathetic hearing back home in the USA. Her former boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito will not be treated sympathetically, but he should be.

The case against him was particularly flimsy, but while both were jeered as they were freed in Italy, Knox has returned to a heroine's welcome in Seattle and Sollecito remains in Italy, without the support that she enjoys. He will remain plagued by this case, probably for the rest of his life, condemned as guilty by many Italians. The Kerchers want the search for answers to continue. They want to know exactly what happened – something that should have happened a long time ago. Knox and Sollecito need answers too.

Deprived of support and assistance Sollecito has no choice but to make the best of a terrible situation. Unlike Knox, he won't have the film offers, book deals and opportunity to sell his story. He's not as 'sexy' a story as Knox and despite his ordeal, he is already a forgotten victim. Had a bar been busier that night, he might not even have become a suspect at all and nor would Knox or an undeniably innocent man, Diya Patrick Lumumba.

The Innocent Bar Owner
While Knox gets used to freedom again, hopefully she will spare a thought for a Congolese bar owner, once good enough to offer her a job – a decision that ruined his life and helped rob him of his livelihood and briefly his liberty too. Lumumba could easily have been wrongly convicted of Kercher's murder. Headlines extracted from Knox's lurid account labelled him a savage murderer, but Lumumba was entirely innocent. He was fortunate, if that is the right word, as he had a solid alibi.

Lumumba was Knox's boss and had given her the night off at the last minute as trade was slow that night. Had he not done so he may never have been dragged into this sorry affair. On November 5th Knox implicated Lumumba in Kercher's murder, claiming to have seen him and Kercher enter the Briton's room that night. It wasn't true, but was enough to secure Lumumba's arrest and detention for two weeks. Knox claims that she lied about him because the police had bullied and struck her – a claim that resulted in her losing a defamation action brought by police.

However, regardless of Knox's role in his fate, police must take some responsibility too. Lumumba's protestations of innocence were ignored by the Carabinieri (Italian police). There was no scientific evidence against him at all and shamefully doubts about his alibi, which was later verified independently, were published by media. Lumumba was freed after two weeks, which coincided with two significant events – the arrest of Guede and corroboration of his alibi that he was indeed working at his bar that night.

Lumumba later successfully sued Knox for defamation and won damages of €40,000. He says that Knox ruined his life. However, doubts remain about why the Carabinieri was prepared to accept the uncorroborated word of a woman they clearly suspected of the murder, or at least involvement in it, especially as they had DNA evidence against both Sollecito and Knox and during Lumumba's incarceration, compelling DNA evidence emerged against Guede. Knox lost her appeal in the defamation case. She remains convicted of defaming Lumumba. She was sentenced to 3 years imprisonment – already served – and a €22,000 fine.

Lumumba lost his livelihood as a result of his wrongful imprisonment. He sued the police for unjust imprisonment and the loss of his bar and was awarded €8,000 in December 2009. That establishes that they were, on any view, at least partially responsible for what happened to him. He decided to pursue a claim for compensation against Italian authorities through the European Court of Human Rights.
There never was any credible basis for suspecting Lumumba, but strangely, given his undisputed innocence, Lumumba remains the most forgotten victim of this sorry affair.

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