Amanda Knox in Court in Battle With Lifetime Over TV Movie

Lawyers say film caused "irreparable damage" to their client.

ByABC News
July 4, 2011, 10:42 AM

PERUGIA, Italy, July 4, 2011— -- Amanda Knox arrived at Perugia's civil court in Italy today for the second hearing of her case against producers of the TV movie about the 2007 murder of Meredith Kercher; the murder for which she was convicted in 2009.

Her lawyers have demanded that producers of the movie, "Amanda Knox: Murder on Trial in Italy," starring Hayden Panettiere as Knox, block its distribution in Italy and immediately remove all images and video of it from the Internet.

The producers, Lifetime TV, aired the movie in February in the United States despite opposition from Knox, Raffaele Sollecito, her Italian ex-boyfriend who was also convicted for the crime, and Kercher's family.

Today's half-hour, closed-door hearing was adjourned and no date for the next hearing was set. The judge, Teresa Giardino, said she would have to decide how to notify the producers of the TV movie because no legal representative had shown up for the hearing and she would then announce the next hearing date.

Knox's lawyers said in the first hearing in March that the movie had caused their client "very serious, irreparable damage" and are demanding total damages for more than $4 million. They are also requesting that Google and YouTube, both with legal representatives present today, take all clips from the movie off the Internet.

Knox has been in jail in Italy since November 2007 when she and ex-boyfriend Sollecito were arrested and charged with the killing in Perugia of Knox's British roommate, Kercher. Knox was convicted to 26 years in prison and Sollecito was convicted to 25 years in 2009 for the murder.

They have appealed the convictions and the appeal sentence is expected sometime in the fall.

During the first hearing against the movie producers, Knox also criticized the movie, saying, "I'm devastated by this invasion into my life and the way I'm being exploited. … I consider it the pinnacle of the repeated violations by the media against my person, my personality and my [life] story … all these things do not correspond to the truth."

She also said she had been ''very disturbed'' by seeing the film's trailer in prison.

Although dozens of cameras and photographers gathered at the courthouse today to see Knox, the prison van in which she was traveling was backed into a side entrance of the courthouse and she was concealed from view by the prison guards escorting her.

The hearing was declared closed to the media and public and they were blocked from approaching the room where the hearing was being held. Knox's mother, Edda Mellas, and her stepfather, Chris Mellas, were instead allowed to wait outside the room, away from the media, and hugged Knox briefly as they told her they would see her Tuesday on their bi-weekly jail visit.

Earlier today, Mellas appeared in another court building in Perugia for the criminal case brought against her and her former husband, Knox's father, Curt Knox, by five Perugia police officers. Mellas and Curt Knox are charged with libeling police in Perugia in the U.K. weekly the Sunday Times of London in 2009 when they repeated what their daughter told them about her treatment in the Perugia police station before Knox was indicted for the killing.