Did Guede's Outburst Hurt Amanda Knox's Case?
Eos alii libris lucilius id, ne quo dicta tritani appetere, sea cu inermis.
PERUGIA, Italy Nov. 18, 2009— -- Just days before lawyers will begin summations in the Amanda Knox murder case, the one person already convicted of the crime appeared in an Italian courtroom today and said he saw Knox leaving the cottage as her British roomate lay dying of a knife wound to the throat.
Rudy Guede was in the Perugia court to appeal his conviction and 30 year prison sentence in the death of Meredith Kercher.
He ended his statement by turning to the lawyer representing Kercher's family and said, "I want the Kercher family to know that I did not kill and did not rape their daughter. It was not me that took her life away."
Guede's appeal is not part of Knox's trial, but in Italy the jury is not sequestered and the Italian press has had lurid coverage of the year-long trial. It comes at a key moment in the procedings. Summations in the case begin Friday.
Prosecutor Pietro Maria Catalani dismissed Guede's account as "not credible" and asked that the conviction be upheld.
Knox's legal team were scathing in their rejection of Guede's account. "Today does not affect Amanda's trial because no one believes Rudy Guede. Guede is not reliable – he is a liar," Carlo Dalla Vedova, one of Knox's lawyers, told ABC News. "Even the prosecutor said this today. He [Guede] has changed his stories."
Guede, 25, has at different times said the Knox, 22, of Seattle, was and was not at the house the night of the murder. At one point, he also implied that Knox's co-defendant Raffaele Sollecito was at the murder scene.
"All Guede can do at this point is just confess and remove two innocent people from this situation," Dalla Vedova said. Lawyers for Knox and Sollecito have suggested that Guede killed Kercher, 21, by himself.
Guede's appeal was held in the same Perugia courtroom where the trial of Knox and ex-boyfriend Sollecito is held. Guede was seated in what is usually Knox's chair flanked by his lawyers.
After the judge read a summary of the case, Guede asked to be allowed to make a spontaneous statement, a courtroom statement by the defendant that is allowed by Italian law.
Guede, a native of the Ivory Coast, spoke of hearing Knox and seeing Knox at the house that Kercher and Knox shared with two Italian women.
