Amanda Knox 'Satisfied' With Italian Court Ruling

ROME Dec. 15, 2011— -- Amanda Knox is "satisfied" with an Italian court's statement today that demolished the prosecution's case that led to her conviction for murder and four years in an Italian prison.

The judges' comments came in a 143-page detailed explanation of their decision in October to dismiss murder charges against Knox and her then-boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito.

The ruling freed Knox, now 24, and Sollecito, 27, after spending four years in prison convicted of murdering her English roommate Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy. A third person, Rudy Guede, was convicted in a separate trial and has exhausted his appeals.

The Italian judges appear to criticize the "obsessive duration" of her interrogation by Italian police and shrugged off Knox's affectionate antics with her co-defendant in the police station -- used as evidence of her guilt -- as nothing more than "tenderness between lovers."

In one of its most damning passages, the court statement, called a motivation in the Italian legal system, said that Knox and Sollecito were convicted despite the fact that the prosecutor's allegation "was not corroborated by any objective element of evidence and in itself was not, in fact probable: the sudden choice of two young people, good and open to other people, to do evil for evil's sake, just like that, without another reason."

Knox's parents Edda Mellas and Curt Knox issued a statement today saying they were "pleased" that the judges' statement "reiterate and reaffirm what we have known all along, that Amanda had absolutely nothing to do with the tragic and terrible murder of Meredith Kercher."

"Amanda and we are satisfied with the motivations and take heart in the strength of the judge's words and proclamation of her innocence," the statement said.

Prosecutor Giuliano Mignini told ABC News that he has read the court's reasoning, but does not think it is proper for him to comment. Mignini said that he "believes that the chief prosecutor will appeal the sentence." The prosecution has 45 days to file an appeal.

The lawyer for the Kercher family was quoted by the Italian news agency ANSA as saying that the motivations "increase the bitterness" of having the murder convictions thrown out.

The judge's ruling dismantled piece by piece the previous conviction and Knox's 26 year prison sentence.

"The evidence, even if taken in its totality, does not prove in any way that Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito are guilty of the murder of Meredith Kercher" and notes that the evidence was largely circumstantial," the court wrote.

It went on to say that the judges "do not confirm the hypothesis that there were many people necessarily involved in the murder."

The very "bricks" on which the judges in the first trial built their sentence of Knox and Sollecito "fell away," the report said.

Not only did these "bricks" get moved, but there was a "lack of materials necessary for their construction," the judges wrote.

The case against Knox and Sollecito began to collapse when an independent panel of forensics experts appointed by the court challenged the handling and the validity of the DNA evidence used to convict them in the original trial.

The court challenged police tactics during an all night interrogation that prompted Knox at one point to say that she had a "vision" that falsely implicated Patrick Lumumba, a bar owner she worked for. The next morning, Knox tried to retract her statement.

Amanda Knox Court Trashes Prosecution Case

In the report the judges show they are in agreement with Knox's defense, stating that due to the "obsessive duration of the interrogations" it is "totally comprehensible that she would find herself in a situation of great psychological pressure -- which to call it stress would reduce it -- which makes one doubt the actual spontaneity of the declaration."

Knox's statement is evidence of her "great confusion, and not being able to remember what is being asked of her," the court wrote.

"If Amanda Knox had found herself in the house... at the time of the murder, her easiest way of defending herself was to give the real name of the murderer, who was present in the house, because this would have made her credible, rather than give a name of someone who was totally extraneous," the court wrote.

Nevertheless, the court upheld Knox's conviction for slandering Lumumba.

During the first trial and during the appeal, prosecutors highlighted Knox's at times odd behavior, like doing cartwheels in the police station and snuggling with Sollecito while waiting to be grilled by investigators. They were indications of the Knox's icy personality and lack of remorse for Kercher's death.

The judges dismissed those actions as nothing more than "simply tenderness between lovers."