Knox ‘upset’ as postmortem video shown in court

THE US student accused of murdering her British roommate was upset and refused to watch as a graphic video of the postmortem examination on the victim’s body was shown during a closed-doors session in an Italian courtroom yesterday.

Amanda Knox, 21, turned away, burying her head in her folded arms.

Her mother Edda Mellas said her daughter was “upset” and “couldn’t watch”.

The media was excluded from the hearing to “preserve Meredith’s memory and dignity”, said Francesco Maresca, the lawyer for the Kercher family.

Knox’s co-accused and ex-boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito, 25, occasionally looked up.

The pair are accused of murdering Leeds student Meredith Kercher in a sex game that went wrong.

The prosecution allege that Kercher was held by the shoulders by Sollecito while Knox touched her with the point of a knife. The pair deny any wrongdoing.

Prosecutors say a third man, Ivory Coast national Rudy Hermann Guede, tried to sexually assault Kercher and then Knox fatally stabbed her in the throat. Guede was convicted of murder in a separate trial last year and sentenced to 30 years in prison.

Kercher, 21, was studying in Perugia, Italy, and sharing an apartment with Knox. She was found stabbed to death in the house in 2007.

In yesterday’s testimony coroner Luca Lalli confirmed his earlier findings that Kercher died from a stab wound to the neck.

He said it cannot be determined if she was raped, though bruises and cuts on her face, neck, hands and legs suggest violence during intercourse.