Knox appeal trial allows new DNA test on knife

Amanda Knox’s second appeal trial has agreed to additional DNA tests on the weapon presumed to have murdered her British housemate Meredith Kercher.

The Italian judge has agreed to test one DNA trace not previously examined because it had been deemed too small. A court-ordered review in the first appeal trial discredited DNA evidence on the kitchen knife linked to Ms Kercher.

Italy’s highest court in March ordered the new trial for American student Knox and her former Italian boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, overturning their acquittals in Ms Kercher’s 2007 murder.

The star defendant was absent at its opening. Knox, now a 26-year-old student in Seattle, has not returned to Italy for the trial, nor is she compelled by law to do so. The appellate court hearing the new case could declare her in contempt of court but that carries no additional penalties.

“We refute the idea that because Amanda is not coming, that Amanda is guilty, that Amanda is using a strategy. Amanda always said she was a friend of Meredith’s, Amanda has always respected the Italian justice system,” Knox’s lawyer Luciano Ghirga said before the trial opened.

Knox and Sollecito, now 29, were convicted and later acquitted in Ms Kercher’s death. Knox served four years of a 26-year sentence, including three years on a slander conviction for falsely accusing a Perugia bar owner in the murder, before leaving Italy a free woman after her 2011 acquittal.

The bar owner, Patrick Lumumba, showed up at the trial, saying he did so to underline the damage he suffered from Knox’s false accusations. “I say the same thing I said six years ago. I think she is guilty, and that is why she slandered me,” he said.

Knox’s conviction for slandering Mr Lumumba has been confirmed by the high court, but it asked the Florence appeals court to decide if it should reinstate it as an aggravating circumstance that Knox lied to derail the investigation and protect herself from becoming a murder suspect.