Amanda Knox Documentary
Amanda Knox is a name many people recognise or know. The reason why she is so well known is because whilst she was participating in a study abroad programme in Italy in 2007, the American university student was accused of killing her roommate, Meredith Kercher, who was doing the same programme but was from Britain. The media went wild, which resulted in the story becoming worldwide news.
Almost ten years later and her story is now a documentary on Netflix. The filmmakers have interviews with people such as Knox, her boyfriend at the time Raffaele Sollecito who was also accused of killing Kercher, one of the journalists who covered the story and the Italian prosecutor in the small town of Perugia.
Although both her and Sollecito have been acquitted of this crime, many people are still questioning what actually happened. This documentary allows these four key people to tell their own stories directly to the camera.
The crime itself is shocking but with this documentary what you may also find unbelievable is the way Knox was treated.
The prosecutor Giuliano Migini suspected Knox of this crime due to her supposed suspicious behaviour. For instance after seeing her and Sollecito kissing outside of the crime scene he said, “They were comforting each other with an affection inappropriate to the moment.” He may feel that this wasn’t appropriate but it in no way should be used as any form of evidence against her. From then on though he seemed determined to get what he deemed as the truth from her, even if this may have resulted in a false confession.
Another key figure in the creation of Knox’s public persona was former Daily Mail and current The Sun writer Nick Pisa. The tables may have begun to turn and he perhaps has now become the villain in this story. For instance, he admitted to not properly fact checking information he was given, saying ”It’s not as if I can say, ‘right, hold on a minute. I just want to double check that myself in some other way.’” However this is exactly what a journalist should do. In the Independent Press Standards Organisation’s Code of Practice, one of the first things it says is, “The Press must take care not to publish inaccurate, misleading or distorted information or images.” Even though the Daily Mail is a member of IPSO, he clearly decided against following the rules, which could have been a major reason as to why this trial turned into a witch-hunt.
Both the media and prosecutors seemed to focus more on making her look bad than actually looking at the facts to find out what really happened and to bring peace and justice for the Kercher family.
With the mix of interviews and footage from when the crime happened it allows viewers a better insight in to what all these different people faced at the time and it may lead you to decide for yourself who you think is guilty or reconsider what you once thought.
Stories like this are important to tell not only for people like Knox and Sollecito but also for Meredith Kercher. So much attention at the time was placed on the roommate accused of killing, not the person who lost her life.
Hopefully this documentary will raise issues of wrongful convictions, sexism in the media but also remembering the young woman whose life was taken away in an awful crime.