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Reflections on the Amanda Knox/Meredith Kercher Case (February 2011)

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Amanda Knox, Original artwork by Hiroshi Mizuno

Tonight, I watched Lifetime Channel’s version of the Amanda Knox conviction. As an international educator, I felt I needed to watch this movie. As a journalist, I have tried to keep my opinion out of my writing.  I have tried to instead focus on what this case has meant for study abroad.

For study abroad, I believe this case should have meant a huge wake up call.  I am repeatedly surprised by how few of my colleagues agree. I have been told on more than one occasion that our role is simply to inform students that local laws preside. But should our job also include giving them a sense of what the local laws could mean in their lives abroad by providing more specific detail?  Is it our responsibility, morally and ethically, to spend quality time explaining the local laws and illustrating the gaps between local laws and that of the home country? Should we also be communicating with parents/guardians about how we would need to work together with clear action steps during times of crises?

Or do we say “not my job.”

Please let me be clear here:  I am not pointing fingers at anyone in this particular case.  I haven’t contacted Ms. Knox’s home school to ask them what they did/didn’t do.  That isn’t the point. Instead, I am here to raise questions about how we, as professionals, might operate in our field and to encourage discussion.

And this case, in my opinion, deserves a lot more discussion.

What happened to Ms. Knox in Italy is something we should ALL be concerned about.  It should have raised a serious discussion about pre-departure information and emergency planning in study abroad.

Let’s face it – At the end of the day, do you want to be sitting in front of the TV and see Hayden Pannetiere playing one of YOUR study abroad students on Lifetime’s Monday night movie?

I sure don’t.

At this juncture, I can’t share my opinion about what I think happened.  Perhaps in the future, but not at this time. Those who know me as a friend and close colleague do know my feelings about the case and will vouch for me when I do eventually write about it.

For now, I can share this: I strongly believe that our field should be talking about what prevents us from talking with our students, in much more detail, about the realities of what can happen in a different legal system.

So, I’ll ask again: How has your campus changed its policies/processes related to emergency and safety planning as a result of the Amanda Knox case? If the answer is “my campus hasn’t,” what would you like to see your campus do differently?

For those of you who want to answer but are afraid of being “identified,” I will simply say that you can comment on this blog anonymously.  Your name will not appear on my website and I will not know who you are, nor will any of our readers.

I invite your feedback.  In fact, I crave a hearty discussion about this case.  I challenge you to have one with me.

(NOTE:  I am referring to the question above – How has your campus changed its policies/processes related to emergency and safety planning as a result of the Amanda Knox case? If the answer is “my campus hasn’t,” what would you like to see your campus do differently? I am NOT asking you to have a hearty discussion about whether or not Amanda Knox killed Meredith Kercher.  She was convicted of doing so and the case is under appeal.  If you want to debate her guilt or innocence, this is NOT the site to do so at – there are plenty of other sites for that, so please visit them instead.)

In closing, I wish peace to all of those involved in this horrific case.  Needless to say, may Meredith Kercher, a reportedly delightful young woman from England who was studying abroad in Italy and brutally murdered, rest in peace.




How Has the Amanda Knox Case Impacted Study Abroad?

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Amanda Knox behind bars

In the US, we are preparing for the Thanksgiving holiday. We’ll be hunkering down in the kitchen, chopping, mixing and baking away.  In Italy, Amanda Knox and her attorneys are preparing for her appeal scheduled for Wednesday.

With Ms. Knox’s appeal quickly approaching, I again began to think about the implications of her arrest and conviction on study abroad program administration.  I recently posed the following question to colleagues in the field: “How many of your institutions (US, non-US) made policy or process changes as a result of the Knox case?”

Let me again state that my role is not to comment on whether or not I think Ms. Knox is innocent or guilty in the murder of Meredith Kercher, a British study abroad student. It is also not to challenge how the evidence was reviewed in a legal system that is different than that of my own country. However, it is important to ask the question so that we may better understand how, as university administrators, we can best prepare our students for an experience abroad and to understand what implications, if any, there are as a result of this rare case.

I had several responses to the question above.  I believe all replies were from the US, although one was from an American who has lived in Italy for 20 years. The majority of respondents confirmed that their institutions have not changed their processes dramatically. Most stated that they continue to provide information about what the embassy ‘can and cannot do’ to assist in the event of an emergency or crime. Some now specifically cite the Knox case as an example of how visitors in a foreign country are subject to local laws.

Interestingly, several commented specifically on the lack of institutional liability in a case like this.  Most agree that we are to simply obligated to share information about the realities of other legal systems and then it is up to the student to choose to make wise or poor choices while abroad.

One person referenced how the behavior of “hordes of drunken American students” abroad can fuel the fire when one is faced with local legal action. We know that the primary issue for our students abroad is their lack of discipline when drinking alcohol. Did visiting American students partying into all hours of the night in Perugia impact the public’s perception of Ms. Knox? No one can say for sure.

There are those who simply say that this case isn’t anything more than common sense – if you commit a crime, expect to suffer the consequences, even if you don’t fully understand them in a different legal system (or your own for that matter.)

The only other recent commentary that I’ve read in the media about this subject – and it may translate well to a young generation who respond to slick and hip blog sites – is this tongue in cheek post called “How Not to Get Arrested When You’re Abroad:  A Foxy Knoxy Inspired Guide” on New York’s Gawker.com.

The reality is that we do have an obligation to notify students about the potential consequences of their behavior abroad. Perhaps that means spelling out for them what can happen in a worse case scenario, using examples like Ms. Knox’s situation.  It may also mean that we need to create a specific process about what to do if you are a witness to a crime scene – such as carrying an emergency card with you at all times, calling your embassy for advice and refusing to speak with anyone until you have legal representation so that you understand the possible implications of your voice and actions.  (Sadly, this also applies to Steve Moore, the ex-FBI and ex-Pepperdine University employee who was fired for allegedly refusing to stop voicing his opinion about the Knox case.)

Wednesday will prove to be a day where the media is humming with news on this case.  It will be fascinating to see what transpires next.




Amanda Knox’s Appeal: Did Mafioso Antonio Aviello Kill Meredith Kercher?

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Amanda Knox

The British news, Telegraph.co.uk, reported today that a man has come forward claiming that his brother, Antonio Aviello, murdered Meredith Kercher in a botched robbery. Interestingly, Luciano Aviello, brother of the Antonio, claims that he notified police three times in 2007 and his evidence wasn’t deemed reliable.

Could this be a turning point in the Knox case?  Mr. Aviello claims that his brother gave him a knife and keys to hide after he showed up at his home on November 1st, 2007.

Here is the article from the Telegraph.co.uk:

“The claim may offer fresh hope to Knox, who in December was convicted of murdering the British student and sentenced to 26 years in prison.

It will form part of an appeal that her lawyers are preparing and that is expected to be heard in the autumn in Perugia, Umbria, where the crime took place.

Luciano Aviello, 41, who is serving 17 years in jail after being convicted of being a member of the Naples-based Camorra mafia, claims that he has evidence that Miss Kercher was killed by his brother, Antonio.

He insists that the two men convicted alongside Knox of the murder – her Italian boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, and Rudy Guede, a local drifter – are also innocent of the crime and should have their jail sentences of 25 years and 16 years quashed.

“It was my brother who killed Meredith on the night of November 1, 2007. Amanda, Raffaele and Guede are innocent,” Aviello told a weekly magazine, Oggi (“Today”).

“I know because my brother confessed to me and asked me to hide a blood-stained knife and a bunch of keys. I hid them underneath a wall, behind my house, covering them with soil and rubble.”

He claimed he could show investigators exactly where the knife and the keys were hidden.

Aviello wrote to court authorities in Perugia three times during the course of the murder investigation and subsequent trial, but his evidence was deemed unreliable.

Now, however, Knox’s defence team are demanding that it be heard as they put together an appeal which they hope could save her from spending much of her adult life behind bars.

In March, her lawyers, Carlo Dalla Vedova and Luciano Ghirga, visited Aviello in the prison near Turin where he is being held and videotaped a statement he made.

They want him to be admitted as a witness when the appeal gets underway.

“Why should he not be considered credible when the prosecution was allowed, during the trial, to call witnesses who turned out to be unreliable, to say the least?” said Mr Dalla Vedova.

The convicted mafioso is from Naples but was living in Perugia at the time of the murder.

He claims that his brother was staying with him in late 2007 and that one night he returned home with an injury to his right arm and his jacket covered in blood.

He alleged his brother and an Albanian man named Florio broke into the hillside cottage that Miss Kercher, 21, shared with Knox and two Italian women.

The Leeds University student was alone in the house, which sits on its own just outside the city’s ancient stone walls.

The men were looking to steal anything of value, but when Miss Kercher saw them, she started screaming.

According to this version of events, Antonio Aviello tried to silence her by putting his hand over her mouth but she resisted and he allegedly ended up fatally stabbing her.

It is not known what has motivated Aviello to point the blame at his brother, although defendants who cooperate with Italian police and prosecutors can often expect their jail sentences to be reduced.

Miss Kercher, of Coulsdon, Surrey, was found lying dead in a pool of blood in her bedroom on the morning of Nov 2, 2007.

Some of her clothes had been removed, and she had several deep stab wounds to her neck.

Antonio Aviello’s whereabouts are unknown.”

What are your thoughts on this turn of events?  Do you think that the court in Perugia is so biased against Knox already that they will not seriously consider this new “evidence?”  How does this impact students who are abroad and considering Italy as a destination?  Please share your thoughts in the comments section.




Amanda Knox interview rumor “inaccurate”

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Amanda Knox sits in court in Italy.

The West Seattle Herald (US) reported yesterday that news out of the UK of an TV interview with Amanda Knox is inaccurate.  (What hasn’t changed, however, is news that Ms. Knox will be in court for a preliminary hearing of the slander charges on June 1st.)

As you can see from yesterday’s post, there are very heated opinions in the comments section about whether Ms. Knox should be in prison at all.

Here is the West Seattle Herald article that clarifies the alleged inaccuracies of the Guardian online article:

UPDATE: Article on Amanda Knox’s TV interview inaccurate

By Steve Shay
May 16, 2010

An article appearing in the British Newspaper Telegraph’s online edition that Amanda Knox will appear on a TV interview is inaccurate, according to Amanda Knox’s stepfather, Chris Mellas, reached in Perugia, Italy by the West Seattle Herald. Such an interview would be of great interest as it would be the first time Knox would have spoken to the public since her murder conviction of her college roommate, Meredith Kercher. Knox is currently serving 26 years in prison for the murder. She is appealing that verdict.

The Telegraph’s reporter, Nick Pisa, writes that Knox will appear on TV, and that one of Knox’s lawyers is against it. She is scheduled to make her first public appearance June 1 when she goes on trial in the slander case, brought based on her accusation that the police hit her during questioning.

“The (Telegraph) article is trying to create a controversy out of nothing,” Mellas told the West Seattle Herald by phone. “This is a non-issue because there was never a June 1 date set for an interview. There was a request for an interview, but it has been denied by the Ministry of Justice. They are in charge of making this decision, not a judge, because the case is sort of in limbo. There is currently no judge assigned. Otherwise it would be up to a judge whether Amanda would be permitted an interview.

“Pisa wrote that one of Amanda’s lawyers, Luciano Ghirga, was completely against the interview and that her family was pushing for it,” added Mellas.

“What really happened was that Amanda wanted to have the ability to speak for herself. As far as her family is concerned, whatever Amanda wants, big deal. Why not? We will support it. When we get a new judge, that judge will decide if an interview is permitted.

“if the judge allows it, we will not receive any money from it.”

The head prosecutor, Giuliano Mignini, who prosecuted the murder trial of Ms. Kercher that landed Knox and her boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito in prison, is scheduled to prosecute a new slander case against Knox. She accused police of hitting her in the head when they first questioned her for 15 hours at the police station. Mignini was in the room during the questioning. The defense is crying foul, and believes such a trial would be unfair as Mignini is trying to pile on more years to Knox’s 26-year sentence she received from his case during the verdict. He had stated publicly he wanted a life sentence for her.

Late edit

On June 1 a preliminary hearing takes place to decide whether there is enough evidence to proceed to trial. All cases in Italy have this process.

“At that pretrial, Knox’s lawyers will ask that Mignini be removed along with (assistant prosecutor) Manuela Comodi, and also the Judge Claudia Matteini,” said Mellas. “They have all been involved in the case. Italian lay states that they cannot be involved in her cases anymore. Italian law states that you can deal with someone only one time, then it has to be a different judge and prosecutor.”




The Amanda Knox/Meredith Kercher Study Abroad Case: A Murder in Italy and the Impact on Study Abroad Internationally

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KnoxKercher_468x341Two young women lost their lives while on study abroad in Perugia, Italy. Meredith Kercher (right in photo), a British student from Leeds University on an exchange program, was brutally murdered inside her new home in Italy only two months into her program abroad. Amanda Knox (left in photo), an American study abroad student from the University of Washington, was found guilty of participating in the crime and sentenced to 26 years. I have no idea if Ms. Knox is guilty or not as I was not there, but I do recognize that losing 26 years of your life if a loss nevertheless, and a particularly sour one if you are eventually found innocent.

Today, newspapers in Europe and the US are ferociously covering this story, some sensationalizing it with tales of a sex game gone wrong, drugs, playful nicknames, dramatic photos and video of family members’ commentary, tears and anger. The Knox family will appeal the decision, the Kercher family will try to move on now that there is a semblance of “justice” for their beloved daughter.

My particular interest in this tragic story is in regards to how the perception of study abroad will be effected, which generally hasn’t been covered by the international press.

Sometime in 2008, a senior administrator at a local university suddenly turned to me at a public event and remarked “I wouldn’t let my kid study abroad – with that girl in Italy being in prison for this long without a trial. Forget it, it isn’t safe to send your kid abroad, even to Italy.” Dumbfounded might have been the appropriate word for my initial response. I pulled myself together rather quickly and simply commented that there was an investigation going on into a young woman’s murder, and that takes time. I think I managed to add that admitting to doing drugs abroad and then not having a clear story of your events that evening (which was in the news at the time of our discussion) was probably not a sound approach for getting out of prison quickly in any country – that and if your “kid” wasn’t doing these things, then perhaps there wouldn’t be any more for a parent to worry about when their “kid” is at home vs overseas studying. Had I not been so thrown off by his question, I hope that I would have mentioned that New York City has been a relatively safe place despite 9/11 and a history of violent crime when compared to other cities around the world , and that thankfully people who still choose to study here recognize that acts of violence and hatred in a place like New York are what should propel us to shove fear aside and venture out in the world to explore truth firsthand.

I’ve reflected on that conversation and recognize that parents latching themselves onto a story like this may result in a specific barrier to study abroad, and this will be of growing concern to those of us who work tirelessly to send our students abroad. The helicopter parent is not a new phenomenon, but will this case bring them out in droves when it comes to program selection and decision making? Or will they even allow their sons and daughters to get to the point of application for a study abroad program? Is this a US issue, or do parents in other regions of the world feel the same need to be increasingly involved in the decision to study abroad? How is this being discussed around the world?

The press has certainly covered the importance of university policy and operational procedures as a result of the Knox/Kercher case. The University of Washington has instituted “The Global Support Project (GSP)” described on their web page as “working closely with the Office of Global Affairs, faculty and staff across all campuses to create a draft university-wide global emergency management plan. The plan will knit together best practices of study abroad programs at both the UW and nationally.” In October 2009, The Seattle Pi news wrote an excellent report on the changes that Knox’s home university made, seemingly in light of her arrest and other study abroad related incidents abroad at other schools, which included tightening up policy and a review of overall process that appears to have resulted in the “Global Support Project.”

This case also highlights the importance of communication between home school administrators and students abroad. The University of Washington pro-actively emailed Ms. Knox to offer advice and support; Ms. Knox replied with an account of what happened when she found out about Ms. Kercher’s death. This email ultimately became part of the legal case in Italy. Legal counsel is increasingly important in cases like these.

Being from such a litigious country, I wonder if the Knox family eventually intends to file any type of suit regarding the housing selection process for this program in Italy. My understanding, and please note that I have not interviewed anyone at the University of Washington, is that the students selected housing in Italy. (If I am incorrect, please feel free to clarify the facts.) Was there something about the location of the apartment that could have left Ms. Knox exposed – for example, I have read that there is a garage down the road that had a reputation for drug deals? I do not know, but it reminds me the importance of knowing who your legal counsel is before making programmatic decisions such as housing.

I’d be very interested in your comments about how parents, students and administrators around the world are reacting to this verdict. Is it business as usual (no one can be safe anywhere in the world)? Or perhaps your university is tackling a safety and communication protocol in light of this case? How are students responding? Will universities directly address this with parents or wait for questions or possibly enrollment figures to come in? Are there trends across regions that we should be noting? Please share your thoughts – this dialogue is not happening across the web and it needs to be discussed.