Amanda Knox reveals if she sees a way forward with Meredith Kercher‘s family after being wrongfully arrested for her former roommate’s murder.
During an exclusive interview with Us Weekly about her memoir Free: My Search for Meaning, Knox, 37, revealed where she stands with Kercher’s loved ones.
“Both of her parents have passed. Her mother had a heart condition, even back then. I remember one of the things Meredith told me was that she was in very, very frequent contact with her mom because she had a heart condition, and there were concerns about her health,” Knox recalled. “So she eventually passed because of that condition — but then, also, her father very tragically died. All of a sudden, he was walking around his neighborhood and got hit by a car.”
Knox acknowledged how Kercher’s family have faced even more tragedy since the exchange student’s death, adding, “The remaining part of her family is her two brothers and sister. I have no idea what her brothers think about me. I do know that her sister has spoken very publicly about her regrets that Meredith has been lost in all of this story.”
Kercher and Knox’s paths crossed in 2007 when they lived abroad in Italy together. Later that year, Knox was accused of murdering Kercher and sentenced to 26 years in prison after she and then-boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito were both convicted of the crime despite a lack of evidence.
An appellate court then found the former couple not guilty in 2011, but they were again found guilty three years later during a retrial. The Italian supreme court cleared Knox of Kercher’s murder in 2015, and she was exonerated.
Ivorian migrant Rudy Guede was sentenced in 2008 to 30 years for Kercher’s murder after his DNA was identified at the crime scene. His sentence was later reduced, and he was released from prison in November 2021.
“This is something I talk about in my book of how her death became intertwined with my identity. If you ever hear any news about her case, it’s typically with a headline that has my name in it and not hers,” Knox told Us about the aftermath of the high-profile case. “And I am in utter agreement with them about how unfair and wrong that is. So I feel like there is opportunity for a lot of common ground and also a lot of opportunity.”
Knox admitted she remained hopeful about a fresh start with Kercher’s loved ones.
“I still am really hoping to have the opportunity to visit Meredith’s grave — but I don’t want to do that without their blessing because I understand that Meredith belongs to them first,” she continued. “Even though I have a special kind of connection to her — literally because her death is intertwined with my identity — I’m really hesitant to be very direct about talking to them.”
The priority for Knox was respecting Kercher and her family, saying, “You have to be careful because who knows what traumas they might associate with my identity that are no fault of my own — but are nevertheless very real for them. I have made it known from back-channeling and all of that that I would like to communicate with them. But I’m not trying to push them in any way.”
Knox’s complicated feelings about being thrown into the spotlight with her wrongful conviction — and the process of trying to make peace with the scandal — is the subject of her memoir Free: My Search for Meaning. The book, which is out now, follows Knox from the day she was arrested to her current life as a mother of two and an advocate for criminal justice reform.
Despite facing backlash for using her experience to speak out about the rights of the wrongfully convicted, Knox stands firm.
“What happened to Meredith is horrific and traumatic and utterly valid. Also, what happened to me is horrific and traumatic and utterly valid. So when I’m talking about my experience, I am only taking ownership of mine, and I am in no way taking away from hers,” Knox shared with Us. “If anything, I’m trying to shed light on hers because it is constantly filtered through my experience. So while I appreciate that that may be confusing because the narrative that you were fed over the course of your young life was that I am a villain, and therefore everything that I do is at the expense of Meredith — that’s actually just a lie. That is the false narrative that you have been given.”
She continued: “I really try to empathize with that perspective because I write in my book that I have my own survivor’s guilt. Why did I get to survive my wrongful conviction or my study abroad experience and she didn’t? There’s no rhyme or reason to it. It’s just the randomness of life. But the way that I carry Meredith in my life is as a constant reminder of how precious life is and how the truth matters. If she fought for her life, I am going to fight for mine and no one can tell me that I don’t matter.”
Free: My Search for Meaning is out now and keep scrolling for a breakdown of Knox’s mentions of Kercher and how she used her memoir to pay tribute:
Making Peace With the Past
Knox didn’t return to Italy for nearly a decade after her wrongful conviction. In 2019, she returned to give a speech at the Criminal Justice Festival, which allowed her to revisit the home she shared with Kercher.
“Meredith was an integral part of my life. But I think it’s also because I’ve never really had the chance to mourn her. As I quickly learned in freedom, many people thought I had no right to mourn Meredith. They believed that I had something to do with her murder, or that Meredith had been forgotten in the wake of my trials, and that this was somehow my fault,” Knox wrote in her memoir. “Either way, Meredith and I were inextricably linked, and so it was somehow a further injustice that I lived while she perished. To those vocal critics, the only dignified path for me was to disappear and quietly count myself lucky to be alive.”
Knox admitted that she “never wanted” the “burden” of upholding Kercher’s memory, adding, “[It is] one that’s especially awkward considering that I really didn’t know Meredith all that well. But I feel privileged that I got to know her, as briefly as I did, for who she was, and not, like the many millions who know her name, merely in the context of her murder. Meredith remains a central figure in my trauma, but she played no role in the cause of my own victimization.”
Dealing With Criticism
Despite the trip to Modena marking a fresh start, Knox called out the Kercher family’s lawyer, Francesco Maresca, for calling her return “inappropriate.” Knox referred to Maresca as a “jerk” for the public statements he made about her — but she didn’t fault Kercher’s family.
“I don’t blame the Kerchers for the attitude of their lawyer. Like many grieving families in such cases, they were told a comforting lie by the prosecution and their attorneys,” she wrote in her book. “It was extremely frustrating to be yet again accused of traumatizing the Kercher family by speaking about my wrongful conviction and trying to use my experience to bring attention to issues that affects tens of thousands of people.”
Trying to Reach Out
In her memoir, Knox pointed out that she “should have been allies” with the Kerchers since they were both “victims” of Guede and the Italian justice system. She revealed she reached out to Kercher’s family several times over the years via various channels.
“I’ve been reluctant to push more than that because I understand how painful the very idea of me must be to them, especially if they still think I had something to do with Meredith’s murder,” she added. “But whether they realize it or not, we’ve always been on the same side.”
The Acknowledgments
Knox mentioned Kercher at the end of her memoir, writing, “To Meredith (RIP), whose legacy I will never stop honoring, and her family, because I still hope we can share our grief one day.”
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