Steve Moore’s investigation and media campaign to get Amanda Knox’s murder conviction in Italy overturned seems to be making progress since his first appearances on national TV in September.
Moore worked for 25 years as an FBI investigator working in counter-terrorism investigations and other major crimes. He’s confident in his investigation skills and confident that Knox and her ex-boyfriend Italian Rafaelle Sollecito are both innocent of the 2007 rape-murder of Knox’s flatmate.
Moore and other Knox supporters have gained traction in the international media— such as British newspapers The Guardian and The Telegraph— alleging mishandled and missing evidence abusive interrogation practices and a dangerous prosecutor with a history of documented injustices in other cases.
Moore said he believes Knox an American student studying in Perugia Italy was tried and convicted of the crimes in the media before she ever saw a jury and that’s why he believes he can help her case by fighting her “appeal” in the media as well.
But the pair’s fate doesn’t lie in their “media appeal”; it’s going to be decided in their actual appeal scheduled for Nov. 24. Depending on whether the judge approves the defense requests for further test of evidence the appeal could run for less than a week or drag on for several months.
And despite successes in the media the most recent development in Knox’s legal status is an indictment for slander slated for trial sometime this spring. The charges are in connection with statements she made during trial where she claimed police physically abused her during an interrogation the night of her arrest. If convicted the sentence would be tacked on to her current sentence.
For two years the predominant narrative in the global media went something like this: “Foxy Knoxy the British tabloids nicknamed her, acted in concert with Sollecito and a small-time drug dealer from the Ivory Coast, Rudy Guede, in the bloody slaying of Knox’s British flatmate Meredith Kercher in 2007. It was a drug-fueled erotic game gone gruesomely wrong.
Knox and Sollecito were both convicted in Decemeber, Knox getting 26 years in prison, Sollectio 25. Guede faces 16 years after opting for a fast-track” trial option.
In the official appeal the defense is simply asking the court to reconsider the evidence and give independent analysists a fair shake at refuting the prosecution’s claims.
They believe that an independent investigation of the alleged murder weapon— a 12-inch kitchen knife— would result in that evidence being thrown out on appeal. Defense attorneys say the knife doesn’t match the wounds on Kercher’s body and tested negative for blood and that the prosecution’s forensic expert broke DNA testing protocols.
Further evidence that Sollecito was at the scene of the crime rests on trace DNA found on Kercher’s bra clasp.
The bra clasp was recovered from the crime scene 47 days after the incident and according to the defense this piece of evidence was contaminated. Video of the crime scene shows investigators passing the bra clasp around among them after they retrieve it from the floor. Specks of dust can be seen on the fingertips of their gloves and the defense claims that three unknown DNA profiles were on the bra clasp a further indication of contamination.
The prosecution also claimed during trial the that Sollecito and Knox cleaned the crime scene between 8 a.m. and noon the day following the murder removing evidence they had been there. The defense says there’s no possible way that the two could have removed traces of themselves from the room while still leaving behind evidence of Guede’s presence in the room.
After Moore’s wife watched a TV documentary last year on the Amanda Knox trial she became convinced of the student’s innocence. She told her husband that he should look into it so he did.
At first he said he sided with the prosecutors. After 25 years in the FBI and not a single acquittal on somebody he brought to trial Moore had developed a distaste for criminals proclaiming their innocence. He wanted to prove the police right.
Moore thought she was just “some pretty American girl who got into trouble” and didn’t want to stay that way.
All he had to do he said was prove that police had the murder weapon and that Knox had bought bleach the next day.
When he found out those two key pieces of evidence were problematic he began to dig deeper and unravel what looked to him like a “house of cards” of evidence set up to frame Knox and Sollecito.
While this battle gets played out in the courts Moore’s media campaign is gaining attention in the right areas trying to undo the two years of negative press toward Knox. After an initial series of online articles and appearances on national TV now papers like The Guardian and The Telegraph are picking up what Moore is laying down.
Moore says this is a major step in the right direction because it was the British papers that originally brought the heat on Knox naming her “Foxy Knoxy” and publishing unfounded leaks about the case as facts.
And the media controversy around this case continues to remain divided along dueling narratives. One says that Knox is a sweetheart an innocent and perhaps naïve soul. The other calls her a vindictive murderess.
And there seems to be a cloud of hateful speech that follows all those who come out in support of Knox.
For instance when an article appeared in the West Seattle Herald about Moore’s termination from Pepperdine allegedly due to his involvement in the Knox trial (Pepperdine denies this is the reason he was terminated) a cluster of anonymous comments appeared insulting Moore and his efforts.
“That is justice! It serves him right one anonymous comment read. Next time he will think twice before he helps to promote the murderess’ financial interests.”
And this effort to discredit Knox supporters isn’t coming just from anonymous sources. Knox’s prosecutor Giuliano Mignini has been slapping slander lawsuits on just about everyone who disagrees with his version of the case.
This includes not only Knox but Sollecito’s parents Knox’s parents the West Seattle Herald newspaper for quoting other people saying Mignini is “mentally unstable two defense attorneys, several writers and journalists, and a psychic. There are a total of 12 people reported to be subjects of Mignini’s slander suits.
Mignini’s conduct, however, is not an isolated incident. He was convicted in January for abuse of office. He was sentenced to one year, four months in prison on a suspended sentence pending his appeal.
He was charged with unlawful wiretaps in what the court decided were illegal, freelance investigations intended to harass and intimidate” people who disagreed with him.
His conviction was related to the unsolved murders of eight couples in Tuscany between the years of 1968 and 1985. The case was popularly called “The Monster of Florence and Mignini released a new theory in 2001, suspecting it was a group of 20 people in a demonic cult. Those suspicions were thrown out for lack of evidence.
Mignini also intimidated an American writer and an Italian journalist who were independently looking into the Monster case.
American writer Douglas Preston and Italian jour
nalist Mario Spezi teamed up to write a book about the murders, and during the course of their investigation, they disagreed publicly with Mignini’s theory that it was a satanic cult.
nalist Mario Spezi teamed up to write a book about the murders, and during the course of their investigation, they disagreed publicly with Mignini’s theory that it was a satanic cult.
The Italian officials starting coming down hard on the pair of investigators in 2004.
Preston wrote this in an article on TheWrap.com: They summoned me to an interrogation accused me of perjury obstruction of justice and being an accessory to murder and suggested I leave the country.” He left the next day.
In 2006 police arrested Mario Spezi accusing him of defaming prosecutors through the media attempting to sidetrack the investigation by planning to plant evidence and for involvement in a 1985 murder.
The Committee for the Protection of Journalists wrote a letter in support of Spezi and after 23 days he was released.
Even though Mignini has been convicted of abuse of office he will remain in power until his final appeal has been exhausted.
Moore said he gave Mignini the benefit of the doubt when he started the investigation but as soon as he “realized the evidence was cooked he changed his mind.
He’ll drop people in jail for weeks at a time Moore said. Just on hunches.”
Moore emphasized that this case is not about the United States versus Italy but about a single prosecutor.
“Italy is famous for a better justice system than that he said.