Headsup: Disney's Hulu -: mafia tool? First warning already sent to the Knox series production team about the hoaxes and mafia connections. The Daily Beast's badly researched Grace Harrington calls it "the true story of Knox’s wrongful conviction of the murder of her roommate". Really?!

Sunday, September 28, 2008

Test Your Grasp Of The Evidence: Locate The Witness’s Apartment

Posted by Kermit

1. Key Location: Signora Nara’s Apartment

The Meredith case is a puzzling and very complicated one, with a talented, hard-working and very appealing girl student, Meredith Kercher, as its sad victim.

Set in an exotic old Italian university town (which normally sees no murders) in another country and under another legal system for most followers. With the main reporting in Italian.

With the victim of one nationality and the suspects of three other nationalities. With limited public information released by police and prosecutors, and with some smoke blown by the defense teams and their enablers.

Analyzing the case based on the public information available at any one time might remind you of peeling the layers of onions. A lot of onions.

Here now is one example of the peeling of an onion. It concerns the evidence of a close neighbor who claims to have heard some telling sounds. Despite some attempts to harass her, the signora and her testimony emerge looking pretty credible.

Signora Nara (her first name) lives in an apartment somewhere above the house of the victim and one of the defendants. She thinks she heard a terrible scream - and then some running footsteps down in front of her apartment somewhere above the girls’ house.

Where her place is really matters because, if she is too far away or at the wrong angle, her evidence becomes a lot less credible.

You need all of these shots to understand her situation. The essential clue as to which one it is is hiding in plain site here.  It was Kermit on the pro-evidence forum (Kermit knows Perugia and has studied the key locations in great depth) who first spotted it, around 10 days ago.The answer is at bottom here.

2. The Various Clues Hiding In Plain Sight

Below: Signora Nara’s apartment is in fact clearly visible somewhere in this shot

Below: The girls’ house cannot be seen from the basement floors of those house

Below: The roof of the girls’ house CAN be seen from apartments one flight up

Below: These are the steel stairs where Signora Nara says she heard climbing footsteps

Below: Again, the steel stairs where Signora Nara says she heard climbing footsteps

Below: The main street south of her apartment; her front door is in a passage left of and parallel to this

Below: This is that parallel passage, here at its west end, emerging (left) onto the stairs by a park

Below: A CBS investigator and a translator in that passage outside Signora Nara’s front door

Below: The CBS investigator and translator again in that passage - at the ground-floor flat

Below: Her bathroom window seen from the parking facility at what is the BACK of her unit

Below: Two shots of Singnora Nara looking to the left and down from that bathroom window

Below: Shot of her on her balcony looking down and to the left - to the girls’ house

Below: Shots of the roof of the girls’ house; they are from one floor above Signora Nara’s

Below: Roof of the girls’ house in daylight from a similar location - not very far away

Below: And its gravel parking area where she claims she heard some of the footsteps

3. And The Vital Clue Is…

Below: The vital clue is this bathroom window - surrounded by an extensive mock window facade

4. And Therefore Her Apartment Is…

Below: The ONLY second-level apartment with a mock facade and balcony is above the trees at center here

A Professional Rates The Perp Walks

Posted by Peter Quennell

How They Shape Up

Someone in the criminal justice profession here in New York been examining the shots of those charged.

They thought about the demeanors, the bearings (to the extent this can be observed), clothing choices, and facial expressions, and whether they compel, for or against.

They informally rate Knox first, so far, Guede second (smart move, that $200 Sean John sweater), and Sollecito at the back of the pack.

And they insist on an interesting hedge: if there are any psychopaths in the group, all bets are off.

Friday, September 26, 2008

The Three Suspects Enter Court For Next Micheli Hearing Today

Posted by Peter Quennell

[click for larger images]

More images on our People Page

Wednesday, September 24, 2008

CCTV Video: Seemingly Unlikely That Meredith And Guede Are Seen Here Together

Posted by Peter Quennell

[click for larger images]

Above: this is possibly Meredith returning home. Below: this is possibly Guede, presumably headed for the house as well..

First, the whole video really REEKS of wetness. Looks like Frank of Perugia Shock gets it wrong once again. All the horizontal surfaces are gleaming. Take a look at the last shot below. The reflection of the car headlights suggests a light rain - still in progress.

Second, the CCTV monitors in our own parking buildings here have a much wider field of view than we are seeing in the video. The video (see the post below) gives the impression of having been zoomed-in for the TV broadcast version - they do that a lot. And it is very compressed.

Three, it is something of a surprise not to see Meredith returning home by way of the steel stairs. That (blue line) is the shorter route for her. What we see here suggests she used the stone steps. Maybe the light is better on that route. Or maybe she picked up a gelato from the gelateria up the top..

Fourth, it is puzzling that Guede arrives from the direction of the steel stairs. That (the red line) is not the quick route down from the kebab place, and he may have had business in the direction of the Chic bar.

Or wanted very much to hide his face en route. For SOME nefarious purpose.

Two more images from the parking-facility CCTV camera.

[click for larger images]

Above: this is possibly Meredith returning home. Below: this is possibly Guede, presumably headed for the house as well.

Tuesday, September 23, 2008

More On The Evil That Was Rained Down On Lumumba

Posted by Peter Quennell

The Tom Kington Interview

Tom Kington of the UK Observer interviews Patrick Lumumba.

Diya Lumumba, 39, was at last week’s first pre-trial hearing in Perugia at which Knox, 21, appeared in public for the first time since her arrest last year. ‘Why did she accuse me?’ he asked. ‘The black is always the killer in films, and I am convinced that is why she named me as her way of derailing the investigation.’

It was November last year when Knox, by then in custody, implicated Lumumba in the killing, telling police he entered Miss Kercher’s bedroom in their shared house on the night of 1 November, while she covered her ears in the kitchen… Police raided Lumumba’s home and arrested him in front of his Polish wife Aleksandra and baby son Davide, saying only: ‘You know what you did.’ Investigators leaked an allegation that Lumumba had entered the isolated house outside Perugia’s medieval walls to ‘possess’ Miss Kercher…

Please click here for more

Monday, September 22, 2008

Collateral Damage: Patrick Lumumba At The Maniacal Hands Of Amanda Knox

Posted by Tara

[click for larger images]

Everyone should “Google” his or her own name. The results are sometimes quite surprising.

You might find yourself quoted at a local political caucus, see your name mentioned in the legal documentation for some past dispute, come across a photo of yourself at a PTA meeting, or even be quoted by someone who didn’t tell you they were writing a story for a local rag!

Usually the results are not life altering, and some of us have no results at all.

Amanda Knox accused bar owner and musician Patrick Diya Lumumba of murdering Meredith Kercher. He was arrested and spent two weeks in jail. He has a wife and a young son, who watched as the police handcuffed him at home early one morning and swept him away in a parade of police cars.

The problem is that he was falsely accused and in fact was not involved in the brutal murder of Meredith Kercher.

To the relief of his family, he was released. Unfortunately, his association with a crime he did not commit has a long electronic shelf life.

Here’s what came up this past weekend in a quick search if you just type “Lumumba Perugia”:

• USA Yahoo Search: 153,000
• USA Google Search: 23,400
• USA MSN Search: 11,800

All of these results associate his name with murder. His young son and wife can “google” their last name and see the results, which are increasing daily because this sensational case is not over.

Le Chic, Patrick Lumumba’s bar, is now closed.

Mr. Lumumba has filed slander charges against Amanda Knox, his accuser. Some have been very vocal about their disapproval of his action. They claimed Lumumba had maybe profited financially from interviews and that he will continue to do so. Their thought is: why hit on a young woman who already has the weight of the world against her and is facing murder charges.

My thought is that when you tell a lie, and falsely accuse someone else of murder, you must be held accountable.

Patrick and his family’s life is changed forever, and not in a good way: not when a search of their name brings thousands of results associated with murder.

Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Outcomes Of The First (16 Sept) Of Six Micheli Hearings

Posted by Peter Quennell

Reports From The Court

[Our emphasis added]

Not decided today: is there enough evidence to indict any or all of the three? But there were some developments:

The Independent reports:

Amanda Knox and Rudy Guede came face to face yesterday with the family of Meredith Kercher, the British student they are accused of murdering in Italy last year…..

Judge Paolo Micheli granted a request for a fast-track trial for Mr Guede [if indicted] who is fearful of a pact between Miss Knox and Mr Sollecito to frame him for the killing…

The family were admitted to the court as civil plaintiffs, as was a Congolese former suspect, Diya “Patrick” Lumumba, 38, who was cleared of any involvement in the crime….

The owner of the house Miss Kercher shared with Miss Knox and others… has also been admitted as a civil plaintiff, and can therefore claim damages if someone is convicted of murder….

It was the first time that Miss Knox, from Seattle, had been seen in public since she was imprisoned last November. Dressed in blue jeans and a white embroidered top, her hair scraped back neatly in a half-ponytail, she was escorted by two female jail guards….

The next hearing is scheduled for 26 September.

And The Daily Telegraph

The judge has yet to rule, however, on whether the case should go to trial - a decision which is expected at a future hearing, probably next month.

Judge Micheli’s First Of Six Hearings To Decide If The Three Must Stand Trial

Posted by Peter Quennell

Not decided today: is there enough evidence to indict any or all of the three? But there were some developments:

Rosa Silverman of The Independent reports:

Amanda Knox and Rudy Guede came face to face yesterday with the family of Meredith Kercher, the British student they are accused of murdering in Italy last year…..

Judge Paolo Micheli granted a request for a fast-track trial for Mr Guede [if indicted] who is fearful of a pact between Miss Knox and Mr Sollecito to frame him for the killing…

The family were admitted to the court as civil plaintiffs, as was a Congolese former suspect, Diya “Patrick” Lumumba, 38, who was cleared of any involvement in the crime….

The owner of the house Miss Kercher shared with Miss Knox and others… has also been admitted as a civil plaintiff, and can therefore claim damages if someone is convicted of murder….

It was the first time that Miss Knox, from Seattle, had been seen in public since she was imprisoned last November. Dressed in blue jeans and a white embroidered top, her hair scraped back neatly in a half-ponytail, she was escorted by two female jail guards….

The next hearing is scheduled for 26 September.

Nick Squires of The Daily Telegraph reports:

The judge has yet to rule, however, on whether the case should go to trial - a decision which is expected at a future hearing, probably next month.

And Tom Kington of the Guardian reports.

The family of Meredith Kercher, the British student murdered in Perugia last November, came face to face with two of her alleged killers for the first time in an Italian court yesterday.

Amanda Knox, 21, the American student who was Kercher’s former flatmate, appeared nervous as she passed photographers outside the courtroom. Rudy Guede, 24, who has dual Italian and Ivorian citizenship, followed her minutes later. Knox’s former boyfriend Raffaelle Sollecito did not attend court, but it was unclear why not. One of his lawyers said he felt unwell, but another claimed the IT student wanted to avoid “a media circus”. All three suspects, who are in custody, deny any wrongdoing.

Yesterday’s hearing was the first of six, after which Judge Paolo Micheli will decide whether to send Knox and Sollecito to trial next year. He accepted a request from Guede to undergo his own fast-track trial which could be concluded by the end of next month.

Tuesday, September 09, 2008

Startling U-Turn: Knox & Sollecito Agree To Truce, Will Now Dump All Blame On Guede

Posted by Our Main Posters

This is from a surprising report from the Guardian’s Tom Kington in Rome:

Claims have been made of a pact between Knox and her Italian former boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito, 24. It is alleged their lawyers have agreed to work together to blame the murder on Rudy Guede, 21, a part-time gardener from the Ivory Coast and the third accused.

Now, Guede’s lawyers are threatening to call for a separate trial for him alone - well away from the legal teams of the other two whom they fear could prejudice his case.

It is a pact, says Guede’s lawyer Walter Biscotti, that can be traced back to July when Sollecito sent Knox a bouquet of yellow flowers on her 21st birthday which both celebrated in prison.

‘There is a clear desire to make Rudy the guilty party, and it’s clear they will try anything,’ Biscotti said.

All three accused deny murder. Knox, or Foxy Knoxy, as she was known at her Seattle high school, shared a flat with Meredith, from Coulsdon, south London, who was studying in the city as part of her degree at Leeds University.

Knox has attracted headlines through a leaked prison diary in which she detailed her sexual escapades and a Facebook page on which she wrote about rape and fantasy. She has also speculated Sollecito, her then boyfriend, could have been responsible.

Knox’s lawyers maintain that bloodstains in the flat and DNA on a knife found at Sollecito’s flat cannot put her at the murder scene.

Sollecito’s lawyers will also question whether his DNA, found on the back of Meredith’s bloodied bra, is conclusive proof of his involvement. He and Knox claim that they were at his flat when the murder took place.

Guede, who fled to Germany after the murder, is the only suspect who has admitted to being in Kercher’s bedroom on the night she died. He states that they were planning to have sex - though he denies rape and murder. He has stated he was using the bathroom when she was killed, claiming Knox and Sollecito had rushed past him as he emerged.

Sensing a campaign against his client, Biscotti may press for the hearings to be separated in the hope Guede will be cleared quickly. It could involve a fast-track trial behind closed doors and a verdict as early as mid-October.

This could mean that Guede is convicted before a decision is made on whether Knox and Sollecito even stand trial.

‘There was a tacit agreement to just work on the defence of your own client,’ said Biscotti of the other legal teams. ‘But it looks like this is finished.’

He points to a recent briefing by one of Sollecito’s lawyers, Giulia Buongiorno, an MP and high-profile lawyer who has previously defended former Italian Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti against Mafia charges, who told journalists that there had been just one killer.

The Kerchers’ lawyer, Francesco Maresca, said: ‘We are holding out for a trial of the other two, even if Rudy is found guilty.’

Sunday, November 25, 2007

Patrick In Mail-On-Sunday: “I Fired Foxy Knoxy For Hitting On Customers”

Posted by Our Main Posters

We are posting this amazing interview by Antonia Hoyle in full a decade later and backdating it because so many vital early reports are awol now.

I fired Foxy Knoxy for hitting on customers

Patrick Lumumba reveals why he was framed over Meredith’s murder

By Antonia Hoyle

Last updated at 13:01 25 November 2007

It was nearly midnight in Le Chic and the three-floor club was heady with excitement.

The crammed dance floor was a flurry of bodies and the queue for the speciality rum cocktails was growing by the second.

Yet in the middle of it all sat barmaid Amanda Knox, whispering sweet nothings to her latest conquest, her chest pressed against his, their mouths just millimetres apart and seemingly unaware of the chaos ensuing around her.

It was at that moment that the club’s owner, Patrick Lumumba, finally realised he’d had enough and told the brash blonde American he wouldn’t be requiring her services any more.

For four weeks he had quietly tolerated her wild mood swings, crass sexual innuendo and complete unwillingness to do any work so terminating her employment was, on the face of it, a wise decision.

It was also, tragically, one that Patrick believes came close to costing him his family, his business and his freedom.

For just a week later, he believes, 20-year-old Amanda took her revenge by framing the 38-year-old Perugian club owner for the murder of her British friend, Meredith Kercher, whose half-naked body was discovered in a pool of blood by police on November 2.

Amanda painted him as a violent sexual predator who had raped the 21-year-old student before savagely slitting her throat and left him to languish in jail for a fortnight for a crime he didn’t commit.

It was only last Tuesday, when police in the picturesque Italian hilltop town discovered DNA found on Meredith’s body belonged not to Patrick but to loner Rudy Guede, that he was finally freed.

Now, in an exclusive interview with The Mail on Sunday, Patrick reveals his feelings towards the infamous “Foxy Knoxy”, and tells how the seemingly quintessential American turned into a tormented monster eaten up by anger towards both himself and Meredith.

“She was angry I was firing her and wanted revenge,” he says. “By the end, she hated me. But I don’t even think she’s evil. To be evil you have to have a soul. “Amanda doesn’t. She’s empty; dead inside. She’s the ultimate actress, able to switch her emotions on and off in an instant. I don’t believe a word she says.

Everything that comes out of her mouth is a lie. But those lies have stained me for ever.

“She tried to play the race card. She thought that by pointing the finger at a black person she’d distract attention from herself. She used me as a scapegoat.

“I’ve never had so much as a fine for not paying a bus ticket before. But now I’ve been branded a cold-blooded murderer.”

Knox is in custody on suspicion of murdering Meredith, along with her Italian boyfriend, computer studies student Raffaele Sollecito, 24, and police have arrested Guede, 20, who has joint Italian and Ivory Coast nationality and was found on the run in Germany.

Her statements to police have changed four times, the only aspect of her complex personality remaining consistent being her extraordinary envy of her friend and room-mate, Meredith.

“Meredith was a natural charmer, a beautiful girl who made friends easily, and effortlessly received attention wherever she went,” Patrick explains, sitting beside his pretty Polish-born girlfriend of six years Aleksandra Kania, 28, and their 19-month-old son, Davide.

“Amanda tried much harder, but was less popular. I didn’t realise it at the time, but now I see that she was jealous. She wanted to be the queen bee, and as the weeks passed, it became clear that she wasn’t. She hated anyone stealing her limelight – and that included Meredith.”

Patrick, who moved from his native Congo 15 years ago when his family opened a chain of clothes stores in Italy, met Amanda and Meredith, both exchange students at Perugia’s University for Foreigners, in late September.

“I’d just opened Le Chic and one of my friends said he knew an American girl who needed work, so I told her to come along to the bar.”

As Amanda, a teacher’s daughter educated at a Roman Catholic school, entered his bar that evening, dressed in flimsy trousers and full of bravado, he decided she’d fit the bill immediately.

“She was open and bubbly, and said she’d bring in more customers because she knew everyone. I didn’t find her attractive, but she was confident about the way she looked. It was almost as if she didn’t need to wear revealing clothes – she thought she was sexy enough as she was.”

The English Language student from Seattle then introduced Patrick to her
new flatmate Meredith, a Leeds University student from Coulsdon, Surrey, who had arrived in August for a year’s stay in the country on an exchange programme.

“Her Italian was poor, but she smiled and commented on the special make of vodka I kept behind the bar. She said she’d used it herself instead of rum when she was a barmaid making mojitos back in Britain,” he remembers.

“I was surprised she was English as her skin was so dark. She told me she had Indian ancestry.

“As she and Amanda headed off to chat with the rest of their group of girlfriends, I thought how close-knit they all seemed. It was a Latin and reggae night, and they danced happily, attracting the attention of all the guys around them.”

The following day he employed Amanda to collect glasses for two shifts a week from 10pm to 3am. But he soon realised she was more interested in making herself available to his male customers than making herself useful at the bar.

“Every time I looked round she was flirting with a different guy,” he says.

“I’d tell her off, she’d smile sweetly and apologise, and be back at it within five minutes. She’d put her mouth so close to her conquests it looked like they were kissing.

“Sometimes, when I tried to get her back to work, the men would become rowdy. Once I was told to mind my own business and butt out of Amanda’s.

“She was always causing trouble.  Even my girlfriend thought she was strange. Whenever she met her she’d death stare her and turn her nose up.

I don’t think she was jealous – she never came on to me. She just felt so threatened by other women.”

Economics graduate Aleksandra adds: “Amanda was so cold. She seemed like a girl who would do anything to get her way, and her man. If she had wanted Patrick I’m sure she wouldn’t have thought twice about pushing me aside.”

As Amanda’s flirtatious behaviour continued, Patrick was faced with a dilemma, knowing that to sack her could generate as much negative word-of-mouth publicity as bringing her in had intended to create.

“I decided to put up with it,” he says. “Even though she’d ask to leave early all the time and got into work late so she could call her American boyfriend. She never told me his name but they seemed very much in love. He sent her presents and she giggled when she mentioned him.”

It was a couple of weeks before Patrick met Sollecito, a doctor’s son from Southern Italy, when he came into Le Chic.

“He was with a couple of friends, drinking rum and pear juice,” he says. “After about four rounds I spotted Amanda flirting with him. Needless to say, I wasn’t surprised.”

What he was surprised to discover, however, was that she had started to date Sollecito. “I’d always thought her flirting was harmless,” he says. “But I couldn’t believe she was two-timing her American boyfriend.”

He next saw Meredith at a party he threw in the club for his employees a couple of days later. “She made everyone two rounds of her special mojitos,” he says.

“She was sparkly and cheery and lifted everyone’s spirits. I bumped into her again in town soon after. I asked her if she wanted to have a spell behind the bar when I next had a female DJ playing, as a kind of ladies’ night.

“She jumped at the chance, although she’d stopped coming into Le Chic, and I heard she wasn’t hanging around with Amanda much either. I wasn’t surprised. The two couldn’t have been more different.”

Amanda, meanwhile, was becoming increasingly erratic. “Her moods started swinging from docile and lazy to hyperactive and flighty.

“I knew she smoked cannabis and it was impossible to predict which one she’d be.

“I told her I’d asked Meredith to come and work for me and her face dropped and there was a big silence. Then she said, ‘Fine,’ and stropped off. I knew then she was extremely jealous of Meredith. She obviously thought she was invading her territory.”

By Tuesday, October 30, his patience ran out. He told Amanda she could carry on handing out club flyers, but could no longer work in the bar.

“She looked at me blankly and walked away,” he says. “The club was busy and I didn’t see her again that evening.”

The next day Amanda attended a Hallowe’en party at the club, knocking back the free red wine. “She was all over two American boys,” Patrick says. “There was no sign of Sollecito and I didn’t see her leave.”

At 3am he locked up and went on to another club, where he bumped into Meredith. “I mentioned the idea of her working for me again,” he says.

“She smiled sweetly and said she couldn’t wait, and she’d bring all her friends back to my club for me.”

That was the last he heard of either girl, until 6pm on Saturday November 3, when a couple of friends walked into his club.

“They asked me if I’d heard that Amanda’s English friend had been murdered. And when they said she was the dark-skinned girl, my heart stopped.”

He called Amanda, who quietly confirmed that Meredith was dead.

“I expected her to be distraught, hysterical and sobbing,” he says. “Surely, just because they’d grown apart didn’t mean she wouldn’t care?

“But instead she sounded weird. Her tone was completely flat and she sounded calm and unaffected. She said she was talking to the police and hung up. I was shaken and sick with sadness.

Things like this just didn’t happen in Perugia.”

Over the next couple of days the murder stunned the town’s 162,000 inhabitants. “It was all we could talk about, and we were all subdued,” says Patrick, who handed out flyers for a candlelit vigil in her memory.

“Everyone became tense and suspicious. Everyone except Amanda, who’d gone into a kind of autopilot mode. I saw her a couple of times and all she talked about was the police, and how stressful the ordeal was for her.”

At 6.30am on Tuesday, November 6, the bell to his fourth-floor flat in the town buzzed insistently and a woman’s voice outside demanded he opened the door.

He had barely had time to do so when the woman, assisted by, Patrick estimates, 15 to 20 others, barged their way in.

“They were wearing normal clothes and carrying guns,” he says.

“I thought it must be some sort of armed gang about to kill me. I was terrified. “They hit me over the head and yelled ‘dirty black’. Then they put handcuffs on me and shoved me out of the door, as Aleksandra pulled Davide away, screaming.”

He was greeted outside by a convoy of seven police cars, sirens blazing, and driven to Perugia’s police station, where he was subjected to a ten-hour interrogation.

“I was questioned by five men and women, some of whom punched and kicked me,” he claims. “They forced me on my knees against the wall and said I should be in America where I would be given the electric chair for my crime. All they kept saying was, ‘You did it, you did it.’

“I didn’t know what I’d ‘done’. I was scared and humiliated. Then, after a couple of hours one of them suggested they show me a picture of ‘the dead girl’ to get me to confess.

“It might sound naive, but it was only then that I made the connection between Meredith’s death and my arrest. Stunned, I said, ‘You think I killed Meredith?’

“They said, ‘Oh, so now you’ve remembered’ and told me that if I confessed I’d only get half the 30-year sentence.”

It wasn’t until 5.30pm that – still handcuffed and unfed – he was shown the evidence against him, a statement from Amanda saying that on the night of November 1 he had persuaded her to take him back to the house she shared with Meredith and two others.

He had then, she claimed, gone into Meredith’s room and raped her before killing her while she sat and listened to the screams from the kitchen. She said he was motivated by revenge after Meredith had rejected him.

“It was only then I realised just how mad she was,” he says. “I had no sexual feelings towards Meredith, and have never cheated on Aleksandra.

“Although I was filled with anger, I was determined to stay calm in front of the police. What Amanda was saying was insane. I have seven sisters and there’s no way I could even imagine hurting a woman.”

Her flawed evidence was, however, enough to keep Patrick in custody, as police feared he, Knox and Sollecito, would flee the country.

His fingerprints and a blood sample were taken and he was put in isolation in a sparse 6ft by 12ft cell in the town’s Capanne prison.

As the days passed police claimed to have further evidence against him, including proof from his mobile phone that he was near Meredith’s house around the time of her death, records of calls to Amanda, whose DNA had allegedly been found on the murder weapon, and a lack of till receipts to substantiate his claim he’d been working behind the bar on the night of the murder.

“I watched the case unfold on TV every day and was shocked by the sordid lifestyle Amanda and her boyfriend seemed to be leading,” he says. “That kind of life was foreign to me and it made me sick that people would think I was involved in some kind of threesome.

“I knew students here slept around, but to hear rumours of sex games with knives shocked me to the core. “As far as I am concerned, anyone involved in them needs psychiatric help. “I’d never even been to their house, and I knew that it was a mistake and I would be released eventually,” he said.

“But the days in prison were my darkest. Aleksandra visited me four times and I received cards of support from friends, but they wouldn’t let me have a picture of Davide or even allow me to change my clothes.”

Aleksandra adds: “I couldn’t sleep when Patrick was in prison. I tried to keep myself together for Davide’s sake and whiled away the hours watching mindless television to try to distract myself.

“I didn’t doubt his innocence for a second, and I tried to be brave for him. When I visited him in prison neither of us shed a tear, I knew we needed to be strong. But we were both crying on the inside.”

Meanwhile, a lack of any of Patrick’s DNA on Meredith’s body and witness statements proving he had been at work forced police to reconsider their original theory and, after 14 days, he was released.

But Patrick is scarred by the ordeal. Le Chic remains closed by the police. He says he may consider suing them after the case is resolved.

He is only too aware that for Meredith’s parents John and Arline, and sister Stephanie, 24, the agony continues. “My heart goes out to them. As a parent myself, I can’t begin to imagine what they’re going through. But I hope they get some peace when the killer is caught. I don’t always think Amanda did it, but I think she knows who did it, and whoever killed Meredith should stay in prison forever.”

He pauses before reflecting on the last time he saw the girl he believes did her damnedest to ruin his life. “It was outside the university library, on the Monday after the murder,” he says. “Despite all my misgivings of her, I wanted to give her comfort and support.

“I told her I was so sorry about Meredith. She seemed completely normal. But she had a nasty look in her eye and simply said I had no idea what it was like to be probed by police for hours on end.

“Well, thanks to her, I know exactly what she’s going through now, and I’ll never forgive her.”